Your invite to a birthday bash at the Digital Gym

A few days after the red carpet was put in mothballs comes a reminder that the San Diego Latino Film Festival doesn’t end following its annual two week run.

Lisa Franek, program director at the Digital Gym, continues to bring art and independent films to of the Media Arts Center’s cozy, on-site screening venue which celebrates its first birthday on April 12.

Since cutting the ribbon one year ago, the Digital Gym has showcased over 130 films.

You are all invited to the party on April 12 from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m. There will be screenings of films made by the MACSD’s Youth Media Tech Camps and Teen Producers Project, raffles, music, and much more.

Look for So Right, So Smart, a documentary “about the unexpected advantages of corporations implementing green initiatives” to show at around 3:30 pm. A reception will be held from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m., followed by a screening of the Mexican crowd-pleaser, Tercera Llamada starring Fernando Lujan and Irene Azuela.

Here’s just one reason to visit the Gym prior to the gala. The Zigzag Kid, a first-rate family film for children of all ages, opens this week. If your kids are old enough to read subtitles, don’t deprive them of this wonderful adventure comedy starring Burghart Klaußner (The White Ribbon) and the ex-Mrs. Martin Scorsese, Isabella Rossellini. And for the adults in our audience who might have missed Zigzag when it played the San Diego Jewish Film Festival, I humbly submit a far more challenging and entertaining experience than any of the live-action crap Disney has been peddling the last 30 years.

Happy birthday, Gym, and thanks for the exposure to a lot of movies that might otherwise never have hit our radar.