Other fests, other events.

"The Golden Age by director Shekhar Kapur will open the Premiere section of the RomeFilmFest," reports Camillo de Marco for Cineuropa. "The non-competition section of large-scale premieres will roll out its red carpet for leading actress Cate Blanchett in the highly anticipated follow-up to Elizabeth (1998), in which she will once again play the Queen of England." October 18 through 27.

"High-profile film festivals are also highly exclusive, often resembling the closed society of a debutante's coming out ball. But the local short film festival Hi Mom!, now almost 10 years old, is more like a high school kegger: rambunctious, loosely organized and open to anyone who shows up thirsty. Forget hors d'oeuvres and distribution deals; think stacks of free pancakes and flaming trophies." Brian Howe profiles one of five winners of the Independent Weekly's 2007 Indies Arts Awards. On Saturday, there'll be a "Best of the Fests" outdoor screening in Carrboro, NC.

Vince Keenan has another fine night at Noir City Northwest: "For me The Spiritualist, aka The Amazing Mr X, is the find of the festival, the B-movie perfectly executed," and it "set up the audience for the main attraction. Nightmare Alley, according to Eddie Muller, is not only one of the greatest noirs but one of the finest American films of the 1940s."

"If you love movies, seeing Napoléon on the big screen, in a rare 70 mm print, is a must - the film's greatness is physical and theatrical, rather than in its depth of content," writes FX Feeney in the LA Weekly.

My, look at all those reviews and reports at Twitch from the Fantasia Festival.

"The 48 Hour Film Project came storming through Austin for the sixth time last month, leaving in its wake more than a hundred movie-makers, aspiring movie-makers, and dilettantes who had forsaken the comforts of both their creative approaches and their soft pillows to find out whether they had it in them to write, shoot, and edit a short film in the span of a single weekend." Josh Rosenblatt has the story in the Chronicle.

Ismet Redzovic files the fourth report from the Sydney Film Festival for the WSWS: "12:08 East of Bucharest and Beauty in Trouble: mixed results from Eastern Europe."

Online listening tip. Vanessa Redgrave talks about her late husband, Tony Richardson on the Leonard Lopate Show. The occasion: Leading the Chagrge: Woodfall Film Productions and the Revolution in 60s British Cinema, a series opening tomorrow at the Walter Reade in NYC and running through July 26.

Posted by dwhudson at July 12, 2007 10:04 AM