Weekend shorts.

Violet Glaze debuts a column on the classics at PopMatters: "Why is [Louise] Brooks a still-immortalized cult figure and [Clara] Bow not? Maybe there's something about Brooks' persona as cool, amoral, gender-ambiguous jazz baby with a keen intelligence shining behind her dark eyes that's got more staying power than Bow, the little Brooklyn spitfire full of terrier enthusiasm and effortless charm." Related: Bow in her own words at If Charlie Parker Was a Gunslinger....

The original King Kong "might never have gotten made if not for the success of its scandalous predecessor." In the Los Angeles Times, Andrew Erish tells the long, engaging story of Ingagi, how it got made, how it played, how it impacted the ongoing Hays Office crackdown and: "While it's true that Ingagi contains many entertaining moments, they are overwhelmed by the suggestions of black women mating with gorillas, among the ugliest, most disturbing concepts in movie history."

Tim Lucas writes an ode to Horrors of the Screen, which "appears to have been the earliest fanzine to insist on the need for more serious writing and reportage about the genre - something attempted previously only by Calvin T Beck's one-shot enterprise of 1959, The Journal of Frankenstein."

The Guardian's Review runs excerpts from John Fowles's Journals, the first written during the filming of The French Lieutenant's Woman: "There was trouble with the proposal scene, and one day Karel [Reisz] rang me up to see if I could help - he felt it was too curt and quick. 'Harold [Pinter] says he'll do anything, but he simply can't write a happy scene.'"

Also, Alex Cox writes against the grain: "Ingmar Bergman began his long directorial career as something of a radical, even a surrealist. He has done some amazing, ground-breaking work. But, like all directors with long, distinguished careers, he has produced some stinkers too. Which brings us to Fanny and Alexander, which he made in 1982."

And John Patterson: "[W]hen it comes to the [drill instructor] sequences, [Sam] Mendes throws up his arms [in Jarhead] and admits he cannot improve upon Full Metal Jacket, whose sergeant, unforgettably played by real-life former USMC drill instructor Lee Ermey, is to DIs what Goodfellas is to gangster movies: definitive, the gold standard."

Todd at Twitch on Johnnie To and his latest: "Despite having frequently promised myself that the next disappointment would be the last I keep coming back, film after film. Why? In the hopes that one day he'd put all the pieces together, that he'd find some content to fill out the form, believing that when that day came he'd turn out a masterpiece. Election is that film."

Filmbrain is unmoved by Marathon.

Flickhead discovers an obscure Czech sci-fi oddity: The End of August at the Hotel Ozone.

It's about time Andrew Bujalski got his profile in the New York Times. Fitting, somehow, that Village Voice film editor Dennis Lim has written it: "Compared to Richard Linklater's earnest philosophers or Noah Baumbach's poised wiseacres, Mr Bujalski's sheepish drifters are mortifyingly tongue-tied. But their verbal tics, taken together, could stand as a fumbling generation's poignant cri de coeur: 'I guess,' 'I mean,' 'I'm sorry,' 'I don't know.'" Related: NYT regular Nathan Lee reviews Mutual Appreciation for Slate, finding it "more than a new twist on the romantic comedy, more than a pitch-perfect period piece about the period we're all living in."

Also in the NYT:

• Dave Kehr meets Albert Brooks to talk about Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World, and in particular, how it played at the Dubai International Film Festival: "I thought, I passed the test, it's OK! The sheik is laughing; he's talking to the guy next to him in Arabic and pointing at the screen. And no one walked out!"

• Larry Rohter: "Two Sons of Francisco (2 Filhos de Francisco) has not only won new respect for an often overlooked musical genre, it has also gone on to break box office records and become Brazil's Oscar nominee for best foreign-language film. More than just a movie with a happy ending, Two Sons of Francisco has become a cultural and sociological phenomenon here."

• AO Scott on Grandma's Boy: "I did manage to be more tickled than annoyed at some of the movie's dumb, crude attempts at humor."

• Liesl Schillinger on the three collections of John Simon's criticism: "While Simon's theater and film criticism can serve as a chronological aide-mémoire for what was onstage and on screen at any particular period, his music criticism is less snarky, less time-pegged, less inventive and, arguably, more useful."

Ylan Q Mui reports in the Washington Post on Wal-Mart's apology for directing "potential buyers of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Planet of the Apes DVDs to also consider purchasing DVDs with African American themes. The world's largest retailer said in a statement that it was 'heartsick' over the racially offensive grouping and that the site was linking 'seemingly random combinations of titles.'" David Ehrenstein: "Well isn't that special? Imagine a corporation has a 'heart' that is 'sick.' It's also, like so much of this culture, racist to its very core." More from Paul Schmelzer.

Because I met Jürgen Fauth and Marcy Dermansky here in Berlin about a week ago and because the topic came up, I have to point to Matt Zoller Seitz's entry that begins, "I was heartened to learn that About.com movie critic Jurgen Fauth put Revenge of the Sith on his Top 10 list, in the number one spot, no less. He even encouraged people to revisit his original review - the most thoughtful, non-condescending piece of writing done on this movie by any critic anywhere. What stones."

For Film & Video, Bryant Frazer interviews cinematographer Robert Elswit, who's "become the go-to guy for socially conscious drama — on both Syriana and the monochromatic Good Night, and Good Luck, he balances you-are-there realism with crisp, rich imagery."

Showgirls, yay or nay? Head to Girish's place where advocates and denunciators are planning a showdown for Wednesday. Flickhead. I'd hate to have to break down and actually watch that movie, but it looks like there may be no way around it.

Susanne Weber's designed this month's Wong Kar-wai calendar; my favorite so far.

Online listening tip. NPR on Favela Rising.

Online browsing and viewing tip. The site for Cam Archer's Wild Tigers I Have Known, an official Sundance selection, is quite a piece of work itself, but it also features a trailer and a music video.

Online viewing tip #1. DVblog hosts a short and clips from other work by Isaac Julien.

Online viewing tip #2. "Gimmicky as all hell, but pretty cool nonetheless." Twitch's Todd points to The Horror Channel, where you can watch all of Night Watch - only very, very fast.

Online viewing tip #3. At independentfilm.com, Corey Boutilier talks with the Crook brothers about Salvage, another Sundance selection.

Posted by dwhudson at January 7, 2006 1:35 PM