Noir City Seattle @ SIFF Cinema Downtown

Winter in Seattle is a fitting setting for films with shadowy figures, mysterious intentions and seductive intrigue. If you need inspiration for your dark and cynical aura, or your femme fatale allure, or the way your singing voice captures the attention of a stranger across a dingy night club, here it is. Through the middle of February, the Film Noir Foundation will present Noir City Seattle for its 18th year at SIFF Cinema Downtown, screening 15 films that represent keystones of the genre.

Classic noir is tight and efficiently paced, staying plot-driven while still hanging on the juicy moments you look for — the romantic tension, the long draws on cigarettes, the pauses in the snappy dialogue. And the movies being screened will run around 90 minutes — they aren’t three-hour whoppers, for those of us who appreciate Scorsese but just can’t hold it for that long anymore. The event is programmed by Film Noir Foundation founder Eddie Muller, sometimes called the “Czar of Noir.” He’ll host the opening weekend, while Seattle author Vince Keenan will host Monday through Thursday.

You’ll see familiar faces on screen, too. In “King Creole” (1958), screening on Feb. 17 at 8:45 p.m., Elvis Presley stars as a teenage night club singer dragged into crime by a crooked businessman. In “A Man Called Adam” (1966), screening on Feb. 15 at 12:30 p.m., Sammy Davis, Jr. is a self-destructive and talented cornetist and appears alongside Louis Armstrong, Ossie Davis and Frank Sinatra Jr.

A $150 pass admits you to all 15 screenings, but individual tickets are $20 ($15 for kids). Eddie Muller and the Film Noir Foundation hold events like this annually to prevent classic and worthy films from slipping through the cracks and being forgotten. They have saved dozens of films since their founding. You can enjoy a multi-night movie marathon, and contribute to this preservation, at SIFF Cinema Downtown between Feb. 13 and 19.