Even the weirder artists of the twentieth century have been attracted to the allure of Hollywood filmmaking, and Salvador Dali was no exception. In the fall of 1941, the surrealist painter hosted a masquerade party at Pebble Beach during one of his regular visits to the town. Called "Surrealism Night in An Enchanted Forest," the fundraising event, intended to assist European refugee artists, brought out a number of stars, including Bob Hope and Ginger Rogers. It was here, the story goes, that Dali became attached to a major studio production called Moontide. The great German emigre Fritz Lang was hired to direct the movie, and asked Dali to create a three-minute nightmare sequence for the film. Unfortunately, after the incident at Pearl Harbor later that year, Twentieth Century Fox deemed the project too bleak. Lang was replaced, and Dali's nightmare sequence went with him.

Although inspired by the movies, Dali didn't always have the easiest time making them. He would get another chance to inject his hallucinatory vision into American cinema with the hypnosis scene in Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound, but it's his unrealized projects that truly indicate the scope of the painter's ambition. So many ideas, such little time. Dali: Painting and Film, a breathtakingly unique exhibit currently on display at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, surveys Dali's completed cinematic works in addition to tidbits from the ones that never came to fruition. Marvelously structured to show how his paintings were intentionally cinematic, the exhibit contains all the obvious highlights from Dali's movie career alongside lesser-known productions. The importance in film history of his collaborations with Luis Bunuel remain uncontested; two large screens in separate rooms showing Un Chien Andalou (where the opening eye splicing retains its original gross-out impact) and L'Age D'Or attest to that. Fewer visitors, however, might know about Dali's collaboration with the Marx Brothers on a deliriously strange movie that sounded too good to be true.

One of the most pleasant surprises of Fantastic Fest this year was Timecrimes (Los Cronocrimenes), which had its world premiere at the Austin fest -- and won the top prize. I went to the second screening at the festival after the audience at the first screening urged the rest of us not to miss it. Not only was the movie itself supposed to be good, but Spanish writer/director Nacho Vigalondo's Q&A was also getting buzz. (The funniest parts are unsuitable for family reading.) The movie lived up to the hype, although the plot was almost too clever for its own good.

As you might guess from the title, Timecrimes does involve time travel, but first and foremost it's a suspense thriller. Hector (Karra Elejalde) and his wife are spending a routine afternoon unpacking furniture at their new house in the country, but things aren't quite perfect. First, Hector receives an odd phone call. Then as he lounges in the backyard with binoculars, he catches a glimpse of a topless woman in the woods behind the yard. He decides to explore the wooded area, perhaps hoping for more salacious peeks, and that's when everything starts to go wrong. A man with a bandaged face seems to be attacking him, and Hector escapes to a very strange scientific facility manned by a lone scientist (Vigalondo). I can't say any more without spoiling the plot ... I hope I haven't revealed too much as it is.

People all over the world are unhappy with Hollywood's domination of foreign box office. It gives audiences worse movies, which must appeal to all of the world. It influences a number of cultures to be more like American. And, most devastatingly, it ruins the production and the identity of national cinemas. Last year we saw a major protest in South Korea because the government was eliminating a quota that mandated theaters to show a certain amount of domestic product per year. This week there was another protest, this one in Spain, but it had an opposite demand. The Federation of Spanish Cinemas (like our own National Association of Theatre Owners) is upset with a proposed "Cinema Law", which is currently moving through the Spanish parliament, mandating that theaters must show one Spanish film for every three imports they show. As a sign of protest and criticism of the law, the Federation shut down 93% of the nation's cinemas Monday, though just for the one day.

Because there are about 230 theaters that aren't a part of the Federation, some people in Spain were able to find a movie if they really tried, but with around 3770 cinemas closed, I feel bad for anybody doing the trying. It wouldn't be surprising if representatives from Hollywood head over to Spain to support the protest, and maybe even bully convince the government, as they have a lot to lose from the law. The Federation apparently has a lot to lose, too, because Spanish films don't perform nearly as well at the box office as Hollywood fare. But last year the nation's top15 highest grossing films included three titles that were at least Spanish co-productions, with Alatriste being all the way up at number 4 (it does star Viggo Mortensen). In 2005, the same position held a Spanish film, Torrente 3: El Protector. Of course, this isn't that great considering most of the other titles are from Hollywood, and so Hollywood is where most of moviegoer's money is going. Plus, so far this year, the highest grossing Spanish film of 2007 (El Ekipo Ja) is all the way down at number 40.

There's an impressive, careful complexity to DarkBlueAlmostBlack that belies the inexperience of first-time director Daniel Sánchez Arévalo. When one learns that he's been a screenwriter for 15 years, however, the unassuming detail of his film becomes less of a surprise. In his debut feature, Arévalo takes a story -- an impotent prison inmate enlists his bother to impregnate his girlfriend, a fellow prisoner desperate for a maternity ward move -- ripe for obvious humor and unsubtle sex jokes and turns it into a subtle, rewarding exploration of family, and the lies we tell ourselves to survive.

The ostensible star of Arévalo's film is Jorge (Quim Gutiérrez), a lonely, ambitious 20-something who has spent the last seven years working as a janitor and caring for his invalid father. Going to school part-time since his father's stroke, Jorge managed to get a degree in business administration, but the seven years in school and his unmanageable home situation conspire to get him nothing but rejection in his frequent, desperate job interviews. By turns resigned and resentful, Jorge simultaneously hates his father for trapping him and is plagued by guilt because the two were fighting when the stroke hit all those years ago.

Guillermo Del Toro's new film, Pan's Labyrinth, is about young Ofelia (Ivana Baquero), who finds a gateway to a fantastic world of gods and monsters, pleasures and perils; a fairly standard set up. She's her mother's best friend, especially now that her mother has married her wicked step-father; again, off the production line for fairy tales. But Ofelia's new father isn't merely wicked; he's a Captain in Franco's army after the right-wing has seized Spain, and this is where you get a sense of the customary flair and shading Del Toro's putting on traditional fantasy ideas.

Good fantasy takes place in a world full of conflicts -- between good and evil, desire and sacrifice, cruelty and mercy, freedom and slavery. Or, put more succinctly, good fantasy can often be appreciated in terms of how much it resembles the real world, not by how much it departs from it. When Ofelia finds a fantastic kingdom in the labyrinth garden near her new home, it's a bizarre place full of visions and creatures and a smiling-scary satyr (actor Doug Jones, performing in thick layers of extraordinarily well-done practical effects). As odd and frightening as that world seems, it's just as odd and frightening as the world she lives in normally -- where her new father, Captain Vidal (Sergi López) is dedicated to wiping out the republican holdouts and local partisans by any bloody means necessary. The satyr explains to Ophelia that she is not who she thinks she is; she is a lost princess, and she can return to where she belongs if she carries out the three tasks he gives her, without fail and without question.

Hot on the heels of the massive success of his Match Point (which was shot in England), Woody Allen has signed a deal to make a movie in Barcelona in 2007. Based on his agreement with Spanish production company Mediapro, Allen will employ Spanish actors for the film, as well as Spanish crew and "artistic teams." The as-yet-unnamed film is expected to be Allen's follow up to the forth-coming Scoop which, like Match Point, stars the suddenly inescapable Scarlett Johansson, and was set and shot in England.

Barcelona will be Allen's first effort at shooting an entire film in a non-English speaking country. Whatever could be next? Might we see Woody Allen in beret, perhaps toting a baguette? Please?