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Indie Roundup is your weekly guide to what's new and upcoming in the world of independent film. This week: a special festival edition. Pictured, clockwise from upper left: One Too Many Mornings, International Film Festival Rotterdam, El Sol, Red White & Blue.

Fest Scene. As our extensive coverage of Sundance 2010 reflects, the festival has kicked off the year in style, inspiring genuine enthusiasm for new American independent films. Sundance is not the only place to discover exciting new work, though, and relatively few of the festival's selections win distribution deals, leaving everyone else to fend for themselves.

Enter The Film Collaborative, a new "non-profit, full-service provider." As reported by indieWIRE, the outfit "aims to provide a range of what it describes as 'affordable' distribution, educational and marketing services to independent filmmakers, but it will not take film rights." The latter is an important point for filmmakers, obviously. The Film Collaborative says it's "opening up a new landscape of distribution opportunities free of extraneous middlemen and unfair contract terms." Hmm, if I'm reading this correctly, The Film Collaborative is a middle man, and most of their services are fee-based, but I guess the idea is that one middle man is better than many middlemen.

Meanwhile, Cinetic Rights Management's FilmBuff, self-described as a "digital movie label," has launched a channel on the Babelgum mobile platform, according to a prepared statement by the company. Babelgum has a downloadable app for phones (if they happen to be smart, like iPhone and Android), and FilmBuff will make available past Sundance titles such as Slacker, The Order of Myths, and The Unforeseen on their channel; 'indies to go,' as it were.

After the jump: The YouTube experiment! Strange cartoons and slacker revenge at Rotterdam!

Indie Roundup is your weekly guide to what's new and upcoming in the independent film world. Pictured above, clockwise from upper left: Mine, the Palm Springs International Film Festival, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnussus, The White Ribbon.

Opening Theatrically / Online / On Demand. If the world goes to the dogs, who will feed and care for them? Geralyn Pezanoski's Mine considers what happened to the animals left behind in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The film, which won the Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature at SXSW last year, "may churn your emotions," I wrote for another site. "Once the true essence of the story becomes apparent, it's difficult to turn away from the screen. The heart of the documentary lies in the conflict between pet lovers." The doc is warm-hearted, but doesn't shy away from portraying both sides of the sometimes-contentious conflicts that developed.

Mine opens theatrically in San Francisco on Friday, according to our friends at indieWIRE, the same day that the film will premiere on iTunes. Thereafter, distributor Film Movement will expand the release to New York and New Orleans, with a 20-city release to follow. The official site reveals that the filmmakers will be in attendance at the Roxie Theater for opening weekend, and also has more details on the release and the trailer.

Festival Scene. The Palm Springs International Film Festival kicked off last night in the desert resort town with a gala presentation of Michael Hoffman's The Last Station. The fest typically draws huge mobs of local film lovers who eagerly line up to see a huge selection of foreign and independent films; I attended once and had a grand time. Check the fest site for more information.

After the jump: Box Office Bonanza?

The movies' penchant for wish fulfillment often requires them to make their triumphs monumental, but the new film Fish Tank makes a convincing case for modesty. The story of a teenage girl discovering herself in Great Britain's equivalent of a housing project, its very conception is steeped in understated humanity, but writer-director Andrea Arnold refuses to indulge melodrama at every turn, creating a film that feels like a less romantic counterpart to another recent coming-of-age story, An Education, but is just as substantial.

Katie Jarvis plays Mia, an embittered, hostile 15-year old who comes home one day to discover that her party-girl mom Joanne (Kierston Wareing) has a new boyfriend named Connor (Michael Fassbender). Though initially standoffish, she slowly succumbs to his charms, especially after he encourages her to develop her burgeoning talents as a dancer. But as she advances closer to womanhood, attracting the attention of a young man her own age, Connor becomes increasingly protective of Mia, eventually drawing her into a relationship that tests the limits – as well as the boundaries - of their fragile, fledgling emotional bond.

Several months ago while Quentin Tarantino promoted Inglourious Basterds, he mentioned that he might only make a few more films before he retires because, as he said, he didn't want to make "old man" movies. If anyone is unclear as to precisely what an "old man" movie is, they need look no further than Everybody's Fine, Robert De Niro's latest film, about a father trying to reconnect with his adult children after the death of his wife.

De Niro, once an indisputable fount of actorly integrity and hard work, has in recent years played a series of characters that either demanded little of his oft-discussed commitment, or exploited his persona as an intimidating figure both on and off screen. And while the character he plays here indicates a return to the kind of character work that made him a screen icon, there's no denying that the film itself is the cinematic equivalent of career achievement award, which is why Everybody's Fine is well-done and effective but too treacly to be truly powerful.

Just when movies about the war in Iraq had exhausted audience interest, this summer's sleeper hit The Hurt Locker came along. And just when those same audiences thought there was only one movie about Iraq that could resonate with them, The Messenger comes along. Starring Ben Foster, Woody Harrelson and Samantha Morton, the film is not only a revelatory look at the war's logistical repercussions stateside, but an examination of the emotional toll not only battle but survival takes on soldiers, culminating in a poignant tale of redemption that counts as one of the very best films of the year.

Foster (3:10 To Yuma) plays Will Montgomery, a staff sergeant more or less waiting out his last days as a military officer after an extended tour of duty in Iraq. Although he initially (and understandably) reluctant to participate when he is enlisted to inform families of the deaths of their loved ones, he bonds with his superior officer, Tony Stone (Harrelson), and slowly emerges from his own emotional morass as a result of reaching out to these grieving families. But when he and Tony inform a mother named Olivia (Morton) of her husband's death, he becomes inextricably involved in her and her son's life, realizing that the tenuous relationships he previously participated in are no substitute for something more meaningful.

It's not hard to like any movie that uses the Beach Boys' music, but Wes Anderson makes it especially easy. As Hollywood's foremost purveyor of hipster drama, his pedigree as a reliable selector of appropriately wistful, poignant and all-around unforgettable songs is virtually unrivaled, but Fantastic Mr. Fox exceeds even the work of his earlier films, using "Heroes and Villains," and later, "I Get Around" as populist punctuation that manages to be both specifically relevant and substantively rousing.

As an animated opus, the film is by necessity his most controlled to date, a painstakingly-designed dollhouse where he no longer controls just the music, sets, and costumes, but the performers themselves. Ironically, however, it feels like his loosest as well - a gloriously unwieldy comedy of manners submerged in the minutiae of Anderson's madcap creativity. All of which makes Fantastic Mr. Fox a celebration both of its stop-motion medium and Anderson's aesthetic, while still managing to fully document the spectacular fun in original author Roald Dahl's daffy, distinctive imagination.

The Messenger opened the 12th Savannah Film Festival with a bang: a sellout crowd, international press, and Hollywood stars Woody Harrelson and Ben Foster in attendance to rub elbows all night. Even without the glitz, though, Savannah was a smart place to screen the Iraq drama. Oren Moverman's film is a character study about a soldier (Foster) dealing with the aftermath of war, but like Kathryn Bigelow's Iraq film The Hurt Locker, it's about the personal toll Iraq leaves on soldiers who survive and the families of those who don't; the politics of war are hardly an issue. And so, in a city that supports two military bases and the men and women who serve them, The Messenger played like gangbusters.

Foster stars as William Montgomery, a recent Iraq returnee dealing with serious leftover issues and a new assignment to play out his final three months of service: informing families that their loved ones have been killed on duty. As Montgomery's partner, Harrelson provides moments of levity, but there were plenty of sniffles throughout the film just the same.

While it was pretty easy to figure out what the general consensus was, there were three figures in particular I was watching for a reaction – the only three uniformed soldiers in attendance, who may or may not have been connected to the production. (The film has been screened for military personnel, and Harrelson and Foster personally met soldiers at Hunter Army Airfield prior to the night's screening.) When asked what military folk have thought of his film in the post-screening Q&A, director Moverman deferred to one of the officers in the audience to share his reaction with the crowd. What follows is the unnamed soldier's impromptu review of The Messenger.

I'm in Savannah, Georgia to spend a week as a guest blogger for the Savannah Film Festival, an eight-day fest hosted in the historic Southern town by the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD). [Read my entries in the "Voices from the Fest" section on the festival website.] As the town prepares to kick off the 12th annual festivities with the Iraq film, or rather post-Iraq film, The Messenger, I'm wondering how SFF's growing success might reflect or even influence the rise of film festivals that similarly fall somewhere in between the biggies (Cannes, Sundance, Toronto, Venice) and the little guys.

For starters, a brief look at SFF's line-up and star-studded guest list. The festival begins today, October 31, with The Messenger, a Sundance entry that has Oscar possibilities but more likely will make a run at the Indie Spirit Awards. Stars Woody Harrelson and Ben Foster will be in attendance. (I will be attempting to run into them at the local Starbucks or wherever it is that Hollywood actors hang out when they visit other cities.) Another Oscar hopeful, the Emily Blunt-starring period biopic The Young Victoria, is screening the following day.

And then there are the almost certain Oscar pictures: George Clooney in The Men Who Stare At Goats; Lone Scherfig's An Education; Michael Haneke's Cannes winner The White Ribbon; Kathryn Bigelow's The Hurt Locker, with star Jeremy Renner in attendance; and Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire, which will bring both director Lee Daniels and his star Gabourey Sidibe to town.

Read on for more about this year's Savannah Film Festival.

Indie Roundup, your weekly dose of what's happening (slightly) outside the mainstream.

Deals. Via our friends at indieWIRE, we learn that Brian Baugh's faith-based To Save a Life will be released by Samuel Goldwyn Films in January 2010. The film follows an "all-American teen" boy dealing with the aftermath of a friend's death. Cross-cultural romantic drama Cairo Time, starring Patricia Clarkson, will hit theaters and on-demand home viewing systems sometime in the new year, courtesy of IFC Films. Bradley Rust Gray's The Exploding Girl will open in early 2010 through Oscilloscope Laboratories. Zoe Kazan stars as a young college woman dealing with conflicting romantic feelings while home in New York for spring break.

Online / On Demand Viewing. Two recommendations this week, both for titles that are newly available through Amazon's VOD service. Susan Seidelman's Smithereens is a quintessentially New York picture and a fiercely independent experience from a time when indies were few and far between. It's a blast of fresh air about Wren (Susan Berman), a rough-talking young woman, and her travails through the seedier side of life as she tries to make something of herself. It's essential viewing, especially if you've been disappointed by one too many slick faux-indies. Musician Richard Hell is great, too.

Much less essential, but no less vital viewing, is Arlene Nelson's Naked States, which trails along as Spencer Tunick engineers massive works of art composed by live, naked human flesh. Tunick is a fascinating photographer / hustler, and so are the people who decide to bare all for the sake of art.

Activity of a different kind, Chilean cleaning, and AFI Fest -- after the jump!

I'm not sure exactly what quality it is that real people possess and actors lack, but any time a film pretends to document real behavior, either literally or as a reenactment, something is almost always missing. Sometimes the problem is a deliberate decision to enhance events with artificial emphasis or drama, and sometimes it's simply too great a sense of self-awareness in the actor, who knows he or she is performing. But while there are a precious few movies that nail that authenticity, notably the recent underdog-blockbuster Paranormal Activity, such is certainly the case in The Fourth Kind, a film that purports to build an argument for alien abductions using "actual" footage from case studies.

While much of the movie's so-called source material carries the convincing roughness and deficiencies of homemade, handheld recording, too much of it seems far too calculated, both in its technical proficiency and the performances contributed by its "real" people. Further, its accompanying reenactments by recognizable actors undermine the possibility that audiences can take its case seriously, all of which adds up to thriller that unravels easily even if it nevertheless occasionally qualifies as a scary good time.