Elizabeth Barret's Stranger with a Camera, screening at the Rural Route Film Festival (Photo: Hans Luxemberger)

This weekend's worthwhile cinematic diversions around New York:

--The 2005 Rural Route Film Festival officially started yesterday at Anthology Film Archives, but you only missed Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man, which you have seen (or at least slept through) a couple of times already. As per usual with this fabulous event showcasing films about rural life around the world, the real fun kicks off on the weekend. This year's festival features four short-film programs (including one from Europe and something called "Hens, Drugs 'n' Techno"), live music and Q&A's with virtually all of the feature filmmakers whose works are featured. The highlight of 2005 has to be the screening of Joseph Anderson's grim and extremely rarely seen (i.e. once every 30 years or so) Appalachian drama Spring Night Summer Night, preceded by Elizabeth Barret's documentary Stranger With a Camera. Judging strictly by its title alone, the closing-night feature BBQ is a Noun could be worth a try as well.

--Tonight at 7:30 in Prospect Park, the Celebrate Brooklyn movie and music series continues with a restored print of Lon Chaney's 1925 adaptation of The Phantom of the Opera. Cambridge's Alloy Orchestra--whom Roger Ebert once referred to as the best silent film accompanists in the world--provides the score, while Finnish folk sextet Kaiku open the evening with a set of their own. I have never heard either group's music, but it cannot possibly be worse than Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom. No way.

--Jonathan Nossiter's acclaimed winemaking documentary Mondovino screens Sunday at the Stony Brook Film Festival, followed by a panel discussion about the challenges small winemakers face in today's agribusiness climate. Nossiter will be around to talk, which is great, but there is also a wine tasting afterward, which will probably be even greater.