SpIFF 2015: It all begins tonight

Way back in 1999, when it was still being called the Spokane Northwest International Film Festival — and went by the rather droll acronym SNIFF — what was to become the Spokane International Film Festival was a small affair.

Sponsored by the Contemporary Arts Alliance, and the dream child of the late Bob Glatzer, SNIFF began as a collection of — as Glatzer once described it — "films only from the northwestern United States and western Canada."

Here's how I described that first festival in a column I wrote for The Spokesman-Review: "(The) two-day festival boasted four films: Don Hamilton's little-seen adaptation of Sally Nemeth's play 'Holy Days' and films by three Canadians, Mina Shum and Bruce Sweeney of Vancouver, British Columbia, and Gary Burns of Calgary, Alberta."

In previewing that year's opening-night movie, Chinese director Ning Hao's "Mongolian Ping Pong," I wrote that "the film won't appeal to all filmgoers. Yet Ning's refusal to provide us easy answers is precisely what makes the film so heart-wrenching." And, I added, "It's what makes it the perfect festival film."

I've been to a lot of film festivals, both in the U.S. and abroad. I even once served on a festival jury (in Kosovo). And so I have a pretty good idea of what a "perfect" film festival is. And I can tell you this: It isn't a festival that gives you films only to "like." It's one that gives you films that provoke you, that engage you, that educate you and that, in their best moments, invite you to question your own basic assumptions.

That's what all movie-watching means to me, but it particularly applies to SpIFF. This year's festival begins tonight at 7 at AMC River Park Square with a screening of the Spanish film "Vivir es facil con los ojos cerrados" — or, in English, "Living Is Easy With Eyes Closed." It will be followed by the opening-night reception at nearby Kress Gallery.

This is the 17th edition of SNIFF/SpIFF. Be great if we could experience at least 17 more.