Short shorts, 2/14.

It's Valentine's Day and the Lovesick Blog-a-Thon is underway at 100 Films. Related: Robert Davis's "Cinematic Valentine."

Brian Darr calls for a Virgin Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors Blog-a-Thon on March 21.

"Directors such as Fred Halsted, Christopher Rage and Peter Berlin used film to creatively explore and express sexual identity before urban gay life was attacked by AIDS and vampirized by mainstream consumerism," writes Johnny Ray Huston. "For [William E Jones], the works of these underworld auteurs contain an endless array of sidelines to rediscover and uncover. Instead of excavating the era's graphic, condom-free sex, he spotlights the erotically charged spaces around it." Also: An interview.

Also in the San Francisco Bay Guardian: Matt Sussman on the first program of the Oppositional and Stigmatized series screening on Sunday and Cheryl Eddy previews programs of Oscar-nominated shorts.

Time Out's Chris Tilly talks with Vincent Cassel about, among other things, David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises.

Brendon Connelly's found news of How the Dead Love, "an animated compendium of four Charles Bukowski stories," featuring the voice of Johnny Depp, who's also producing.

"The Office: A Spec Script by David Mamet." Julia Ward in McSweeney's. Also via Movie City News: "Judd Apatow On Creating A Fake Musical Biopic." MTV.

Tim Wong files an appreciation of Sam Fuller and François Truffaut to the Lumière Reader.

Doug Jones's "role as The Silver Surfer may just propel him into name regnition beyond the rabid fanbase of geeks that keep track of who plays their favorite non-humans onscreen." Canfield interviews him for Twitch.

"Gray Matters is as unhinged as its characters," writes Ed Gonzalez at Slant.

Bright Lights After Dark: C Jerry Kutner on Michael Powell's Age of Consent and Alan Vanneman on Black Snake Moan.

Rob Moll talks with Jeffrey Overstreet about Through a Screen Darkly: Looking Closer at Beauty, Truth and Evil in Movies for Christianity Today.

SBalcer at Dr Mabuse's Kaleido-Scope on what makes Letters From Iwo Jima "the best American war film in years."

"Is film criticism worthless?" asks Paul Schrodt at the Stranger Song.

Fests and events:

• The SXSW short film lineup is out and about. Also, at AICN: "SXSW's Grindhouse Trailers Begin Splattering on YOUTUBE!!!"

• Manohla Dargis previews the Film Comment Selects series for the NYT. Through February 27.

• Matt Riviera previews Australia's traveling French Film Festival.

Online viewing tip. Craig Phillips points to The First Ones, "a short film by Jake Paltrow, interviewing 7 actors on the films that had the biggest impact on them early on."

Posted by dwhudson at February 14, 2007 3:42 PM