SEPT. 8-NOV. 10

Achtung, Frau Direktorin! Austrian director Leontine Sagan dishes out smoldering kohl-lined glances and stolen bow-lipped kisses between mistress and student in her 1931 film Maedchen in Uniform (pictured, with In the Street at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 22), part of the National Museum of Women in the Arts’ Filming the 20th Century: Visions From Women Directors film series. When young Manuela arrives at an aristocratic girls’ boarding school thick with oppressive Prussian discipline, the young Frþulein falls hopelessly in love with her gorgeous female teacher. The steamy tale was banned by the Nazis for its bold anti-authoritarianism, but it should please modern audiences keen on power games. Somewhat less controversial is Ruth Orkin’s Little Fugitive (with Ruth Orkin: Frames of Life at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 20), a black-and-white flick from 1953 that Franáois Truffaut declared an inspiration for the French New Wave. Its kid-centric journey through childhood’s jungles has Nouvelle Vague written all over it, and photographer-turned-filmmaker Orkin lends each frame the street smarts she gleaned from her years photographing New York City and its denizens. The film’s early sequences, shot in Brooklyn streets teeming with boys in thick denim and Converse All-Stars, are a sharp introduction to 7-year-old Joey. But when the young protagonist goes on a day trip to Coney Island—complete with extended action sequences on carousels, bumper cars, and pony rides—Little Fugitive looks like a series of amusement park postcards strung together in a big whirl of cotton eye-candy. The series also includes Lois Weber’s silent drama The Blot (with The Lost Garden: The Life and Cinema of Alice Guy-Blachþ at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 8) and Shirley Clarke’s gritty docudrama The Cool World (with Go! Go! Go!- at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 10). At the National Museum of Women in the Arts, 1250 New York Ave. NW. $5. For reservations call (202) 783-7370. (Jessica Dawson)