The third annual Newark International Film Festival (NIFF) opens this Wednesday evening at sunset in Washington Park, across from 33 Washington St. with “Besouro,” a 2009 Brazilian martial arts film. The screenings continue every Wednesday through Sept. 28. It is all free with a spectacular and varied lineup of films. All you need to bring is your interest and a lawn chair or blanket.

The film festival is a co-production of the Commons Community Development Corporation and the Washington Park Conservancy, two interwoven not-for-profits behind the very popular Wednesday lunchtime farmers markets in the park.

Newark native son Derek Ware — he grew up in Weequahic and attended Science High — is the dynamo behind the festival and the revitalization of street life in Newark through the arts.

A few weeks ago, Ware, who lives downtown and teaches economics and business at Essex County Community College, was enjoying an espresso at Mi Gente Café where I was talking with artist Mansa Mussa about his current photography show, “Cuban Diary #6, Reverence.” Ware and my chance meeting was exactly the kind of arts centric occurrence that Ware envisions for Newark.

“Downtown Newark is poised to be the next Williamsburg; already artists are finding other Brooklyn neighborhoods too expensive,” Ware said. “Newark has four great cultural institutions: the Newark Public Library — I assign books and my students are wowed by the architecture and art there, the Newark Museum, NJPAC and WBGO jazz radio. We have college campuses and more students living in the area. We need to extend the library, museum, performing arts into the texture of city — to open the doors, to make cultural connections, to create an environment where people are out on the street enjoying and walking to art galleries, cafes, and more.”

Ware sees film in the park as one of the ways to bring more people downtown, especially at night. Historically, people from all over the area came to the great Newark movie houses.

“The inventor of motion film, Reverend Hannibal Goodwin, lived less than one mile from our movie location,” Ware said. “Newark once had 45 movie houses showing films including international foreign films.”

The long success of the Newark Black Film Festival — drawing capacity crowds from the city and the metro area — was another of the inspirations for the NIFF. “We start our screenings the week after the final Black film festival show,” Ware said.

As to the lineup, in August, the opener “Besouro” is based on a legendary 1920s Brazilian capoeira fighter trying to improve the lives of the oppressed Black population of Northern Brazil. Successive summer weeks include “I Will Follow,” about a cancer death and family tensions and the British “4123,” a thriller involving four girls and a diamond heist by famed director Noel Clarke, the creator of “Kidarthood” and “Adulthood.”

September opens with the gripping French-Arabic Canadian film “Incendies,” an unforgiving look at the contemporary slavery and the trafficking of young Sudanese girl into the London sex trade by the award-winning director Denis Villeneuve and the team that created “Death of a President” and “The Last King of Scotland.”

Then there are two films set against the events of 9/11: “My Name Is Khan,” exploring a Muslim with Asperger’s Syndrome who is detained after 9/11. “Brick Lane” tells of a young Bangladeshi Muslim woman’s self discovery after an arranged, loveless marriage to a much older London man.

The festival ends with “Sita Sings the Blues,” a retelling of the story of the Hindu goddess Sita and her abduction, from the classic epic “Ramayana.”

As to Washington Park, Ware sees capital development as the next step. “Right now, we are using an inflatable, temporary screen,” Ware said. “We want to reconfigure the park to include the infrastructure for a movie screen.

“When I was a kid, you had to get suited up to come downtown; it was an event. We want to create an environment where people who live, work or study in the city — or who once lived here and are now in the suburbs — want to come back.”

The Newark International Film Festival opens at sunset each Wednesday night from Aug. 10 through Sept. 28. Admission is free. Bring your own chair or blanket and picnic. Drinks and food available for purchase. For more about the line up, www.NewarkInternationalFilmFestival.com is coming soon; promoters may call