Tribeca run-up, 4/24.

With the Tribeca Film Festival opening tomorrow and running through May 6, Nathan Lee opens the Voice's package with "half dozen random, contradictory, but generally optimistic notes."

The preview: "25 movies that intrigued, annoyed, and greatly pleased our fest-happy critics." The interviews:

• Ed Halter with Esther Robinson (A Walk Into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory).

• Michelle Orange with Andrew Piddington (The Killing of John Lennon).

• Aaron Hillis with Stephen Kijak (Scott Walker: 30 Century Man).

• Jessica Grose with Kevin Connolly (Gardener of Eden.

Even with the Spider-Man 3 US premiere, "in the years since 2004, Tribeca has been cannily paring down its blockbuster mentality and ramping up its cinephile appeal," argues Glenn Kenny, introducing Premiere's preview package. Besides the photos and such, it includes Aaron Hillis's festival picks.

In a New York Times piece headlined "The Man Who Made Mapplethorpe," Philip Gefter previews James Crump's directorial debut, Black White + Gray, a portrait of curator and collector Sam Wagstaff.

For the Wall Street Journal, Anthony Kaufman selects, as he puts it on his blog, "a dozen picks that I believe are safe bets for WSJ readers. And at indieWIRE, noting the numbers that count for many - "75 world premieres, five international premieres, and 30 North American premieres" at Tribeca - Anthony takes a moment to step back to scan the big picture: "'this ridiculous concern for premiere status,' as one festival programmer calls it, puts excessive pressure on filmmakers, limits their ability to generate momentum on the festival circuit, and arguably runs counter to the broader mission of film festivals in the first place: to showcase good films and cultivate cinephilia."

ST VanAirsdale talks with Mary Stuart Masterson about her directorial debut, The Cake Eaters.

Tim Murphy blogs for New York: "Festival followers are yammering about a generational turf war between Robert De Niro's by-now well-established Tribeca Film Festival, which kicks off tomorrow, and the inaugural year of the exquisitely edgy High Line Festival, which launches May 9, hard on the heels of its Big Daddy downtown." High Line, by the way, is curated by David Bowie.

Posted by dwhudson at April 24, 2007 3:35 PM