Shorts, 11/24.

"[E]ssentially, The Good German is a parallel universe version of Casablanca, which both makes the film interesting and ultimately lends it a certain hollowness," writes Drew Morton at Dr Mabuse's Kaleido-Scope. "The film finds itself so massively indebt towards the superior films of Curtiz and Carol Reed that one senses an overcomplicated plot as a means of compensation." That said, "Soderbergh's Berlin is beautifully haunting, amazingly constructed out of Hollywood backlots and found footage, full of images that linger in the viewer's mind. Mise-en-scene aside, the film's main attraction is its stars."

"Jean Renoir stands on his own: the greatest of European directors: very probably the greatest of all directors—a gigantic silhouette on the horizon of our waning century." Orson Welles in 1979 for the Los Angeles Times, now at Wellesnet.

"Next Tuesday, November 28, marks the 60th birthday of Joe Dante." Tim Lucas proposes a Blog-a-Thon.

Yesterday, John McElwee saluted Boris Karloff on his 119th. Today, part 2.

"'I don't know what it is about this town,' she says, with a deep, rich chuckle. 'We're all trapped in its golden arms!'" That's Barbara Steele talking to David Ehrenstein at the end of a lovely holiday weekend read on British ex-pats in Los Angeles. Somewhat related: Liam Gowing in the Los Angeles Times on the sounds of Britain in LA clubs.

Also in the LA Weekly, Scott Foundas: "Flannel Pajamas is probably one of the worst date movies ever made, and I mean that as a compliment to [Jeff] Lipsky, whose storied career as a movie distributor includes stints with such maverick independent filmmakers as John Cassavetes, Mike Leigh and Victor Nuñez, and who is clearly after the kind of emotional honesty and candor that permeates those directors' work."

"One of the most disarmingly clever genre deconstructions I've ever seen is Scott Glosserman's Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon," writes Scott Weinberg at Cinematical. "So here's some good news: Not only has Anchor Bay purchased Behind the Mask for distribution, but they'll be doing it in a theatrical capacity!"

The numbers are staggering, admits Darcy Paquet. In September, Korean movies represented nearly 83 percent of the country's box office, and Japanese movies, too, sold more tickets that Hollywood could. "But you'll have to forgive me if, despite the numbers, I feel a lack of energy in mainstream Korean cinema these days." Related: Jon Pais at Twitch. But also at Koreanfilm.org: No Regrets offers "an engaging story, equal parts melodrama, social commentary, comedy, and treatise on hope for us all," writes Adam Hartzell.

Ray Young on a film by Yoichi Sai from the manga by Kazuichi Hanawa: "By reversing our expectations of prison and the trappings of the prison film, Doing Time satirizes the society that squanders its freedoms and subconsciously desires the security of a police state." More from Tom Mes at Midnight Eye, where we find more new reviews:

• Paul Jackson on an anthology of work by Koji Yamamura, "not a typical animator, not in the Japanese mould or any other."

• Jaspar Sharp on Splatter: Naked Blood, "[Hisayasu] Sato's much-celebrated gore title from the mid-90s."

• Tom Mes on the "first Toho fantasy film to be shot in widescreen and in color... The visual upgrade is precisely where much of the beauty of The Mysterians lies. The combined impact is, to put it simply, a feast for the eyes."

• Mes recommends an introductory text, Keiko McDonald's Reading a Japanese Film: Cinema in Context.

Nick Schager at Slant: "Days of Glory (a title strangely reconfigured from Indigènes) was made with the not-so-implicit goal of compelling the French government - which froze the pensions of all North African soldiers who fought on France's side during World War II, and which has dragged its feet since consenting in 2002 to reimburse the men - to finally pay up. That Jacques Chirac has now reportedly agreed to do so makes Rachid Bouchareb's film something of a political success, a fact that nonetheless doesn't correlate in any way, shape, or form to its artistic merits—of which, it turns out, there are few."

"Something disastrously dangerous is going on in Russia, a post-Glasnost, post-USSR, mythical variety of collapse." And it's seeping over into London, too, evidently. David Roth in Your Flesh: "The recent film-festival favorite 4, embraces that breakdown." Also, George Pelecanos on three by Jack Hill.

Along with the new blog, MovieMaker has a few selections from its fall issue up: Peter Weed presents a list of essential films noir, Matthew Power suggests a few ways filmmakers can compress their films for streaming online and James L Menzies has a holiday preview.

"A Casa Nostra is essentially a film about money, about what it can buy and what people will do to get their hands on it (out of necessity or greed), whether it is selling their bodies, their possessions or their souls," writes Elisabetta Povoledo. "It is also about Italy today as [director Francesca Comencini] sees it, a cinematic final curtain on the capitalist myth and this country's transmutation from postwar prosperity to the widespread venality she says has taken root in the national soul."

Also in the New York Times:

• William Grimes offers a guide to Tom Stoppard's latest: "If ever a play required a reading list, The Coast of Utopia is it. So let's get started." Related online listening: Stoppard on the Leonard Lopate Show.

• Donna Kornhaber and David Kornhaber tell the story of the American Repertory Theater's adaptation of Wings of Desire (through December 17).

• "There are few better illustrations of that still useful distinction between actor and star than [Rock] Hudson, who never claimed any particular acting talent and seldom strayed from the square-shouldered, straight-talking character he perfected in the early 50s," writes Dave Kehr.

• "Déjà Vu is more removed from reality than most of their collaborations, which makes their exploitation of Sept 11, Katrina and Oklahoma City (which earns a couple of vague mentions) less offensive than it might in a film that bore some relation to the real world," writes Manohla Dargis. "Yet Déjà Vu is so wildly divorced from the here and the now of contemporary politics, policy and people that it's impossible to get worked up by its invocation of these three calamities, though a throwaway shot of a decimated New Orleans neighborhood used purely for some atmospheric flavoring is certainly vulgar in the extreme." More from Nathan Lee in the Voice.

• "Our Daily Bread could do much more [than Fast Food Nation] to catalyze the move toward Slow Food nation," writes Christine Muhlke. It's also "as much an art film as a political statement." For Manohla Dargis, the documentary "can be extremely difficult to watch, but the film's formal elegance, moral underpinning and intellectually stimulating point of view also make it essential. You are what you eat; as it happens, you are also what you dare to watch." More from Jürgen Fauth.

• Stephen Holden on Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny: "In this jolly rock 'n' roll comedy, sprinkled with amusing one-liners and hilarious sight gags, [Jack] Black is more teddy bear than grizzly. Six decades ago, this movie might have been called 'Abbott and Costello Go to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.'" More from Matt Zoller Seitz at the House Next Door: "The movie doesn't just invite and exceed low expectations; its half-assedness is woven into the fabric of its screenplay which, one can only presume, was printed on hemp-based paper. Paying to see it is the moviegoing version of ordering Domino's when you're baked; just as the cost of a ticket won't yield a real movie, the late-night phone call won't deliver an actual pizza, merely a pizza-flavored circular object cut into triangles." Related: Liam Gowing talks with the boys for the AV Club.

• Neil Genzlinger: "Those who think of the director John Waters only as a sicko, a wacko, a pervert, a psycho, a multi-fetishist, a deviant, a menace and/or a nut job will be surprised to discover, through This Filthy World, that he would also make an excellent dinner-party guest." Related: ST VanAirsdale meets Waters. More Genzlinger: Sun Kissed.

• Jeannette Catsoulis: "Opal Dream is a sickly sweet tale of deep dysfunction masquerading as family solidarity." But writing at indieWIRE, Michael Joshua Rowin recommends it. More Catsoulis: Eating Out 2: Sloppy Seconds.

• AO Scott on Deck the Halls: "Like garish snowflake sweaters, Christmas movies are a regrettable, disposable part of the season. This one is worse than most."

Via Jeffrey Overstreet, Kristopher Tapley on Children of Men: "[I]n manifesting one of the most horrific visions of the future yet committed to film, [Alfonso] Cuarón has given us his masterpiece, the crowning achievement of 2006."

"You see, she wasn't a natural, or a great talent - except in Pandora's Box and there, coming right at the end of the silent era, she is so good that she makes us ashamed at giving so much patience to fatuously archaic versions of womanhood as were offered by Lillian Gish, Mary Pickford and Janet Gaynor." David Thomson on Louise Brooks.

Also in the Guardian:

• "Sex on the cinema screen, it seems, only mattered when it wasn't there." A brief history from Matthew Sweet.

• Patrick Barkham on the Borat backlash. All jokes aside, Timothy Garton Ash reminds us that "Kazakhstan is a hugely corrupt dictatorship with a dismal human rights record; a supine judiciary; controlled or intimidated media; and elections that do not, to put it very mildly, come up to the standards of Europe's leading election monitors."

• Barbara McMahon on why Franco Zeffirelli's upcoming autobiography is already generating coverage in the Italian papers.

• Xan Brooks: "While [Peter] Jackson was the right man for The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit is a different beast and requires a different sensibility.... I'd like to see what a film-maker such as Michel Gondry or Guillermo del Toro could bring to the material." Related: Harry Knowles has the latest twist at AICN.

• James Silver on "celebrity" critics in the UK who skip out on screenings of the movies they review.

• Ryan Gilbey: "Hollywood's sequel machine has lowered our expectations to the point where the sound of the barrel being scraped becomes almost soothing, like a lullaby."

Now here's a title for an entry. Steven Boone at the House Next Door: "Quiet miracle: James Longley's Iraq in Fragments is the future of the movies."

Bruce Wallace reminds us that Letters From Iwo Jima will be coming out soon.

Also in the Los Angeles Times:

• Susan King previews Warner Home Video's Forbidden Hollywood Collection, Vol 1. More DVDs on the way. And more.

• The Superman II released in 1980 was "a hybrid of [Richard] Lester and [Richard] Donner's work [and] a strong commercial success and earned upbeat reviews," writes Geoff Boucher. "Still, for die-hard fans familiar with the backstage struggle, Donner's stillborn project became the equivalent of The Magnificent Ambersons for superhero cinema." And now, here it comes.

• Fridays are movie nights at the Playboy Mansion. Tina Daunt drops by.

• Gina Piccalo on Amanda Congdon's prospects in Hollywood.

• Robin Abcarian talks with Tom Hayden about Bobby.

"Are there any film classics that are truly great solely for the acting? It's hard to think of any." Nonetheless, Kristin Thompson recalls a few of her favorite performances and then segues into a review of The Queen. Related: Chuck Tryon finds it to be "one of the smartest and most emotionally compelling films I've seen this year."

"Volver disappoints," sighs Stanley Kauffmann in the New Republic. "After all Almodóvar's interview talk about returning to his roots (some of the film takes place in a village), the three months of rehearsal with his cast (no better ensemble playing than what we can see in any well-made picture), the very serious shopping and hair-styling (the usual amusing Almodóvar glitz), and the hints of spiritual depth, we get a porridge-consistency story, full of explanations rather than drama." Ryland Walker Knight disagrees at the House Next Door. So does Roger Ebert.

Emanuele Saccarelli at the WSWS: "[T]his reviewer expected to welcome Marie Antoinette with an outburst of plebeian hatred. Imagine the disappointment when the film not only failed to stimulate a vigorous Jacobin response, but proved to be relentlessly and irrepressibly boring."

Jason Morehead finds that Ikiru "feels vaguely biblical at that, as it takes on topics and expounds upon themes that could have easily come from that most existential of books: Ecclesiastes."

"It's a Wonderful Presidency." Frank Cammuso and Hart Seely imagine a different George, a different Clarence, at Slate.

"The lack of theaters in Center City is a fairly recent phenomenon, and would appear to run counter to the urban revitalization that's characterized the city for more than a decade now." Cassidy Hartmann opens the Philadelphia Weekly's cover package. Also: Mike Benner interviews Bernard Nearey, owner of the Roxy Theater, Sean Burns's "most profound movie theater memories," Andrew Repasky McElhinney on the best theaters in the 'burbs and Matt Prigge: "In its winter 2006 issue MovieMaker magazine listed Philadelphia as the nation's fifth-best city for filming, beating Miami and even Los Angeles. Last year it was No 3."

E-flux video rental has arrived at the Arthouse and in the Austin Chronicle, Robert Faires explains why this is very good news.

"Hollywood, it seems, is ready to give God his close-up." But there are many different ways of doing that; Rebecca Winters Keegan checks out a few. Also for Time, Simon Robinson looks into how the diamond industry is prepping itself - and its message - for the release of Blood Diamond. Related: Jeffrey Ressner interviews Leonardo DiCaprio.

Scott Eyman in the New York Observer: "The essence of New York is that it's too big to be one thing - it's the city as schizophrenic, with something for everybody, in any mood. So it's appropriate that Scenes from the City is sufficiently varied, and luscious enough, to melt the heart of the fiercest partisan of pastoral pleasures."

David Haglund in Slate on Preston Sturges: The Filmmaker Collection: "These movies display a satirical intelligence unmatched in American cinema - and they suggest that, if Sturges is underrated, it's because his movies are like no one else's."

Stephanie Bunbury profiles Robert Downey Jr for the Sydney Morning Herald; via ScreenGrab, where John Constantine has another trailer roundup.

Justin Juul at SF360: "The Redwood City-based startup InDplay is like an online dating service for the film industry." He talks with director of marketing and business development, Julie Baumgartner.

VHS may have been officially pronounced dead, but it lives on at Girish's place.

The Film Panel Notetaker recommends Phil Hall's Independent Film Distribution: How to Make a Successful End Run Around the Big Guys.

Online browsing tip #1. Clip/Stamp/Fold: The Radical Architecture of Little Magazines 196X - 197X. Via Rashomon.

Online browsing tip #2. Penguin's DIY book covers. Via everywhere.

Online browsing tip #3. USSR posters. Via Coudal Partners.

Online viewing tip #1. Expanded Cinema. Via James Petrie at Rhizome.

Online viewing tip #2. Via Truthdig and at the Largest Minority, Richard Dreyfuss on civics. Parts 1 and 2.

Online viewing tip #3. Ed Champion's found Rex Reed talking about the Oscars with Dick Cavett in 1971.

Online viewing tips, round 1. The Guardian's Kate Stables has seven festival winners.

Online viewing tips, round 2. That Little Round-Headed Boy lines up the recent impressionist guests on David Letterman. Yes, Kevin Pollack's Christopher Walken is in there, but it's his Alan Arkin that slays me.

Online viewing tips, round 3. Alternet's Evan Derkacz rounds up some holiday videos.

Posted by dwhudson at November 24, 2006 3:08 PM