Not all relationships were meant to last, so after a quick coupling last year with the High Falls Film Festival, the Rochester International Film Festival - a/k/a Movies on a Shoestring - is once again single and ready to mingle. The world's longest-running event devoted exclusively to short cinema, RIFF celebrates its 51st installment in 2009 by offering another line-up of pocket-sized documentaries, narratives, and animation, both homegrown and far-flung, with places like Brazil, South Korea, and Iran in on this year's action. Admission is free, though donations are always appreciated. For a complete lineup of films, visit rochesterfilmfest.org.

Thursday

The festival opens with "Room in New York," a nicely designed piece that juxtaposes an interpretation of Edward Hopper's 1932 painting with a real-life romance. Danielle Hagan's powerful lead performance thankfully distracts from the stock characterizations found in "Purge," the story of a teenager who finds heartbreaking refuge in an eating disorder as a way to deal with years of abuse at the hands of her stepdad. With its lofty narration and majestic music, the animated "Skylight" takes a tongue-in-cheek look at those suddenly ubiquitous documentaries about the environment as it marches with a tribe of googly-eyed penguins. Anyone curious as to what might happen once you part with your quarters will appreciate South Korea's "Mr. Vending Machine," which combines live drama with computer animation to tell the tale of two lonely souls that bond over the law of supply and demand.

Friday

The resourcefully shot "Alternative" uses a nifty split-screen device to explore one distraught man's choice while in the throes of an unbearable grief. Judy Molner, who recently rocked the Irish Community Players' "Faith Healer," stars in Lindsay Berkebile's melancholy "Harold Please" as an optimist wrestling with unrequited feelings for a man who covets another, "Rear Window" style. Filmmaker/songwriter Dave Puls' "Thanks to the Whistleblowers" sets collage-like animation to a folk song that name-checks people like Deep Throat, Karen Silkwood, and Bunnatine Greenhouse as it pays tribute to those who stick their necks out to expose the wrongdoing of the powers-that-be. A happy couple goes up against Sun Tzu-toting bad guys in "Interpretation," an intense short with surprisingly decent fight choreography that illustrates the various lessons to be gleaned from "The Art of War."

Saturday afternoon

A 30-year-old man makes his own arrangements after being given a week to live in the darkly funny Brazilian short "Before It's Gone," but no one seems to believe him or even care, which causes him to think more about life than death. Natural performances and unflinching imagery highlight "Open Your Eyes," a beautifully acted drama that observes as a breast-cancer survivor gains perspective from a candid new friend as she and her scared husband try to cope in the aftermath of her mastectomy. The clever "Written Off" follows the travels of a pencil through the high-school halls before it finds its ultimate purpose. That enduring myth about turning into a tree after swallowing a cherry pit is irrefutably proven in "The Best Man," goofy, profane fun from Florida State University's Justin Lazernik about a wedding gone wrong

Saturday evening

"Animated American" is the politically correct term for a cartoon character as well as the title of this flawlessly crafted animation/live-action noir that re-imagines Hollywood as a place where ‘toon actors are getting their revenge as the industry moves to cheaper CGI. The gonzo Mexican auteur Alejandro Jodorowsky might feel a kinship with "Butterflies Die in Snow," a surreal road movie from Iran about two filmmakers who come across a series of illogical scenes as they search for inspiration in the mountains. "A Voice from the Lantern" is a soapy melodrama about a despondent Japanese woman planning to return home in an irreversible way and the peep-show regular who tries to save her.

RIFF saves its best for last with Sou Yun Sim's hilariously imaginative "My Four-Inch Precious," another selection from the ever-reliable FSU Film School that stars the incredibly game Owen Provencher (you may recognize him from 2007's super-silly short "Caress of the Creature") as a garbage collector who falls for the lilliputian beauty that pops out of a magic tulip. Just a bit risqué, "My Four-Inch Precious" shows that size really does matter. So sorry about that...

Screens Thursday-Saturday at the Dryden Theatre

rochesterfilmfest.org