The Hi Mom! Film Festival (see page 23) isn't the only cinematic happening going down in the Triangle. It's the first weekend of the month, and as always, a few noteworthy films are popping off on screens around town.

Where would the month's first Friday be without the Natural Horror Picture Show over at the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences? Tonight, it's the 1958 film "Monster From Green Hell," starring future "Dallas" patriarch Jim Davis and future Jennifer Jason Leigh mom Barbara Turner as inhabitants of an African jungle filled with radioactive wasps-turned-mutant monsters. It starts at 7 and it's as free as can be. Details: 733-7450 ex. 379; www.naturalsciences.org.

If you prefer your horror a whole lot gorier and nastier, then skip on over to the Colony for its monthly midnight movie on Saturday night. This month, it's Stuart Gordon's famed 1985 freakshow "Re-Animator." It starts at 11:59 and admission is $5. Details: 847-5677; www.myspace.com/colonytheatre.

The N.C. Museum of Art will get all artsy with its outdoor-cinema screening this evening. The museum will be giving props to Ingmar Bergman by showing his 1957 filck "The Seventh Seal." You know, the one with Max von Sydow in a high-stakes chess match with Death. It starts at 8 and admission is $3 (free to museum members, children 6 and under). Details: 715-5923; ncartmuseum.org/events/summermovie.shtml.

By the way, on the second Thursday of each month, the Open Eye Cafe in downtown Carrboro will host free preview screenings of the latest films from PBS' "Independent Lens" series. This Thursday, the first film shown will be "Chicago 10," Brett Morgen's hybrid documentary on the maverick protesters who raised a historic ruckus (and went to trial for it) at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. The film will be immediately followed by a panel discussion. It starts at 7. Details: 968-9410; www.openeyecafe.com.

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