Short films don’t get short shrift

The L.A. Shorts Fest ’09 has attracted a lot of star power.

The 13th annual festival, which begins tonight at Laemmle’s Sunset 5 Theatre and continues through next Friday, features shorts directed by Courteney Cox, Demi Moore and Scarlett Johansson. Among the opening-night offerings are Cox’s “The Monday Before Thanksgiving” and Johansson’s “These Vagabond Shoes” with Kevin Bacon. Moore’s “Streak,” starring her daughter Rumer Willis, screens Friday.

The largest short film festival in the world will include 300 screenings, educational panels, coffee chats and guest speakers. www.lashortsfest.com.

Gutsy females

In the 1960s and ‘70s, women directors such as Doris Wishman, Stephanie Rothman and Amy Holden Jones ventured into the grindhouse film world. The UCLA Film & Television Archive celebrates these heroines of the low-budget cinema with its “No She Didn’t! Women Exploitation Auteurs” retrospective. The festival begins Friday evening at UCLA’s Billy Wilder Theater in Westwood with 1973’s female prisoner colony thriller “Terminal Island,” directed by Rothman, who will appear at the event.

Scheduled for Monday evening is a Wishman double bill: 1965’s “Bad Girls Go to Hell” and 1966’s “Another Day, Another Man.” The retrospective will continue on various days through Aug. 30. www.cinema.ucla.edu.

Tiki time

The American Cinematheque’s Egyptian Theatre goes native with its annual “Enchanted Tiki Weekend Blow Out.”

The South Sea winds blow into the Egyptian on Friday with a double bill of the 1950 Esther Williams musical “Pagan Love Song,” which also stars Howard Keel and a young Rita Moreno, and the 1962 melodrama “Diamond Head,” with Charlton Heston, Yvette Mimieux, James Darren, France Nuyen and George Chakiris. Nuyen will introduce “Diamond Head.”

A big luau dinner is in store on Saturday along with live music, dancers and vendors. The enchantment continues Sunday with the 1961 drama “The Devil at 4 O’Clock” with Frank Sinatra as a cynical convict, Spencer Tracy as a boozed-out priest and Barbara Luna as a blind native girl. Luna will introduce the film. Preceding “Devil” will be a tiki-themed clip show.

On Sunday, the Cinematheque’s Aero Theatre presents the restored 70-millimeter version of Jacques Tati’s 1967 comedic masterpiece, “Playtime,” starring Tati as his alter ego, Monsieur Hulot. The scene in the restaurant is the highlight of this clever, funny movie. www.americancinematheque.com.

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susan.king@latimes.com