FESTIVITIES: Forget about that big shiny show-off in Rockefeller Center. Tonight the menorah and Christmas tree in Washington Square Park will be illuminated for all. Come bask in the glow of holiday, people. 6pm // Washington Square Park [W 4th St to Waverly Pl between MacDougal and University] // Free FILM: In a week-long tribute to Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini (pictured), tonight The Film Society of Lincoln Center will be screening Notes for an......

If you've seen I'm Not There and are hankering for some more Bob Dylan (the real McCoy, not the Blanchett/Ledger/et al hybrid)...then head over to Lincoln Center sometime today. The man himself won't be there in person, but he'll be there in celluloid at a screening of The Other Side of the mirror: Bob Dylan Live at Newport Folk (which previously played at the NYFF this year). The documentary covers 1963 to 1965, so you'll......

Just a thought as we look ahead to this week's new releases. Someone should really take Diane Keaton aside to tell her that this series of increasingly painful looking romantic comedies where she plays an over-the-top meddling mom aren't good for her cinematic legacy. The newest installment is the Mandy Moore romantic comedy, Because I Said So, where Keaton plays a mother desperate to marry off her headstrong youngest daughter. Please Diane, after loving you......

Get your creepy crawly on with two potentially frightening movies out this weekend. Yet another '80s horror staple is getting the remake treatment with Dave Meyers' The Hitcher. Little do the college couple Grace (the former Mrs. Chad Michael Murray, Sophia Bush) and Jim (Zachary Knighton) know what's in store for them when they pick up John Ryder by the side of the road. Though it would seem clear from his various bad guy roles......

THEATER: It’s Friday night, and what better way to cut loose than an evening of interactive theater – set in plague-ravaged New York City! In All Fall Down, a savage battle rages for the dwindling supplies of the vaccine, but soon a question arises: "Is the cure worse than the disease?" Theatre Recrudescence vows to explore our “post 9/11 hysteria with elements of carnival, clowning and rock and roll.” (All Fall Down is in previews,......

Can you think of a better way to spend part of the potentially crazy-humid next couple of days than with Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx in sweaty Miami? Michael Mann brings his '80s TV staple into the present with Miami Vice, a flick that looks as steamy as its setting. For a less R rating friendly movie goer, there is the animated kids flick The Ant Bully with it's Honey, I Shrunk the Kids and......

Have you seen this trailer? If you haven't seen it in a movie theater, chances are it won't have quite the same oomph. Major kudos need to go to the DreamWorks marketing team for putting together a preview that doesn't even pack its full punch until the words "From Director Woody Allen" pop-up on screen. Everything that comes before looks more like a sequel to last year's Closer than anything Allen has done, certainly in......

Today marks the beginning of the 43rd New York Film Festival, and the program looks to be one of the strongest The Film Society of Lincoln Center has put together in years, beginning tonight with Good Night, and Good Luck, a new film directed by George Clooney depicting the battle between legendary CBS newscaster Edward R. Murrow and Wisconsin Senator and self-appointed commie-hunter Joseph McCarthy. Gothamist has been attending as many of the press screenings......

The Film Society of Lincoln Center has put up the lineup for the New York Film Festival 2005 and it looks, as usual, to be a fun time. Opening the festival is George Clooney's second try at directing "Good Night, and Good Luck" about news reporting in the 50s and the McCarthy hearings ("Have you no sense of decency sir?"). The centerpiece movie is Neil "The Crying Game" Jordan's "Breakfast on Pluto" starring Cillian......

The Film Society of Lincoln Center announced the lineup for the New York Film Festival 2004, and it looks like NY will again benefit from being, arguably, the world's last major film festival by getting films that have played at other festivals by the time the NYFF starts October 1. Opening the festival will be Agnes Jaoui's Look At Me (premiered at Cannes); Pedro Almodovar's Bad Education (also at Cannes) is the centerpiece, as......

There was a time when actual music captured America's attention, versus lip-synced chaos, so Gothamist encourages everyone to take advantage of the excitement around the 40th anniversary of the British invasion - when Beatles came to America, landing at JFK. The Daily News has a fabulous guide to Beatles happenings in town this weekend, including: • The Museum of Television & Radio's Beatles exhibit. • Makor will be showing Yellow Submarine tomorrow night. • The......