The Hottest State is one of the most inauthentic films I've seen in a long time. Written and directed by Ethan Hawke, and from his own novel no less, the film plays out like some version of hell where everyone is being forced to perform in an acting class skit that will never end. The story follows William (Mark Webber), a 20-year-old aspiring actor who is hanging around the Manhattan bar scene when he runs into Sarah, the girl of his dreams. The casting of Sarah is the movie's fatal flaw. As written, she's an aspiring singer who is gaga over William, but Catalina Sandino Moreno is an actress who, it's clear from the get-go, can't sing a note and worse, seems ready to climb the walls to get away from her co-star throughout the picture. I've seen more sexual chemistry from two doorknobs. Watching this mess, you have to believe that Ethan Hawke, as talented as he is, must have realized he was making a colossal turkey but was too far into the thing to back out.

And that's only the start of it. The Hottest State is structurally odd -- something that's sometimes a necessity in the case of book adaptations, but especially true in this case, since what begins as a romance ultimately takes on the trappings of a thriller in the third act. I won't go into specifics in case you plan to see it for yourself, but let's just say that if the entire movie were on the same wavelength as the third act, I think we'd actually have an interesting, tough little film here. I also think Hawke must have known this too on some level, because it's only in the third act that his personality as a director begins to shine through -- interesting and creative camera choices, powerful acting moments and an earned level of tension that are present only during this part of the movie. The first two-thirds of the film are a cloying, obnoxious romantic fable about two young people bouncing around in Manhattan and down in Mexico, lounging around and pretending, for our benefit, that they actually love each other.

One of these years, Cinematical is going to have to send someone Down Under to watch things drain the opposite way and check out the Melbourne International Film Festival. The fest, which opened Wednesday and runs through August 12, has a bonanza of excellent films for fest attendees to revel in. If you live in Melbourne and don't want to waste your precious fest budget on films that are going to open there soon anyhow, Man About Town has a super-convenient reference chart of films that have already secured local distribution. It's a great idea, and hopefully one that we'll see with other fests -- it's a bit of a battle to figure out which films you can see a week or month later in theaters, thus opening your schedule for the films that might never hit the screen again.

The selection of films contains everything from old-news films like Inland Empire and Red Road, to great new documentaries like Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten and A Walk Into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory, which I recently reviewed from Toronto's HotDocs. But those are on the already-found distribution side of things. The Melbourne Film Blog is posting short reviews of a number of films, such as Kim Ki-Duk's Breath, and the festival's website is posting extra news about screenings and filmmaker chats. Heck, Ethan Hawke will be on-hand to introduce The Hottest State and give a Q&A, something my screening at TIFF last year was sadly without. The fest has only just begun, so if you're itching for films to see during the Aussie winter, I'd suggest checking it out.

Since Ethan Hawke seems to have better luck with movies than he does in the literary world, if anyone was going to make a film from his debut novel, it might as well have been him. ThinkFilm has just released the trailer for the film version of Hawke's book, The Hottest State. Hawke wrote and directed the story about a struggling actor in a tempestuous relationship with a singer -- throw in some parental abandonment issues and you have your typical Generation X love story. The film marks the third directorial effort for Hawke; the last time was back in 2001 with the ensemble piece Chelsea Walls. State stars Mark Webber, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Michelle Williams, Laura Linney, and Hawke even makes an appearance to play Webber's father in flashbacks.

The book was released back in 1996, and while reviews were somewhat harsh -- it doesn't get much worse than, "His callow cynicism about women and his flattened out, '90s rendition of Holden Caulfield grow wearisome". It's hard to say whether it was because critics had their knives out for an actor-turned-author, or maybe the book just wasn't that good. The film premiered at the 2006 Venice Film Festival, but much like the book, reviewers weren't exactly falling over themselves with praise. Hawke seems to be through with directing for now though, and the actor has since signed for double "vampire duty" in the horror flick Daybreakers, and The Countess with Before Sunrise co-star Julie Delpy. The Hottest State is set for a limited release on August 24.

Image fests aren't only for the big summer blockbusters. IGN has thrown up pictures for a bunch of indie films, so I thought I'd share:

• First, there's The Hottest State, Ethan Hawke's first directorial feature since 2001's Chelsea Walls. I was able to catch the film when it was at TIFF a few years back, and it's not bad. I preferred star Mark Weber's stint in Dear Wendy, but it had an interesting take on NYC romance (surprise, surprise) and a cast that also included Laura Linney and Frank Whaley. The pictures include some of Weber's on-screen romance with Catalina Sandino Moreno, a chat with Michelle Williams and a few other clips as well as the movie's poster. While it's taken a while to get to the public-at-large, State is gearing up for a limited release on August 24.
• This year, Scott Weinberg reviewed The Ten from Sundance, saying that it felt "a little like a "cult flick" waiting to happen," and then I directed you to a trailer for the strange movie will a killer cast. Now, the collection of pictures that IGN has posted over the last month are definitely a must-see if you're curious about the movie. There's Adam Brody stuck in the ground, Justin Theroux's Jesus grabbing some toosh, a room full of almost-naked men with beer and munchies, Winona Ryder embracing a dummy (of the wooden variety) and Ken Marino (Vinnie Van Lowe from Veronica Mars) pointing at an x-ray that shows a scissors resting against a spine. The movie hits theaters on August 3 -- in, of course, limited release.
• Last but not least, there is a little documentary goodness for you indie fans. The final link will send you to images from David Sington's doc -- In the Shadow of the Moon. The movie, which is about the surviving crew from NASA's Apollo missions, won the World Cinema Audience Award this year at Cannes. This final collection of images is one that you space geeks will especially like because it not only includes pics of the crew, but also some funky scenes from space -- high-quality ones at that! Just like the other two, Shadow will head to limited release in a few months -- on September 7.