UCI SERIES TO GIVE FILM VIEW OF CHILDREN

The UC Irvine Film Society will screen nine films spanning 33 years and representing seven countries in its fall film series entitled “The Eyes of Innocence,” which looks at life from the perspective of children.

The series opens today with Martin Bell’s 1985 American documentary “Streetwise,” which was nominated for an Academy Award as best documentary for its striking portrayal of young runaways living among the drug dealers and prostitutes in downtown Seattle.

On subsequent Friday nights, films by such acclaimed directors as Francois Truffaut, Hector Babenco and Volker Schlondorff will be screened.

Truffaut’s 1959 Cannes Film Festival winner “The 400 Blows” will be shown next Friday, followed on Oct. 17 by Miguel Littin’s “Alsino and the Condor,” a 1982 collaborative work among Nicaragua, Mexico, Cuba and Costa Rica.

The oldest work in the series is French director Rene Clement’s 1952 film “Forbidden Games,” which will be shown Oct. 24. “Peppermint Peace,” screening on Oct. 31, is a 1983 work by West German director Marianne S.W. Rosenbaum about a small girl who is befriended by an American occupation soldier who is arrested.

In “The Father,” which will be shown Nov. 7, Hungarian director Istvan Szabo focuses on a young boy who creates romanticized memories of his father but is forced as he grows up to accept the truth. Another Oscar nominee, director Kohei Oguri’s 1981 film “Muddy River,” will be shown Nov. 14.

Brazilian director Hector Babenco, whose 1985 film “Kiss of the Spider Woman” became an international hit, is represented on Nov. 21 with the screening of his 1981 film “Pixote.” After a one-week break, the series concludes on Dec. 5 with Volker Schlondorff’s 1979 film “The Tin Drum,” in which a 3-year-old boy decides to remain a child for the rest of his life to avoid the adult world of sex, violence and Nazism.

All films will be shown in the university’s Social Science Hall at 7:30 p.m., although there will be an additional screening of “Streetwise” today at 9:30 p.m. Tickets are $2 for UCI students and $3 general. For more information about the series, call (714) 856-6922.