Quick, Good, and Good for You

Let's face it: A film festival sponsored by a women's nutrition bar might seem a little ... well, flaky. Luckily, Lunafest is just as gender-neutral as its tasty soy-based namesake, catering specifically, but not exclusively, to women. Though the touring minifestival's theme is "By ... For ... About Women," the featured short films promise something for every breed of film buff, male or female.

"Velvet Tigress"

For the third year in a row, Lunafest is being locally sponsored by Reel Women, a nonprofit arm of Women & Their Work. The group, dedicated to supporting amateur and professional female filmmakers, is slotted to screen local work for 15 minutes.

Though all the films concern women, the variety of forms and subject matters protects against any desire to pin down a collective ethos among the filmmakers. Jen Sachs' "The Velvet Tigress" fuses documentary and animation to retell the Winnie Ruth Judd "Trunk Murders" trial through the voice of the yellow press. A Jewish grandmother and lingerie shopkeeper discusses the changing needs of her clientele in the lighthearted short "A Good Uplift" (get it?).

One short, directed by Terri Edda Miller, approaches a traditional feminist theme with tongue-in-cheek humor. Like Ann Sexton's fairy tale poems, "Dysenchanted" poses the idea that the lives of such fabled heroines as Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Goldilocks, and Red Riding Hood might not be so picture-perfect. Miller puts the characters in a group therapy session and lets them vent.

Our favorite offering, however, is the immaculately titled "Wet Dreams and False Images," a documentary short by Jesse Epstein. Dee Dee, a barber and self-proclaimed "booty expert," is introduced to the art of media manipulation. Will Dee Dee renounce the booty-related iconography that plasters his shop's walls? Find out when Lunafest rolls into the Stephen F. Austin this Sunday at 3pm. Admission is $10 and benefits the Breast Cancer Fund. For more information, see www.reelwomen.org.