Chew on this:

• The last time I mentioned Margot Kidder, LiLo was in talks to take a role in her Dante Tomaselli horror film, The Ocean. Now the ex-Lois Lane is going to star in a thriller called The Box Collector. The project is being helmed by John Daly, who last directed The Aryan Couple, but is better-known for his role as executive producer on huge films like Platoon and The Terminator. The movie is about "a brooding young artist who falls for a flirtatious young divorcee, despite his overprotective mother's increasingly crazed efforts to halt any relationship." Pesky mothers, but I have to say, this sounds more like a romcom than a thriller. I imagine Kidder is the crazy mom, and perhaps co-star Noah Segan (Brick) is the kid and Michael Bowen (Kill Bill: Vol. 1) is the dad? The last two on the docket are European, which probably means this is the girl in question -- Belgium newcomer Lyne Renee, with Dutch actor Victor Low playing her ex. The movie will start shooting next week in Manitoba, Canada.
• There's a fun little interview over at TOMB with one of the flamboyant players of John Cameron Mitchell's Shortbus -- Justin Bond, who played the mistress of the "salon for the gifted and challenged." Besides the stint on the infamous orgy film, Bond's cabaret duo, Kiki and Herb, got a Tony nod this year. He speaks of the nomination, and of course, his time as the mistress and just what that orgy scene was like: "I could have joined in the scene, like John did, but I didn't really feel like it. And after you're in the room with all those bodies for a couple of hours under the lights, the smell isn't really that appealing." Hours of sweaty, smelly orgies -- some people are so dedicated to their work. Or they just really, really like each other -- Bond says that the Shortbus crew became a close group and play wiffleball in the park on Sundays. Will this be part 2 -- Wifflebus?
• The latest duo to hit the indie scene -- Barbara Hershey and Ron Perlman. Variety has reported that both are starring in Vacuuming the Cat, which is, and I quote, the story of "a young man who, after suffering the death of his wife, goes tot he desert to build a porch for his aunt and meets a retired ex-cop who guides him through his grief toward acceptance." I assume the porch will be attached to a house, and not be of the Scrubs variety. Then again, this is a dramedy, so who knows? Kenny Golde is directing the script by Ted Henning, and Daniel Gillies, Irma P. Hall and Pat Crawford Brown are also on the cast list. Note: this is the second film both Hershey and Perlman share -- the first was Frogs for Snakes, a comedy thriller from the 90's.
  

Just when you thought the IMDb was the greatest asset to movie lovers, the site has gone and revealed itself to be less a service to the cinematic community and more of a privilege from another corporate power worried about its public image. It isn't clear when the site instituted this, but as of today the IMDb has a search filter that makes it difficult to locate some titles, specifically pornographic or otherwise sexually explicit titles. These titles include the usual XXX fare, but also include more mainstream films like John Cameron Mitchell's Shortbus and Caligula, which stars Golden Globe winner Helen Mirren.

They aren't gone from the database, though. Shortbus can be found by way of Mitchell, who shows up when searched. The same goes for Caligula, which can be found in a roundabout way via its stars. But the IMDb isn't only filtering out the titles, it is also filtering out some performers who appear in adult titles. At least that's how it seems. The Rabbi Report experimented with the IMDb search and discovered that while most of the Shortbus cast doesn't show up, some large profile porn stars do show up. As further examples, I tested out the names Jenna Jameson, John Holmes and Ron Jeremy -- all were easily searched. Then I looked up The Brown Bunny and the documentary Inside Deep Throat -- neither was easily located.

I was immediately intrigued when I started hearing about Shortbus. After seeing both Hedwig and the Angry Inch and his First Day of My Life video from Bright Eyes, I was intrigued. I didn't actually believe that the sex could be as graphic as promised. I was comparing the whole thing to the ridiculous uproar over Kill Bill and how fake, over-the-top violence somehow made it more violent than other movies. And then I sat down to watch the film, which John Cameron Mitchell made sure to start with an explosion ... literally.

I was actually a bit disappointed in the film, as I was hoping for rampant sex with a little more responsibility -- that, and my assumptions about the Star Spangled Banner were a bit off-target. Nonetheless, Mitchell managed to make an intriguing film where the sex was long and graphic without being gratuitous. In fact, it was the inclinations that were gratuitous more than anything else. However, no matter how well it was received by some circles, it's still a film with a lot of actual sex in it, and that doesn't make for great wide-spread money making ventures. Hell, it isn't even searchable on imdb, you have to find it through Mitchell's directorial links.

To try to help the film with its DVD sales, Mitchell is taking a cue from the Weinsteins and their marketing plan for Clerks 2. Usually, a fan's street team efforts result in free discs and other sorts of fan goodies. Well, this filmmaker is taking it a step farther. CHUD has reported about the film's new DVD promotion: Any person who raises awareness of the film by sending an e-card to five friends will find their name in the DVD's credits. Talk about being immortalized in thanks. It's definitely a neat gimmick, but I'm not sure if it's the right one.

In an effort to expand and prove they can now roll with the big boys, THINKFilm was bought by film financier and producer David Bergstein for an undisclosed amount of money. (Yeah, that means it was a lot.) Bergstein has been on the move recently, having snatched up Capitol Films (one of Britain's largest film production, financing and sales companies) earlier this month. He then merged Capitol with his own production company, Mobius Pictures.

Says Bergstein, "The collaboration will allow us to pursue our grand vision, including becoming more involved in production, wider releases and rapid expansion." Seeing as THINKFilm has always gone after "interesting" projects, but never really had the dough to move up in the food chain, I'd say this is a pretty sweet deal for them ... IF they stay true to their reputation and continue to pursue films that are often deemed "too controversial" for other major production companies and distributors. While no one from THINKFilm is losing their job because of this sale and (right now) they're still committed to high-quality independent films, one only hopes they remain that way in the future. I'd hate to see films like Shortbus and Born Into Brothels: Calcutta's Red-Light Kids get the shaft because THINKFilm is now too good for that kind of material. So, what do you, er, think?

It was gone for a while -- but now, it's back -- Coming Distractions, Cinematical's weekly podcast! This week's special guest is Time Out New York Film Critic David Fear, and David and myself talk about Jesus Camp, The Last King of Scotland, Shortbus and many others -- as well as the New York Film Festival, the difference between cretins and Spartans and much, much more. You can listen to the entire podcast by just downloading it here -- and let us know what you'd most like to hear in the Podcast in the future!

(Music credits: "Overdose," Dumb.)

As advertised, there's a whole lotta sex in John Cameron Mitchell's Shortbus. Men with men, women with women, women with men and all possible multiplications and permutations thereof. Which really shouldn't be surprising, since the film is quite aggressively about sex. Unlike the great majority of cinematic sex scenes -- most of which are blocked and scored so carefully that they're more like choreographed, showy dances than anything else -- those in Shortbus are no mere window dressing, and nor are they present as excuses to get pretty people to take their clothes off (and then be artfully covered by that old Hollywood favorite, the L-shaped sheet). Instead, they're crucial to the plot, and to the development of the characters in the film. And they're also a whole lot of fun, much of the time. Mitchell and his cast very successfully avoid both the falseness of mainstream sex scenes and the bow-chick-a-bow-bow absurdity of straight-up porn, arriving instead in a place of realism, where actual people have actual sex. Sweaty, awkward, joyous, sad sex that's not always either pretty or sexy.

Alright, I'm officially excited about the Toronto Film Festival now. The lineup for the Fest's new Vanguard sidebar -- a group of 11 "risky, more challenging" films -- was announced yesterday, and there's some great stuff included. Personally, I'm most looking forward to finally seeing John Cameron Mitchell's Shortbus, which James (and everyone else) loved at Cannes, as well as Johnnie To's award-winning Election and Election 2, both of which are are being featured in the Vanguard program. Also on the list are 2:37, an Australian, Elephant-style movie about a suicide (that almost drove James to off himself), Renaissance, the black and white French animated flick we've told you about a couple of times, and Macbeth, a modern, Melbourne-set adaptation of the play, which will be making its world premiere.

The TIFF runs September 7-16 this year, and we'll be driving you nuts with lots and lots of reviews from there.

As I approach 30, I've come to accept the fact I will most likely live out the rest of my life without ever truly understanding women. Also, how is it one sock always manages to disappear after doing laundry? To me, those two are life's greatest mysteries. I don't care where we came from or whether or not God actually exists. Women and missing socks -- that's all I need to understand. Explain them and I'm set for life.

The following films all examine the unique relationships shared between men and women. Boys and girls. Him and her. The dude and his lady. Sometimes a woman can enter a man's life and completely ruin things, turn it upside down and shatter his foundation. However, the presence of a women, so delicate and warm, can also turn into life's most precious reward ... until a sock goes missing. Then it's war. Welcome to this week's Trailer Park:

The organizers of the massive Toronto International Film Festival announced the names of all 25 of their North American premieres (a number that amounts to about 2% of the roughly 30 zillion movies that will screen at the fest) yesterday, and it looks like Toronto is setting up to be Cannes West. Among those titles are such Cannes successes as Red Road, Shortbus, Babel, Nani Moretti's The Caiman and Palme d'Or winner The Wind That Shakes the Barley. The non-Cannes films on display include a refreshingly large group from Asia, including Time (Korea), Bliss (China), Invisible Waves (Thailand) and Takashi Miike's Big Bang Love: Juvenile A (Japan).

Though James covered many of the big Cannes premieres already, we will also be on the ground in Toronto and will catch up with a few of the films he missed (hey, one man can only do so much), hopefully including The Caiman; the 2006 TIFF unspools this fall, running from September 7 to September 16.

Back in May, when the rave reviews of Shortbus (James' included), John Cameron Mitchell's follow-up to Hedwig and the Angry Inch, were coming out of Cannes, I posted about the difficultly of arranging American distribution for a clever, charming movie that also just happens to be filled with real, explicit sex. At the time, my point of reference (as well as that of many others) was a film like The Aristocrats which, despite the fact that it consists entirely of endless retellings of a filthy joke, was a box office success for ThinkFilm. They supported the NC-17 film with a clever marketing campaign and wooed a relatively large audience, considering the number of theaters that will even book a movie with that rating. The hope at ThinkFilm, clearly, is that lightning will strike twice, because they just took the plunge and bought North American theatrical rights to Shortbus. (According to Mitchell, he had a dozen offers for the film's rights, including from big indie names like Magnolia and IFC Films.)

While the lack of familiar names in Shortbus will deny it one of The Aristocrats' major selling points (Bob Saget, swearing? Sign me up!), the presence of real sex is sure to appeal to a different, equally eager audience. Plus, the fact that it's a good movie should help, too. ThinkFilm plans to begin rolling the film out this summer; I can't wait for the advertising campaign.