Weekend shorts.

"[Michael] Moore's real test will come on the issue of accuracy," writes Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times. The New York Times senses that as well, and has sent Philip Shenon to look into it:

[I]f Fahrenheit 9/11 attracts the audience Mr. Moore and his distributors are predicting, Mr. Moore may face an onslaught of fact-checking unlike anything he - or any other documentary filmmaker - has ever experienced.... After a year spent covering the federal commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks, I was recently allowed to attend a Hollywood screening. Based on that single viewing, and after separating out what is clearly presented as Mr. Moore's opinion from what is stated as fact, it seems safe to say that central assertions of fact in Fahrenheit 9/11 are supported by the public record (indeed, many of them will be familiar to those who have closely followed Mr. Bush's political career).

Shenon then goes on to detail just how Moore and his team are preparing for that onslaught: a "war room" is prepared to hit back with "instant response to any assault on the film's credibility"; a team of fact-checkers is going through the film's final edit with a fine-toothed comb; and Moore's got lawyers at the ready: "We want the word out... Any attempts to libel me will be met by force."

Also in the paper: Todd S Purdum compares and contrasts the two Cole Porter biopics, Night and Day and De-Lovely, and David Edelstein considers the career of Ben Stiller: "Few actors - few comedians, even - have made such box-office hay out of their pathologies."

What'll you be reading this summer? Douglas Coupland recommends Dennis Hensley's Screening Party. Also in the Guardian:

• Steven Poole reviews Koji Suzuki's Ring, the novel on which the films are based.
• Andrew Pulver's adaptation of the week is Lindsay Anderson's This Sporting Life.
• Sean Clarke covers the legal wrangle over Michael Winterbottom's Nine Songs.
• Decca Aitkenhead profiles Jennifer Saunders. It's longish, so you might want to scroll past the breaking-the-ice Shrek stuff and start about halfway in where we get background on her teaming with Dawn French and other tidbits on Brit TV in the 80s.
• Steve Rose chronicles Kevin Smith's horrid European adventure and then asks him about his future plans: "[H]e's got a small ($250,000) project starting in October. No clues as to the story though, 'let's just say I won't need Affleck for this'. Could he afford Affleck for this? He cracks into a smirk. 'Oh I think Ben could be pretty cheap right now.'"
• Joel Coen has also spent his time in Europe defending the recent direction he and his brother have taken; in case he forgets his audience isn't buying it, John Patterson reminds him.

Fatih Akin's Head On, winner of the Golden Bear at the Berlinale in February, swept the German Film Awards last night, picking up five: Best film, director and cinematography, best actor for Birol Ünel and, the highlight of the evening, best actress for Sibel Kekilli. You may remember the smear campaign launched against her by Germany's most notorious tabloid just days after the Berlinale triumph (Reuters will remind you as well). German audiences and critics ignored it and made the film a hit and Kekilli the darling of last night's ceremony. At any rate, all the winners are listed here.

Posted by dwhudson at June 19, 2004 7:48 AM