Shorts, 2/14.

For the Los Angeles Times, Liz Brown reviews Making Waves: New Cinemas of the 1960s, "Geoffrey Nowell-Smith's brisk, sharp-witted primer on one of the most explosively creative periods of filmmaking," and It's So French! Hollywood, Paris, and the Making of Cosmopolitan Film Culture, "an extremely learned book, citing as it does academic studies and film archive research. In it, Vanessa R Schwartz argues that the exchanges between France and the United States in cinema have long been critical components in the globalization of culture."

The Austin Chronicle has a nifty cover package on Marc English Design, featuring Marc Savlov's profile, samples of the work that led to the studio's cover for Criterion's release of Alex Cox's Walker, Raymond Blanton on the film itself (more from Jeremiah Kipp in Slant) and Spencer Parsons: "[P]erhaps more than any previous release, Two-Lane Blacktop reveals limitations in the Criterion approach that sets the bar for home-theatre-centric cinephilia."

Also: Spencer Parsons on Zodiac: The Director's Cut.

For a New York Press cover story, David Blum lays into New York Times show biz reporter Michael Cieply for his coverage of the just-ended writers strike: "In Cieply's view, the chief WGA negotiators had taken an excessively hard line on its demands, showing a lack of understanding of how Hollywood was supposed to work. He was annoyed by the strong-arm tactics of the union's West Coast executive director, David Young, and the seeming intransigence of the WGA's leadership in the face of management's clear willingness to compromise." Then, in a sidebar, he adds, "Cieply describes a series of events in an omniscient voice that suggests multiple sources; however, he usually doesn't identify those sources by name or even let readers know he's gathered his facts from interviews with interested, often biased, parties to the events he describes."

Meanwhile, in the New York Times:

• Definitely, Maybe is "a nimble and winning little romance," writes AO Scott. More from the Reeler, James Rocchi (Cinematical), Nick Schager (Slant), Richard Schickel (Time) and Kenneth Turan (LAT).

• Also, the "sloppy, secondhand" Spiderwick Chronicles. More from Carina Chocano (LAT) and Nick Schager (Slant).

• Matt Zoller Seitz on Step Up 2 the Streets, a sequel to Step Up: "Like its predecessor, this follow-up takes place in a gritty neighborhood, has a white lead, posits a universe where racial and class differences are minor obstacles to fun and pretends its clichés aren't clichés."

• Back at work, writers for several television shows are struggling to remember what they were working on three months ago, reports Brooks Barnes.

Matt Zoller Seitz's "5 for the Day" at the House Next Door is a Valentine's Day special: "Declarations of Love." But for Dave Itzkoff, today's Vampire Day.

Entries to return to (or for right now, for those of you not in the throes of festival fatigue): David Bordwell, Jim Emerson and the Self-Styled Siren.

Back in the New York Press: Armond White on Bless Their Little Hearts and Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins.

Giuseppe Sedia talks with Bong Joon-ho for Koreanfilm.org.

You'll have seen these trailers: Pineapple Express and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

More online viewing from Filmmaker's Scott Macaulay: "Here's 'Flashing Lights,' a strange and violent video for the Kanye West song directed by West and Spike Jonze."

Online viewing tips. The Guardian's Kate Stables rounds up a batch of Valentine's Day shorts.

Posted by dwhudson at February 14, 2008 2:56 PM