Other fests, other events, 6/19.

"Unlike the standard festival circuit, the Media Matters Film Festival continues to play an active role in the lives of the films it supports, all the way up to a DVD collection that will be released later this year. The festival operates under leadership of Arts Engine founder Katy Chevigny, a documentarian whose latest feature, Election Day, hits cable and DVD on July 1." Eric Kohn talks with her at Stream.

"Security fences, punching bags, graveyards, beat-up cars: These are [Danny] Lyon's tropes," writes David Velasco for Artforum. "The journeys he charts (and sometimes facilitates) are those across borders, those into and out of prison, those, often, to nowhere in particular. It's the peculiarly American, desperate aimlessness of the underclass—our country, riven with roads, none of which take you where you want to go." Born to Film: The Cinema of Danny Lyon opens tomorrow at Anthology Film Archives; Lyon's photographs are on view at the Edwynn Houk Gallery.

"Ironically, it seems, one super-sized name can capsize a national film industry by monopolising international interest," writes Paul Julian Smith in the Guardian. "This is why the London Spanish Film Festival, which comes to an end this Friday [tomorrow!] at the Cine Lumiere, is important. Along with Manchester's longer established Viva festival, it gives a flavor of what lies beyond planet Pedro."

Jerzy Skolimowski: Inside/Outside runs at the International House tomorrow and Saturday; in the Philadelphia City Paper, Shaun Brady previews Identification Marks: None and Deep End.

For the MinnPost, Rob Nelson previews the Solstice Film Festival, opening tonight and running through Saturday.

"Kids as young as 13 and 14 years old, established filmmakers, film students, people who do it as a hobby." Matthew Halliday talks with 48 Hour Film Festival producer Sharon Murphy for the Vue Weekly. Saturday in Edmonton.

Mike Russell has details on this weekend's charity screenings of Serenity in Portland.

The Nashville Scene picks out a few highlights from the Belcourt's "Summer Doc Block," running through July 3.

Charlie Olsky rounds up New York goings on for indieWIRE.

The AfroPunk Film & Music Fest: July 5 through 13.

Accepting submissions through August 11: The Melbourne Underground Film Festival.

At Midnight Eye, jury member Tom Mes reports from "one of the best film festivals in Japan," the Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival, where he's also interviewed documentary filmmaker Kenji Murakami.

Posted by dwhudson at June 19, 2008 2:20 PM