Shorts, 2/4.

By David Hudson on 02/04/2009

"Al Pacino will play the title role in 'King Lear,' an adaptation of the Shakespeare play that will be directed by Michael Radford," reports Michael Fleming in Variety.

Also: Dade Hayes and Dave McNary report that the Weinstein Co has optioned the rights to Gerald Clarke's "Get Happy: The Life of Judy Garland." Reviews of the book: George Hodgman (EW), Monica Stark (January) and Vanessa Thorpe (Observer); and CNN has an excerpt.

Wolfgang Becker will be directing an adaptation of Daniel Kehlmann's novel "Ich und Kaminski" with Daniel Brühl in the lead. The two last worked together on "Good Bye, Lenin!" The Tagesspiegel reports (in German).

"Sunday's celebration in Copenhagen of the 25th Roberts Awards, presented by the Danish Film Academy, was a triumphal night for Henrik Ruben Genz, whose film 'Terribly Happy' won seven awards, including Best Film and Best Director." Annika Pham reports for Cineuropa.

In the Tisch Film Review, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky wishes Michael Cimino a happy 70th - despite everything: "Like many American filmmakers with troubled production histories, he's moved to Paris and tried his hand at being a novelist. He has become a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres, lost weight, dyed his hair and hidden his sympathetic eyes behind aviator shades. He has been in one stage or another of pre-production on an adaptation of André Malraux's 'Man's Fate' since the beginning of this century. He is trying his best to remain in suspended animation, hoping that someday we will come and wake him and he can make movies again."

Via Bookforum, I've only just now come across signandsight's translation of Helmut Merker's review of Alexander Kluge's "News from Ideological Antiquity. Marx - Eisenstein - Das Kapital" for the Tagesspiegel last month.

For Filmmaker, Nick Dawson talks with Veit Helmer about "Absurdistan" as well as "his retro tastes, the international nature of his filmmaking, and the dangers of not recognizing Glenn Close."

The Guardian runs a transcript of Mark Salisbury's recent onstage interview with David Fincher. Meanwhile, the New Yorker's Richard Brody takes note of a rave for "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button in Le Monde.

Here at IFC, R Emmet Sweeney talks with Alexis dos Santos about "Unmade Beds," which premiered at Sundance, then went on to Rotterdam. More on the film from Brandon Harris at Hammer to Nail.

In the Auteurs' Notebook, Glenn Kenny notes the place of Frank Borzage's "They Had To See Paris" (1929) in the creation of Will Rogers's persona in a series of films treating "a theme that's rather watered-down Twain, that is, American common sense meeting up with and defeating European stuffiness and/or frivolity."

"For those who didn't get enough of Iraq on their movie screens over the last six years, here's 'Memorial Day,'" growls Andrew Schenker in Slant. "Because apparently what we need is not only one more shitty film about the occupation, but one more shitty film about the occupation which consists principally of a brutalizing, unreflective restaging of Abu Ghraib, which pointlessly links the aggressive attitudes of the American soldier to that of the spring-break reveler and which places the blame for US wartime atrocities squarely on the shoulders of the average army grunt." More from Ed Gonzalez (Slant) and Nathan Lee (New York Times). And indieWIRE interviews director Josh Fox. At the IFC Center today and tomorrow.

Horses Think notes the influence of photographer Saul Leiter on the production design of "Revolutionary Road." Via wood s lot.

"What if 'Waterworld' were an eco-parable whose message was merely ahead of its time?" wonders David Zax in Slate.

Simon Brew at Den of Geek lists "55 movie remakes currently in the works." Via Coudal Partners, warning, "Don't click if you anger easily."

In Salon, Andrew O'Hehir writes up the "best DVDs of 2009 (so far)."

[Photo: "Memorial Day," Bay Bridge Productions, 2008]

Tags: Al Pacino, Alexander Kluge, Frank Borzage, Judy Garland, Michael Cimino, Unmade Beds, Veit Helmer, Will Rogers