Shorts, 4/8.

"The whole idea of the nouvelle vague was more vague than new." Claude Chabrol makes for a charming interviewee, as the Telegraph's David Gritten discovers. "I'm convinced women are the future of mankind, the driving force, the regulators of the evolution of human nature... It's good to get to know them and be in their good books, because they're very powerful - the bitches!" And you know he means that with love and the utmost respect. Also in the Telegraph: John Hiscock interviews Sydney Pollack.

"It is a fittingly ironic fate that the movement that inspired the femme fatale has become the very force that has destroyed it. And as with any good noir, the culprit is a powerful woman. In this case, lots of them." Sean Macaulay traces the history of the "temptress archetype." Plus: The most fatal femme of each decade, from the 20s to the present. Also in the London Times: Ian Johns picks Hollywood's best legal dramas.

BRAINTRUSTdv interviews Lori Silverbush, writer, co-producer and co-director of On the Outs, winner of the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award at Sundance, and slated to screen tonight and tomorrow night as part of the GenArt Film Festival in New York.

Sebastian Harcombe goes to Odessa and sends word back to the New Statesman: "This year is the centenary of the historical events dramatised in [Battleship Potemkin], which was made 80 years ago. In the light of these anniversaries and the deep suspicion many Odessans feel about Ukraine's recent 'orange revolution,' I wondered if the very mention of the film, a potent symbol of 74 years of the Soviet Union, might provoke some interesting conversation."

"Filmbrain recently caught up with two Korean films from 2003 that were both smash hits in their native country - Lee Je-yong's Untold Scandal, and Kwak Jae-yong's The Classic."

Why hasn't Stephen Chow been as huge internationally as he has been in Hong Kong? You know, like Jackie Chan? Andy Klein explains in the LA CityBeat. But this is likely Chow's big moment: "If the gamble being taken by Sony Pictures Classics pays off, Stephen Chow's Kung Fu Hustle will be a big hit," writes Eugene Hernandez.

Also at indieWIRE: Lisa Bear interviews Lukas Moodysson.

"The story behind the Hitchhiker's movie might have sprung, fully formed, from one of [Douglas] Adams' novels," writes Xan Brooks:

It is a tale of development hell at "the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral Arm of the galaxy", and of a whirlwind success that became bogged down in 25 years of baton-passing, thumb-twiddling and excruciating near misses. If the chief thrust of Adams' intergalactic satire was to remind us that the human race is really rather powerless and inconsequential then the fate of Hitchhiker's: the Movie might be regarded as the author's crowning cosmic joke. Until now, that is.

Also in the Guardian:

• Woody Allen's next film - the pace just doesn't let up, does it? - was shot in London. He tells Peter Kelly why (in a word, money) and, as if to prove he was actually there, the paper presents a map of the locations where Match Point was shot.

• "'Fun-loving' is certainly not the first adjective that most moviegoers associate with [Sean] Penn," notes Richard T Kelly. But he can be. Really! He's got the quotes to prove it. Related: Roger Clarke in the Independent: "Is politics about to come into fashion in American films for the first time in 30 years?" For the Guardian, Peter Bradshaw reviews The Assassination of Richard Nixon.

• And recommends Bresson's Pickpocket; a new print's just been released.

• News bits: Soderbergh and Clooney are adapting The Good German; Wes Craven will remake The Hills Have Eyes; Ken Loach is set to shoot The Wind That Shakes the Barley, an Irish civil war drama.

• Not film-related, but: Dorian Lynskey interviews Hans-Joachim Roedelius.

"The recorded rock concert has become familiar to the point of passé. A live DVD usually means an added profit margin for a marginal artist and at best a sub-par performance." Dan Nishimoto explains in PopMatters why Born to Boogie, a record of the T.Rex concert in London in 1972, is the exception that proves the rule.

"At 57, [Christopher] Guest may be the best parodist working today, and the evidence is in a tightly focused retrospective beginning tonight at the Museum of Modern Art." In the New York Times, Caryn James presents an appreciation in text, pix and audio.

Interviews in the Independent: Marc Cameron with Melissa George and Tiffany Rose with Matthew McConaughey. Related: Sean Axmaker's interview with Steve Zahn.

Uncle Grambo shares ten quality minutes with Danny Boyle.

USA Today's Andrew Kantor on the significance of the FCC vs Brand X case before the Supreme Court: "Imagine turning on your TV and having an Internet's worth of programming to choose from, just like when you start your Web browser. I'm not talking about Web pages - I'm talking about television content delivered through an Internet-like model."

Online browsing tip. Shaolin Chamber. Posters, trailers, the works. Via The Crime in Your Coffee.

Posted by dwhudson at April 8, 2005 9:14 AM