Editorial

Jews in American baseball, flood victims in the Netherlands and Russian musicians in Paris are among the subjects of movies in the 15th Annual Stony Brook Film Festival, opening on Thursday at Stony Brook University.

Although its offerings are global, said Alan Inkles, the founder and director, this year’s festival is among his smallest. Only 33 films, 4 fewer than last year, are being shown, culled from 750 submissions, he said.

“We feel we’ve done the work for the audience,” Mr. Inkles, 50, said. “They trust us that we’ve picked the best films.”

Most of the 15,000 people expected to attend the 10-day festival, he said, are Long Islanders, not industry insiders. “They don’t want to miss any of the films.” So he eliminated two afternoon sessions that had been sparsely attended, after reducing screenings several years ago to one at a time. All are held in the main 1,000-seat auditorium of the Staller Center for the Arts.

Peter Miller, who directed and co-produced “Jews and Baseball: An American Love Story,” said the Stony Brook festival, where his documentary will be shown next Sunday, has “become one of the festivals that people talk about and care about.” A seasoned filmmaker who has worked with Ken Burns and taught at Columbia University, Mr. Miller, 48, said his movie, narrated by Dustin Hoffman, was “not just about sports or baseball.”

“It’s a history of Jews in America, about a mistreated immigrant group that finds its way into the mainstream through America’s most iconic institution, which is baseball,” he said.

“Five Star Day,” a first feature written, directed and produced by Danny Buday, “just took my breath away,” Mr. Inkles said. Mr. Buday, 33, said his movie followed a young man who tracks down three other people born on the same day and in the same hospital that he was, in order to test the claims of astrology. His tale was inspired, he said, by “an ex-girlfriend who was into astrology.” Among its stars are Jena Malone and Cam Gigandet ( “Twilight” ).

The festival opens with two Dutch dramas, “The Storm” and “Bride Flight,” both directed by Ben Sombogaart. The first takes place during the devastating North Sea flood of 1953, and the second is about young Dutch women who join their fiancés in New Zealand after the flood. Part of the closing program is “The Concert,” a French-Romanian-Russian feature, about a classical concert in Paris organized by a band of misfits, that Mr. Inkles called “very, very funny.”

The Stony Brook Film Festival runs July 22 through July 31 at the Staller Center for the Arts, Stony Brook University. Festival passes, $75. Single tickets, $9; students and seniors, $7. Information: (631) 632-2787 or stonybrookfilmfestival.com.