FOR THE LOVE OF FUNNY

Thursday, Oct. 24, 7 p.m.
JCC Theatre, $9

A successful short film walks the delicate balance of ending before you're ready, but leaving you sated -- and for the most part, that delicate balance holds up in this collection of women's shorts. The perfect voiceover and hilarious animation of Boobie Girl () will leave the hearts of flat-chested ladies pounding in fright while the more, er, endowed sisters nod knowingly. Bar Talk () is a cleverly executed snapshot of a bar pick-up -- then reconstructed with instructional diagrams and text “for the lesbian impaired” -- and watch closely, because according to the credits, hot Hollywood commodity Maggie Gyllenhaal cameos.

Ballet Diesel

Ballet Diesel () pirouettes on the edge of silly, but ends up wearing its tutu on its sleeve, and you can't help but laugh along with the joke. The Seamstress () is an exercise in the bizarre, but it's over in nine minutes and leaves the viewer rooting for the underdog. Uncle Bar's Barbershop () is a sobering piece, in Japanese with subtitles, but it's ultimately beautiful and touching with amusing twists. It's hard to tell what the point of lesbianfilm () is, unless it's simply to give us a glimpse behind the scenes of lesbian filmmaking, or the struggle to get there, but at least the ladies seem to be having a good time. Make a point to get popcorn and soda during Pussies from Outer Space (); beyond the most bizarre-humored silent films fan, this one is too strange for most of us to enjoy. Also featuring The 10 Rules (A Lesbian Survival Guide), not provided for review. -- KC