Fests and events, 9/10.

"The Alamo Drafthouse and Fantastic Fest have announced that five feature films and six shorts will be streamed online via the BSide community, in their entirety, from Sept 14 - 20." The Austin Chronicle's Marc Savlov has details.

"If this year's Toronto International Film Festival had a subtitle, it could be 'When Good Directors Go Bad,'" proposes Scott Foundas. "At least that's what it has felt like around here as one anticipated new film after the next by some of the world's name-brand auteurs - the Coen brothers, Spike Lee, Jonathan Demme - has laid a less-than-golden egg. And the younger directors one had harbored high hopes for? They've crashed and burned, too." For more on the fest so far, see Cheryl Eddy and Jesse Hawthorne Ficks in the San Francisco Bay Guardian or tickle yourself with the fury of Rex Reed in the New York Observer. Meantime, Robert Davis lists his favorites so far.

But for now, back in the Voice, J Hoberman: "Before his son and namesake grew up to be the edgiest Hollywood actor of his generation, Robert Downey enjoyed a small measure of celebrity as the edgiest indie cine-satirist of his. Downey, whose early work is showcased this week at Anthology Film Archives, is the missing link between the 'sick' cabaret humor of the early 60s and the considerably wilder countercultural gross-out burlesques that John Waters began making as the decade ended."

More from Bruce Bennett, who, in the New York Sun, notes that the series sets "a promising precedent for the fiscally challenged yet indispensable local theater responsible for exhibiting these twisted and brilliant early films and shepherding them back from the brink of decay."

Related: Nelson Kim on Putney Swope at Hammer to Nail.

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"Audiences visiting the Whitney's film and video gallery this summer have been privy to an ample and diverse program of artist-curated screenings." For Artforum, Federico Windhausen previews the program for the weeks ahead.

"Film Forum, in association with the British Film Institute, is launching a long overdue two-week, 16-film retrospective, Sept 12 to Sept 25, of David Lean's lushly directed, written, and acted works." A preview from Andrew Sarris in the New York Observer.

Mike Everleth has the lineup for the Sydney Underground Film Festival, running tomorrow through Sunday.

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"With enthusiasm for the state of independent filmmaking as well as enthusiasm for activism in both the US and the world, the Mill Valley Film Festival introduced its 31st program to the press Tuesday morning at Dolby Labs." Susan Gerhard reports at SF360. October 2 through 12.

Noting that passes are now available, Chicagoist Rob Christopher's anticipating the Chicago International Film Festival, running October 16 through 29.

Valkyrie, with Tom Cruise as would-be Hitler assassin Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, will open in Germany on January 22 - too early for the Berlinale, so there go those rumors. The Netzeitung reports (in German).

Posted by dwhudson at September 10, 2008 2:37 PM