Shorts, 6/17.

Richard Roud on Robert Bresson, Jonathan Rosenbaum on Walt Disney, Tom Milne on Carl Theodor Dreyer and more: Doug Cummings offers a few choice excerpts from a great find, Cinema: A Critical Dictionary, at filmjourney.org.

"If this column saves even one person from watching another 90 minutes of a reality-based show - or leads to one more Frida rental tonight - my mission on Earth will be complete." But Gary Dretzka's talk with composer Elliot Goldenthal in TV Barn about his award-winning and "wonderfully imaginative" score for that film - and about the San Francisco Ballet's production of Othello - is a lot less flippant than that snippet might make it sound.

Speaking of Othello: "Actor William Marshall, who played a variety of roles, from Shakespeare's Othello on stage, to Blacula in the camp movie classic, has died. He was 78."

Well done, Marilyn Berger. Her obit for Hume Cronyn in the New York Times: "He said he found film easier than the stage, but less satisfying. Nevertheless, he said it was necessary to accept lucrative film parts if he and Miss Tandy were to do plays off Broadway at wages that barely paid for the car rental to get them to the theater, no less the food and the rent."

"Part playground and part hands-on gallery, the Ghibli Museum is designed with a sense of fun in mind, but its exhibits also give inquisitive minds plenty to wonder about." Dawn Matus tours Hayao Miyazaki's "living fantasy" for the International Herald Tribune. Also: Leiji Matsumoto and Daft Punk's hour-long space opera, Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem, is to be released on DVD in December. Both stories via Anime News Service.

The Iron Giant, The Third Man, Ballad of a Soldier. Just a few of the films that make men cry - by their own admission. The Couch Pundit rounds up the confessions. And adds one of his own: Robin and Marian. As it happens, I saw that one myself on an airplane many years ago. I was in the midst of a, how shall we say, romantically stressed situation. And I just bawled. Right there on the plane. Terribly, terribly embarrassing, but you know how, as with laughter, when you try to suppress tears they tend to come on all the stronger, with a terrible vengeance? Yep, that's the way it was. Shudder to remember it now.

Short shorts:

Cat Soup, directed by Tatsuo Sato and described by ICv2 as "Hello Kitty On Acid," is to be released in September;

The Independent interviews Gael García Bernal;

Screen Daily: "Hou Hsiao Hsien to direct Ozu homage";

Emma Thompson: "Why in this world do we find money for war when we are faced with the Aids virus - the greatest threat to human existence in our history?";

T3 stuff: Producer Gale Anne Hurd profiled, Arnie interviewed and Stan Winston, too;

John Patterson on John Cusack;

Mel Gibson and theologians call a truce - for now;

and Patrick Goldstein on the waning of the AFI.

Online listening tip. Thekit.org interviews artists, critics and musicians. A little over halfway down their audio page, you'll spot an interview with Michael Snow who talks about Wavelength, of course, and the relationships between experimental film and painting on the one hand and with Hollywood on the other.



Posted by dwhudson at June 17, 2003 7:11 AM