Friday Happenings

Movies

-- As close as you can get to a real-life Bond villain this side of Vladimir Putin, Yukio Mishima had it all: ambiguous sexuality, a private army, a secret hideaway, ambitions to overthrow the Japanese government, and, of course, the perfect cover as an author and perpetual Nobel Prize also-ran. The HFA launches its Paul Schrader retrospective with his biopic Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters (1985). The man who wrote Taxi Driver found a lot to love in Mishima's life, and the film is widely considered his directorial masterpiece. Score by Phillip Glass. Schrader appears in person. Havard Film Archive, Carpenter Center, 24 Quincy St., 7 p.m. $8/$6.

Jazz

-- The ICA's New Music Now series continues with experimental vocalist Shelley Hirsch, who will use Bernard Hermann's film scores as a substrate for her autobiographical art music, and the Theo Bleckmann/Ben Monder duo, who perform a fusion music that the ICA likens to "jazz art song." Institute of Contemporary Art, South Boston, 7:30 p.m. $25/$20.

Shorts

-- The Boston Underground Film Festival presents the work of Carey Burtt, a New York filmmaker with a taste for the dark absurd, serial killers, and psychics. His showcase, called Films that Hurt Feelings, might instead leave you feeling dirty. Space 242, 242 E. Berkeley St., South End, 6 p.m. RSVP required.