FILM

FROM THE PAGE TO THE SCREEN Before turning to filmmaking, Olivier Assayas was best known for his critical contributions to the influential French film magazine, Cahiers du Cinéma. Then he thrust aside the writing habit in favor of directing. Anthology Film Archives honors the filmmaker with a retrospective. Mr. Assayas introduces a Saturday night screening of “Irma Vep” (1996), which draws from the silent film work of Louis Feuillade and the bombastic sensibility of Hong Kong cinema. In the movie, a French director casts an Asian lead actress (Maggie Cheung, playing herself), and quickly becomes infatuated with her, as does a costume designer who follows her around Paris. Other featured actors include Jean-Pierre Léaud and Nathalie Richard. Saturday, 7 p.m., Anthology Film Archives, 32 Second Ave. at 2nd Street, 212-505-5181, $8 general, $6 students and seniors, $5 members.

ART

SCRATCH THE SURFACE The new works featured in Elliott Puckette’s exhibit at the Paul Kasmin Gallery are the products of a laborious artistic process: Ms. Puckette covers her canvases in a gesso primer, then either covers the canvas in black ink and etches through the ink to expose the white gesso underneath; or etches straight into the gesso, filling the canals with black ink to create a work with a white background. From afar, her etchings seem like spontaneous paintings covered in whimsical doodles; in fact, each line has been painstakingly carved in. Through Saturday, February 23, Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m., Paul Kasmin Gallery, 293 Tenth Ave. at 27th Street, 212-563-4474, free.

YOUNG AT HEART Khalif Kelly makes his New York debut with his first solo exhibit, “Recess.” The images recall the artist’s early childhood interactions and the rituals that make those experiences memorable, if a bit awkward. Through Sunday, February 10, Wednesday–Sunday, 11 a.m.–6 p.m., Thierry Goldberg Projects, 5 Rivington St., between Chrystie Street and the Bowery, 212-967-2260, free.

MELVILLE IN MINIATURE Art 101 presents an exhibit of paintings and essays by Jane Freeman, inspired by Herman Melville’s “Moby Dick.” Ms. Freeman is best known for her intricate miniatures, some of which are also on view. Highlights of “Melville, Miniatures, and More” include two 19th-century theme pieces that were created exclusively for this show: “The Spouter Inn; The Creaking Sign” and “The Spouter Inn; The Patchwork Quilt.” Through Sunday, February 17, Friday–Sunday, 1–6 p.m., or by appointment, 101 Grand St. at Bedford Avenue, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, 718-302-2242, free.

FAMILY

THE PLANT DOCTOR In “The Life and Work of George Washington Carver,” the New York Botanical Garden celebrates the remarkable career of this botanist and researcher who in the 1800s was one of a relative few black Americans to achieve prominence and social recognition. After cotton crops were devastated by disease and insect damage, Carver taught former slaves how to plant alternative crops, such as peanuts and sweet potatoes. He also created the Jesup Agricultural Wagon, a mobile school manned by Tuskegee University faculty who set out to educate farmers. The botanical garden is housing this exhibit in its Everett Children’s Adventure Garden, where a re-creation of a Jesup Wagon is featured, as well as “lab” experiments focusing on the various uses of the crops Carver espoused, and an opportunity for children to examine and diagnose sick plants. Friday, 1:30–4:30 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday, 10 a.m.–4:30 p.m., through Friday, February 22, dates and times vary, NYBG, 2466 Arthur Ave. at 200th Street and Kazimiroff Boulevard, the Bronx, 718-817-8700, $13 general, $11 students and seniors, $5 children (2–12 years), free for members and children under 2.

FILM

LOOKING FORWARD The Brooklyn Israel Film Festival opens at Kane Street Synagogue with “Souvenirs,” a documentary about director Shahar Cohen’s exploration of his father’s wartime past. Mr. Cohen’s father served in the Jewish Brigade of the British Army during World War II, traveling from Italy to the Netherlands. In the film, the Cohens take to the same road again, together. Habitually distant, father and son explore the complexities of their relationship for the first time with the backdrop of the past. They also confront the possibility that the elder Cohen may have left living “souvenirs” in Amsterdam — with two different Dutch girls. The festival also presents Oded Davidoff’s “Someone to Run With,” about a teenager in the Jerusalem underground, on Saturday at 8 p.m. Director Yaron Zilberman appears on Sunday at 7 p.m. for the screening of his film, “Watermarks,” about the champion women swimmers of Hakoah Vienna, an entirely Jewish athletic club that existed before World War II. Saturday, 8 p.m., Sunday, 7 p.m., Kane Street Synagogue, 236 Kane St., between Court and Clinton streets, Cobble Hill, Brooklyn 718-875-1550, $10 per film.

FORD REMEMBERED The Museum of the Moving Image presents “John Ford at Fox,” a retrospective featuring a selection of the 50 films the director made for the studio during the first half of the 20th century. The series features the three films Ford and Will Rogers made together, including “Doctor Bull” (1933), in which Rogers plays a small-town doctor whose honesty leads him to attack a local construction tycoon, and “Steamboat ‘Round the Bend” (1935), starring Rogers as a medicine peddler and the owner of a floating wax museum on a Mississippi riverboat. This weekend, moveigoers can catch a screening of “Wee Willie Winkie” (1937). The film is based on a Rudyard Kipling story, and features Shirley Temple as a girl in India who saves an entire regiment (Saturday, 2 p.m.). “Drums Along the Mohawk” (1939), Ford’s first color film, is a Revolutionary War tale about a homesteading couple dealing with emotional hardship in the bucolic landscape of the Mohawk Valley. It stars Henry Fonda and Claudette Colbert (Sunday, 2:30 p.m.). Saturday and Sunday, times vary, through Sunday, February 24, Museum of the Moving Image, 3601 35th Ave. at 36th Street, Astoria, Queens, 718-784-0077, $10 general, $7.50 students and seniors, $5 children.

MUSIC

SOME KIND OF WONDERFUL The Town Hall launches its 2008 concert season with Richard Nader’s third annual “Doo Wop & Rock N’ Roll Reunion.” The program highlights golden oldies such as Charlie Thomas and the Drifters, whose gospel-inspired beats produced hits including “Under the Boardwalk” and “Saturday Night at the Movies.” Other concert selections featured during this musical stroll down memory lane include Kenny Vance and the Planotones’ doowop classics “This Magic Moment” and “Some Kind of Wonderful”; and Frankie Lymon’s Legendary Teenagers’ “(Why Do Fools Fall in Love).” Friday, 8 p.m., 123 W. 43rd St., between Sixth Avenue and Broadway, 212-307-4100, www.ticketmaster.com, from $35.

PHOTOGRAPHY

PRECIOUS MOMENTS Nicholas Nixon’s latest portraiture series, “Patients,” was completed over a three-year period, with Mr. Nixon visiting three hospitals in the Boston area and photographing patients, suffering from serious illnesses, and their families. Mr. Nixon is best known for his ongoing collection, “The Brown Sisters,” in which every year since 1975, he has photographed his wife and her three sisters. Through Saturday, February 16, Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m., Yossi Milo Gallery, 525 W. 25th St., between Tenth and Eleventh avenues, 212-414-0370, free.

TALKS

FINE PRINT The Brooklyn Museum Library hosts “Walt Whitman: Librarian & Printer’s Devil,” a lecture by poet and librarian Jeffrey Croteau about Whitman’s years as a printer and the acting librarian of the Brooklyn Apprentices’ Library. A featured part of the Brooklyn Museum Library anniversary lecture series, the talk highlights Whitman’s relationships within the printers’ community during his apprenticeship years. Saturday, 3 p.m., Brooklyn Museum Library Reading Room, 200 Eastern Pkwy. at Washington Avenue, Brooklyn, (718) 638-5000, free.

WE ARE WHAT WE EAT For many New Yorkers, bagels and lox are synonymous with Jewish cuisine. But the boiled, doughnut-shaped piece of bread and the salty salmon are only the tip of the knish where Jewish food is concerned. The author of “Jewish Eating and Identity” (Routledge), David Kraemer, gives the Henry N. Rapaport Memorial Lecture, tracing the rich history and eating habits of Jews. The talk borrows from Mr. Kraemer’s research, which has focused on gastronomic explorations of customs and dietary laws dating back to the Holy Land and Babylonia (Iraq), through 20th-century Germany and Poland, and recent traditions in America. The author also highlights those who broke custom and created their own hybrid traditions. Monday, 7:30 p.m., Jewish Theological Seminary, 3080 Broadway at 122nd Street, 212-280-6093, free with reservations.

PAINTINGS

ALL MIXED UP Chris Martin’s abstract paintings showcase a diversity of styles: Some of his works, such as “August Afternoon, 11 Munn St., Walton, N.Y.” (2007), feature a thicket of bold, swirling lines, while others, such as “Broom Painting” (2007), seem to be vague renderings of landscapes. “Glitter Painting” (2007), above left, and “Samuel Palmer” (2007), above right, have luminous qualities that evoke the netherworld of an artistic imagination. Through Saturday, March 1, Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m., Mitchell-Innes & Nash, 534 W. 26th St., between Tenth and Eleventh avenues, 212-744-7400, free.

To submit an event for consideration for the Calendar, please wire the particulars to calendar@nysun.com, placing the date of the event in the subject line.