Thurs. Feb. 25 & Fri. Feb. 26

 Once upon a time, animation was cartoons and cartoons were for kids. Or so a lot of folks thought. But just like comic books weren't just Donald Duck but the Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers, there was always an animated underground and that's what "Spike & Mike's Sick & Twisted Animation Fest" was been doing for, gulp, 33 years. It's up this year at the Regent Theatre in Arlington. We think the title tells you what you might need to know and you should be aware a few gross-out gags could be involved.  You know what that means: animated gross-out gags,from quirky hand-draw stuff to more elaborate computer generated animation. "Spike and Mike’s" is the longest running festival of its kind, and has played a major role in helping the animation medium become one of today’s most popular facets of mass entertainment. Note: the Oscar created for animation, the popularity of "Shrek" and the sequels, "Up," and dozens more. This year, Spike & Mike adds spice to the "S&T" event with another series, “New Generation of Animation,” which focuses on the flat-out best, funniest, hippest, and most sophisticated animated shorts the world has to offer.

 Sun Feb. 21

Last call! My experience in Harry Potter land is, I must confess, limited. I saw the first movie, I've read no books. Figured it was for kids a long time ago. Wrong. It became a cross-generational mega-success. Not having taken the dive I can pretend no deep knowledge. But curiosity ... yes. And with the "Harry Potter" exhibit up at the Museum of Science through Feb. 21, I wanted to go and see if there was magic there. Well, it was rather delightful, after you get over the crowds, and there sure are a lot of Potter artifacts - many replicas on sale on the gift shop. (Yes, I wondered how Harry Potter - being about magic and all - tied in with science, but that's a topic for another day.) At any rate, I wanted to go with someone who was a Potter fanatic, and Dana Tambeau, 28, fit that bill. She'd read every book, saw every movie (to date), and helped me negogiate the tricky terrain of this house and that house and who was good and who was bad. All of the stuff. And she filed this report ...

I stumbled onto Harry Potter by accident. I hadn’t paid any attention to the whole Harry Potter craze at first thinking it was just some stupid fad for kids to enjoy and parents to loathe. Then one year for Christmas my father bought the first four books for my younger brother. I was home for Christmas break and had nothing to do so I picked up book one and that was it for me. It was such a fun and cute tale I couldn’t help picking up the next one and then the next one. Within a week I had read the first four books of the series. I couldn’t wait for the fifth one to come out. Sadly for me I had to wait for about a year. Since then I eagerly awaited each new book of the series and actually felt a small sense of loss when I read the final one. Happily I still have two more movies to see, so my Harry Potter experience isn’t quite over yet. If you haven’t read the books or seen the movies give it a shot. Sure there is plenty of teenage angst and sometimes silly magic experiences but it’s more than that. It’s a story of bravery, loyalty and above all love. What could be better than that?

Thurs. Feb. 18

Jonathan Richman: The coolest, nerdiest rocker to emerge from Natick. That, and, well, a whole lot more. He was there picking up on the Velvet Underground's cues in the early '70s with the Modern Lovers, putting ironic, sometimes dark twists on throbbing, minimalistic rock 'n' roll. And then he turned his back on that sound and band - although he re-formed different versions. Richman has been noted, really, since the 1980s for his whimsical, light, acoustic-based music. Music not without wit or occasional bite mind you. But Richman - who plays the Middle East Upstairs, three nights, concluding Thurs. Feb. 18 with percussionist Tommy Larkins - has embraced the ethos of Neil Young's "I Am A Child," which is in no way a negative thing. That's a song of trying to be able to see the world through a child's eyes, to yearn for an optimism that seems so hard to find sometimes.   Tix: $15. He's on at 8. There is a reviewof Tuesday's show  up at www.bostonherald.com/entertainmnent  and in the Herald today, Thursday.

472 Massachusetts Ave., Cambriddge, 617-492-0082 www.ttthebears.com

Sat. Feb. 20

    "I’m a huge fan of Metallica," said violinist David Garrett, on the phone from his New York home. "They have a strong sense of rhythm. They’re incredibly talented players and the pieces they write are very symphonic." Garrett’s eponymous CD, his first American release, begins with the last, frantic movement of Vivaldi’s "Summer" from "The Four Seasons" concerto. Next up, Metallica’s "Nothing Else Matters."

     Garrett – a handsome former model with long blonde hair and tattoos – looks like a rock star.     But that’s not how he grew up. Garrett - who plays Berklee Performance Center tonight Feb. 20 at 8 -  started playing violin at age four. Considered a child prodigy, he never cared for the term much. It implied that he was born a genius, and did not have to put in the hours.

    Garrett said his parents did pressure him, but "every morning I woke up and picked up the violin by myself. There was a deep love for the music and the instrument. There was inner drive."

  ongoing

We live in a short attention span age. Shorter by the minute. I've been saying this for a while now, and with the Twitter generation twittering madly about nothing (mostly), the trend has only accelerated. Bad news I suppose for websites like this for where we occasionally - ok, always - go past 140 characters, but, what are you gonna do? The Coolidge Corner Theatre and The Sundance Art House Project is taking films for the short-attention span era - ten of the 91 short films screened at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival - and bringing them to Coolidge Corner Theatre. (There'a about a dozen other art house theaters around the country also participating.) What's on tap? We especially want to see "Love You More," a 15 minute film by Sam Wood about two teenageers drawn together in the summer of '78 by the Buzzcocks (in photo) song of the same name. We love (still love the Buzzcocks) and have the melody in our head as we're writing this. And the thought, well, those teens could have been me except I was into my 20s already. Other films?