Shorts, 5/1.

By David Hudson on 05/01/2009

Since the last entry on a new issue of Rouge, six new pieces have been added to #13: Mark Rappaport's "The Secret Life of Objects" is a perfect weekend scroll; in other words, you may start reading from top to bottom, but soon enough you'll be riding up and down the page, taking in the imagery of the spaces and things in the sumptuous stills that accompany the text.

Also, Lars Henrik Gass considers the future of film festivals; Adrian Martin shows us his "Unfinished Diary Las Palmas '09"; HarryTuttle has some fun with CNN's stab at a hologram for the two-dimensional screen (and meantime, at Screenville, he fires a few shots at various attempts to brand film movements).

And: "Jairo Ferreira lived for cinema," writes Filipe Furtado, "including Brazilian cinema; his filmic and written work can be seen as a vast map that involves the richness of Brazilian culture, movies and life - and the path one must take in order to turn it all into what Ferreira valued above all else: invention." Rouge runs Ferreira's 1978 piece, "Horror in Brasilia."

"Watching 'Love Steams' again, and hearing the strangely poignant music of Bo Harwood used so effectively by Cassavetes made me wish there was some way to have access to this music," writes Peter Rinaldi. "Over the years I have come across other people who were very excited by this music as well, who were also lamenting its inaccessibility. So, on a whim the other night, I found Bo Harwood's email online and reached out to him." You probably won't be surprised to learn that he got an answer; but you may be surprised to hear about what Harwood's been up to.

Marlene Dietrich's work in silent films isn't nearly as bad as she claimed, argues David Cairns in The Auteurs' Notebook.

"After the Amateur: Notes" from Ed Halter at Rhizome.

FilmInFocus's latest "Behind the Blog" profile: Peter Nellhaus.

Dan Sallitt: "Auteurism Is a Taste, Not a Theory."

John McElwee introduces "Greenbriar Short Subjects," an occasional gathering of notes and recommendations.

"[W]hile summer will never be the independent film hotbed that is the fall, in recent years there have actually been quite a few indie breakouts during the studio's favorite months." Peter Knegt introduces indieWIRE's guide to Summer 2009; earlier: PopMatters'.

"Dissolute movie producers have told all in books like 'The Kid Stays in the Picture' and 'You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again,'" writes Lawrence Levi in the Los Angeles Times. "But what about the less flashy producers, those staid men and women who anxiously strive to keep their budgets and directors under control? That's the story Michael Deeley means to tell in 'Blade Runners, Deer Hunters, and Blowing the Bloody Doors Off: My Life in Cult Movies.'

Film International runs two essays that have scored Honorable Mentions of the 2008 Frank Capra Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Film Criticism: Alexander Ginnan's "Sign of the Times: Cinematic Representations of Virtual Reality, From 'Tron' to 'eXistenZ'" and Victoria Jaschob's "Fear of Heaven," on "Far From Heaven," "Fear Eats the Soul" and, of course, "All That Heaven Allows."

"There can be few people who would disagree that literature, drama and music should be taught in our schools," blogs Ronald Bergan for the Guardian. "But what about film? Why does film history and film theory have very little place in the school syllabus? Is it because most educationalists see cinema primarily as a pleasant but vacuous diversion, only judging it by its populist side, and not as an art form on a par with the other arts?"

Jonathan Rosenbaum, who'll be reviewing Thomas Pynchon's "Inherent Vice" for Slate when it comes out in August, runs his 1973 review of "Gravity's Rainbow" "intact, complete with the Voice's cutesy title/headline and my bum prophecy at the end."

The latest addition to Scott Tobias's "New Cult Canon" (which, by the way, Scott Wilson asks him about for the Pitch): "Millennium Actress." Also at the AV Club, Nathan Rabin interviews James Toback.

In Salon, Stephanie Zacharek considers "why a real-life virus scare and a wholly fictional movie elicit the same response in us: Both make us think about coming face-to-face with our own sense of aloneness."

"Benten Films has acquired their first Asian film, and what a film it is," announces Andrew Grant. The film is "Fish Eyes," a "powerful, gorgeous Jia Zhang-ke-esque independent drama from newcomer Zheng Wei, who I am convinced is at the start of a long and successful career. Part of the new Beijing independent movement, Zheng's film is remarkably assured, particularly for a first film."

The Cinema Guild has picked up rights to distribute Andrew Bujalski's "Beeswax" in the US, reports Peter Knegt in indieWIRE.

Gary Hustwit in frieze on making "Helvetica" and "Objectified": "I've come to appreciate how similar the methodology of design is to film. In a formal sense, the screen on which a film is projected is a horizontal rectangle, and a filmmaker's job is to arrange things within that rectangle in much the same way a graphic designer arranges type and images on a page."

A list from William Bostwick at Flavorwire: "Architecture in the Movies: 8 Classic Films."

Chris MaGee lists the "Top Ten Japanese Films that Make Us Cry."

Andy Horbal lists his "Favorites movies, 2006 - 2008."

New issues out today: Artforum, the Believer and - more on this one soon, of course - Bright Lights Film Journal.

Online viewing tip #1. Kevin Lee presents a Q&A with Ying Liang ("The Other Half").

Online viewing tip #2. David Poland talks with Paolo Sorrentino ("Il Divo"). Related: Susan King's brief profile for the Los Angeles Times.

Online viewing tip #3. What is David Lynch's Interview Project? 20K miles over 70 days, across the US and back. Sample a few of the questions, and we'll all find out more on June 1.

[Photo: Jairo Ferreira]

Tags: Gary Hustwit, Jairo Ferreira, James Toback, John Cassavetes, Marlene Dietrich, Michael Deeley, Rouge, Thomas Pynchon