Telluride, 9/1.

"It's late out here at Telluride, and no real time for a full considered review of what is sure to be one of the year's most remarkable movies," blogs Reverse Shot's clarencecarter. "Not to be all David Poland about things, but what [Todd] Haynes has accomplished [with I'm Not There] is so ingenious, intelligent, unique, and wholly entertaining that it's unfair to other filmmakers. I left the theatre shaking and stammering, wanting to make out with everyone involved (sans Harvey)." I don't often do much commenting in these roundups, but as a dedicated admirer of both Haynes and Dylan, color me relieved. For now.

Updated (a lot).

Well, speaking of David Poland, he's just caught Margot at the Wedding: "[W]hile [Noah] Baumbach proves himself more than capable of delivering a GenX sitcom, stealing laughs throughout the proceedings, he fails completely in his effort to make sense of all the different walking punchlines into which he turns his characters. It is the definition of bad dramaturgy to have to tell the audience over and over and over again what the meaning of the characters' actions are. And that failure defines virtually the entire movie."

"It's difficult to tell whom Kevin Macdonald is angriest at in his new doc, My Enemy's Enemy - Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie, or the US government, which pic argues was responsible for protecting Barbie for more than three decades following WWII," writes Robert Koehler in Variety. "The argument may be awfully loaded - and will be read in some circles as simplistic Yank-bashing - but Macdonald summons a vast range of witnesses and experts to describe the darkest days of the Cold War."

Karina Longworth's blogging from the festival, where's she's already come face-to-face with many a name. "But none of that could compare to our run-in with Werner Herzog." Well, naturally.

Updates: David Poland's now seen I'm Not There, which, "remarkably, in a 2 hour 18 minute running time, turns out to be a very demanding, but very clear-minded piece of filmmaking.... At times I felt like Haynes was falling into hero worship, but by the end of the film, I think that even my feelings were just a reflection of some pretty direct propositions. Basically, watching a guy who thinks he is King Shit can be infuriating, not because the filmmaker is necessarily agreeing, but because that guy is simply infuriating. Rage is, on some level, proof of the filmmaker's honesty.... You can, as Greil Marcus commented while presenting Haynes before the film, take away moments that you feel are definitive. (Personally, I did not. For me, it was the collage that drew me in.)"

"Sean Penn's Into the Wild, based on Jon Krakauer's book, is an extravagantly ambitious, unfocused film," writes Sura Wood in the Hollywood Reporter, "with flights of brilliance, self-indulgence and thrilling nature cinematography."

Kim Voynar files a first dispatch for Cinematical: "Getting There is Half the Fun."

And Kim Voynar now reports at considerable length on the Daniel Day-Lewis tribute.

"I saw three movies today at the Telluride Film Festival and without a doubt the one to write home about is Todd Haynes's I'm Not There," blogs Eugene Hernandez. "After the screening, I lingered in the lobby and witnessed both Ken Burns [and Eugene's snapped a shot] and Laura Linney each gushing to Todd separately about the movie.... Just see it."

Karina Longworth's seen 17 minutes of Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood and she's got extensive notes.

For the Hollywood Reporter's Michael Rechtshaffen, "Noah Baumbach has followed up his acclaimed 2005 breakthrough The Squid and the Whale with another wryly observed, giddily cringe-inducing, bracingly original winner. Where the previous film took its cue from Baumbach's own upbringing, Margot at the Wedding probes the terminally dysfunctional relationship between two sisters, played, without a safety net, by Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Jason Leigh. The two actresses do some of their best work here, while Baumbach gives further evidence as having one of the most original and affecting comic sensibilities in the business."

At As Little as Possible, JJ, writes "I'm still trying to figure out if [Nicole Kidman's] performance is a sensation or a near-miss. I'm leaning more toward the former." Via Nathaniel R.

"[I]n his fourth and by far best feature turn behind the camera, Sean Penn delivers a compelling, ambitious work that will satisfy most admirers of the book," writes Dennis Harvey, reviewing Into the Wild for Variety. In some ways, adapter-director Penn has made a lyrical youth-rebellion flick in the classic late 60s/early 70s mode, or at least something that will be interpreted as such by viewers who'll buy the ecstatic aspects of [Christopher] McCandless's odyssey. Others may find the character, portrayed by Emile Hirsch, annoyingly over-endowed with undergraduate self-righteousness, borrowed ideals and resentment toward (who else but) mom and dad."

Kim Voynar sees Shyam Benegal's Trikal: Past, Present, Future.

Online listening tips. At the SpoutBlog, Kevin Buist interviews Todd Haynes and Paul interviews Julian Schnabel and Leonard Matlin.

Then, Kevin Buist on I'm Not There: "I've never seen a film that manipulated my heart and mind so deftly, often in a single shot or line. I'll be very disappointed if Cate Blanchett doesn't pick up an Oscar for this, and I'm rooting for Todd Haynes for both the best screenplay and best director prizes. Is that an objective opinion? Of course not. I have an irrational crush on this movie. I'm a fan."

Posted by dwhudson at September 1, 2007 8:24 AM