Fests and events, 10/4.

The Berlin School, the first series of its kind in the US (see comment below), runs Thursdays through December 4 at the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art in Chicago.

"Perhaps because Marin County is the pasture to which many a semi-retired rock star got put out, the Mill Valley Film Festival has long emphasized music-related film and live performance. Now that the festival is officially over 30 (and hence untrustworthy according to ancient wisdom), MVFF '08 will wave its vintage freak flag even harder than usual." A preview from Dennis Harvey in the San Francisco Bay Guardian. The festival runs through October 12. Related: Michael Fox talks with James Savoca about Around June for SF360.

"The Viennale International Film Festival - to be held in Vienna from October 17 - 29 - has unveiled its line-up, packed with major names." Bénédicte Prot reports; also at Cineuropa, Gabriele Barcaro has an overview of the lineup for the Rome International Film Festival. October 22 through 31.

At Cinematical, Scott Weinberg briefly previews Sitges (today through October 12), LA Screamfest (October 10 through 19) and Toronto After Dark (October 17 through 24). Related online listening: James Rocchi talks with Scott.

Hollywould, the Freewaves 11th Festival of Experimental Media Arts, happens October 9 through 11.

"I'm personally honored that the Woodstock Film Festival contacted me about using a piece that I wrote last year about Point Blank called 'Lee Marvin: A Sensitive 17-Year-Old Boy' as part of the festival program." Congrats, Kimberly Lindbergs! The festival runs through tomorrow.

"Get ready for one of the more interesting - and certainly comprehensive - French festivals to come to NYC for some time: I Kiffe NY, beginning this Monday, October 6, and continuing over three weeks until Tuesday, October 28." James Van Maanen's got details.

The Guardian's Ben Walters on Hollywood on the Hudson: Filmmaking in New York, 1920 - 39, running at MoMA through October 19: "At times, the conflation of realism and melodrama yields peculiar, borderline surreal results."

For the Chronicle, Kimberley Jones previews the Austin Asian American Film Festival, running October 9 through 12.

At BAM:

• "Howard Hawks, morbid and somber." Daniel Kasman in the Auteurs' Notebook: "Hats off to the Brooklyn Academy of Music for showing a rare double-feature of rare Hawks in their current retrospective of the director. Tiger Shark (1932) and The Road to Glory (1936), paired together for who knows what reason - rarity, perhaps? Or maybe because they re-work similar plot outlines, though then again Hawks more than anyone usually reworked similar plot outlines - was a great boon for audience members whose familiarity with the director is traced from his more known adventure films and comedies."

• "Born in Tehran, educated in Paris, famous (for a time) in Hollywood, a director of documentaries as well as melodramas, Barbet Schroeder is the most cosmopolitan filmmaker to emerge from the French new wave." J Hoberman previews Mad Obsessions: The Films of Barbet Schroeder for the Voice. Through October 21.

• "As a kind of meta-cinematic calling card for one of the most varied and disjointed film movements to straddle mainstream and art cinema, Six in Paris is appropriately fun and disorienting," writes Benjamin H Sutton in the L Magazine. "Like a banal conversation chopped up by jump cuts and ending off-screen as the camera pans right for no reason, these six New Wave directors turn everyday Parisians into portentous vessels of quirks, tragedy and love." Through October 9.

Susan King rounds up local goings on for the Los Angeles Times.

Similarly, Brian Darr for the San Francisco Bay Area.

"The Sundance Film Festival has ended its relationship with new media aggregator Mediastile Inc after the company repeatedly failed to send royalty payments and traffic reports to Sundance directors who screened films online via iTunes, Netflix and XBox LIVE," reports Eric Kohn for indieWIRE. "Over the weekend, Sundance organizers e-mailed filmmakers to confirm the shift, leaving them to resolve their individual situations with Mediastile, which controls digital rights to their work. The decision affects at least 45 filmmakers who had opted to put their work online after also being accepted to screen at Sundance this year, as well as another crop from the 2007 festival."

"The Locarno Film Festival and Italy's National Film Museum in Turin are teaming up on Manga Impact an extensive retro and exhibition dedicated to fostering a better understanding of the Japanese Manga and Anime toon phenom in Europe." Nick Vivarelli reports for Variety.

"Last Saturday night, in Nyack, New York, the Hudson River village where I spent a lot of my kidhood, an ad hoc group of local people in the arts put on a show: a benefit for Barack Obama," blogs Hendrik Hertzberg. "Not to gush or anything, but it was wonderful." Hardly surprising, given who all performed.

GEN ART invites you to apply yourself. Screening committee applications are now being accepted.

Online viewing tip. The Portable Film Festival.

Posted by dwhudson at October 4, 2008 12:11 PM