For the second installment of this celebrated series of articles, I have decided to celebrate the awesomeness of Seattle International Film Festival, or SIFF to those of us in a hurry. On Friday, August 29, SIFF will kick off the 1 Reel Film Festival (which they curate for Bumbershoot) in their plush SIFF Cinema, located in McCaw Hall. In honor of this great event, I took SIFF into consideration for this article, to parse out its most awesome moments.

SIFF could easily claim the title of awesome with just one fact: the movie Alien world premiered at SIFF. I think this fact pretty much sums up how much I love SIFF. Did you world premiere Alien in your basement? No, that was SIFF, and SIFF is awesome. They also premiered countless other iconic films, such as Donnie Darko, Last Days, Braveheart, Poltergeist, Trainspotting and Return Of The Jedi (next, they should premiere a movie that’s a cross between all of those, about Kurt Cobain as a ghost Jedi who has 30 days to save Scotland before the world ends).

SIFF is definitely awesome for being the largest film festival in America, spanning the entire city of Seattle for 24 days. They also play amazing movies year-round at “SIFF Cinema (like black and white spy movies, the original Godzilla, and The Neverending Story). But SIFF’s most awesome moment comes with curating the 1 Reel Film Festival. Yeah, I know that seems like a cop-out, since I work for the ‘Shoot and all, but think about this: they’re hosting a short film festival inside a giant national music and arts festival. It’s a festival within a festival—like Russian nesting dolls. If you can’t step back and appreciate the awesomeness inherent in that, then you’re just too cool for school.

And if you’re not impressed by the very presence of a festival within a festival, then check out the film offerings (SPOILER ALERT: they’re all awesome as well). I happened to watch a few, including the hyper-cute John and Karen, an animated short where a polar bear is apologizing to a penguin for his past, probably cute, transgressions. (ADORABLE TIME!) Or maybe you’re more in the mood for Rubberheart, a romantic short that turned from funny to bizarrely sweet in a matter of seconds. Or there’s always Parachutes, a compact tale in the “Meaning Of Life” program featuring a heartbreaking funeral for a batch of toy soldiers, overseen by a child genius and a philandering husband.

That’s just the start. The films are divided into 27 programs, each an hour long (featuring a total of 126 films from 24 countries), including my two favorites thus far “Love And Marriage” and “The Twilight Zone.”

So for those reasons (and my own desire that one day with SIFF’s continued success they will merge my two favorite programs to create “Love and Marriage In The Twilight Zone”), I am awarding Seattle International Film Festival (and the 1 Reel Film Festival) with the title of Awesome. Maybe I will have a plaque made up, and present it to SIFF during Bumbershoot. But it’s hard to present a plaque to a festival… Maybe I’ll just make a certificate instead and tape it to the doors of SIFF Cinema. Either way, Congratulations, SIFF!