Having a film fiesta by MATTHEW HAYS Local film connoisseur Adrian Gonzalez is launching his second annual crusade to bring Spanish-language cinema to Montreal. Ciné-Fiesta, which features an impressive collection of Latino celluloid, runs today, Thursday, April 15, through to Sunday, April 18. "We did quite well last year," says Gonzalez, whose day job is a film publicist. "So many people came up to us and thanked us for doing the festival, for bringing smaller films from their countries to Montreal. This year has definitely been just as hard as last year to put together, because we still don't have any money. But I think that, overall, this year's lineup is better." Ciné-Fiesta still operates entirely without grants, relying on fundraising parties throughout the year to fill its coffers. Gonzalez says the move from Concordia University to the Goethe means less seating capacity, but adds that "we have more screenings of the films this year, so we're hoping to match last year's numbers." (Over 2,000.) Fest fodder includes Courage, Alberto Durant's biopic about El Salvador women's rights crusader Maria Elena Moyano; Hitting Bottom, Enrique Gabriel's profile of the developing friendship between two down-on-their-luck men who meet up in the streets of Madrid; and Thanks for the Tip, Francesc Bellmunt's poignant slice-of-life story about two struggling orphans. Fest info: 523-3515. Congratulations go out to Montreal filmmaker Jean-Marc Vallée, perhaps best known for his 1995 feature Liste noire. His short film, Les Mots magiques, a gripping drama about a man's confrontation with his alcoholic, deadbeat father, took the best drama award at the prestigious Aspen Short Film Festival in Colorado last week. This award makes the film automatically eligible for a nomination at next year's Oscars. The film also won a Jutra for best short last March. Though Vallée won't be in the director's chair this time around, an American-backed, English-language version of Liste noire is scheduled to begin shooting in Montreal in late May. And for those who need a big-screen reminder of the talents of dyke director Rose Troche, Montreal's Image&Nation gay and lesbian film festival is presenting a once-only fundraising night tonight (April 15), when they will screen the hilarious, outrageous 1994 feature Go Fish. Guinevere Turner plays a lonely lesbian desperately seeking Ms. Right. The screening begins at 7 p.m. at the Parisien. $6. The Goethe Institut begins its annual celebration of German national cinema next week, and this year organizers promise that the films presented will be heavier than in previous years. This may sound odd, as most tend to associate Germans with the dire and obsessive visions of auteurs like Fassbinder, Wenders and/or Herzog. But German films in the '90s took a rather despairing turn into the realm of the light and comic. Some of these films, like Doris Dorrie's Men, still had redeeming qualities. But the success of that film led to plenty of cheap knockoffs, leaving German cinema with a reputation as being lightweight and ultimately missable. Stay tuned: this year's anthology, which runs until June 4, will offer more onscreen meat. COMMENTS: matt_hays@babylon.montreal.qc.ca