SpiFF-Mini: Catch a taste of cinema Oct. 26

Over the past few years, the Spokane International Film Festival — for which I serve as a member of the board — has tried to be more of a presence than a several-day-long festival in February. Through such programs as the Professor's Series, and the occasional partnering with such venues as the Magic Lantern and The Bing Crosby Theater, SpIFF has attempted to make its brand better known.

Which was one of the reasons behind the formation of SpiFF-Mini, a series that began last week with a showing of the film "Dead Show 2: Red Vs. Dead" and continued Monday night with "Purgatorio: A Journey into the Heart of the Border," a meditative 2013 documentary about the U.S.-Mexican border by Mexican director Rodrigo Reyes.

SpIFF-Mini will conclude at 7 p.m. Oct. 26 at the Magic Lantern with a screening of "The Return to Homs," another 2013 documentary, this one following two young men caught up in the Syrian conflict. Directed by Talal Derki, the film — wrote the Hollywood Reporter — "should endure as a viscerally direct, consistently informative account of how participants experience the hazards, tedium and lethal thrills of urban combat, and as a portrait of young men radicalized and energized by their circumstances."

"The Return to Homs" will be introduced by Kristin Edquist, a professor of government at Eastern Washington University. For more information, go to the Magic Lantern or SpIFF websites.