I found the first segment, in which Kiarostami talks about being able to get more natural, more genuine performances from tiny digital cameras and non-existent film crews, to be the most interesting.  I remember thinking the same thing in the third season of Felicity, when Sean tried making a documentary about his loft friends.  And now I will hang my head in shame for bringing up Felicity in a review of a Kiarostami movie.

The Libertine – What could be more unnerving than directing your first film?  Laurence Dunmore would probably say, "Directing your first film, which happens to star the two greatest actors of their generation."  That's what Dunmore does with The Libertine, an exquisitely shot period piece with enough filthy dialogue to make A Dirty Shame seems rather pedestrian. Of course, the fancy accents and costumes will probably prevent this picture from being slapped with an NC-17 rating, despite containing waaaay more nudity than Shame.

Johnny Depp stars as John Wilmot, the Second Earl of Rochester, a thickly smarmy, cynically slimy drunkard who promises we won't like him at all in The Libertine's terrific, dark opening monologue.  From there, Rochester takes a floundering stage actress (Samantha Morton) under his wing -- and into his bed -- transforming her into the top star of the day.  He also, on advice of King Charles II (John Malkovich), pens a play of his own.  This is somewhat less successful, as the drama includes characters named Clitoris, props which include giant dildos, and more than a passing swipe at old Chuck Deux.  Oh, and Rochester has a servant named Cock.

What follows is a startlingly impressive transformation from Depp, and this performance is, to date, the crowning achievement of his career.  Those dolts who pushed Depp for a Best Actor award last year for that stupid amusement park movie should be embarrassed when they see this.  Likewise, Depp makes The Sea Inside's Javier Bardem look like even more of a meatloaf.

Dunmore and photographer Alexander Melman give The Libertine the suggestion of color, bathing the film in candlelight, fog and smoke.  Michael Nyman's score is right on, as are the costumes, art direction and makeup.  But this one is all about Depp.  Somebody get this a distributor . . . stat!

Hotel – Jessica Hausner's economical horror/thriller would have been fairly unremarkable were it not for the complete lack of horror and thrilling which occur over its 82 minutes.  That, however, doesn't stop Hotel from being darker and creepier than anything I've seen in the Midnight Movie program so far.

Franziska Weisz stars as Irene, a young go-getter recently hired as part of the staff of a hotel isolated by both the Alps and some woods that would make M. Night Shyamalan crap his pants.  Irene isn't exactly welcomed to the hotel with open arms.  Her co-workers seem especially ruffled when Irene asks what happened to her predecessor, but we're all pretty sure it has something to do with The Lady of the Woods, and a frightening cave in which she is supposed to roam.  When Irene's glasses break, and she just happens to find a replacement pair formerly owned by her antecedent, her fate is pretty much sealed.

What I liked the most about Hotel were the assumptions Hausner put in my head, capitalizing on decades of programming from lazy American horror films.  I'd explain how, but that might ruin the movie for those lucky enough to see it.  I could see a picture like Hotel being extremely polarizing -- even more so than Shyamalan's The Village.  But it's still worth watching.

CQ2 (Seek You, Too) – I try to stay away from as many Canadian films as I can.  Been burned too many times in the past, I have.  Doesn't matter how cool the description is in the program book (and this CQ2 had several key words I often scan for: teenager, rebellious, motel, confused, forced -- even maturation, which at first read like an even more exciting word).  But tonight, this seemed like the lesser of about 12 evils.  And it probably was, although it was still unsatisfying.

No relation at all to Roman Coppola's CQ, this Carole Laure flick plays like a French-Canadian version of Honey, starring a French-Canadian version of Katie Holmes, with just a pinch of a French-Canadian Angelina Jolie (where the rebellious part kicks in).  Rachel (Clara Furey) is 17, dually aggravatable and aggravating, and can't stand living with her mother and step-dad.  For some reason, while hanging out in front of a women's prison, Rachel decides to follow a ex-con (Danielle Hubbard) home to a rustic motel in a town in the outskirts of Montreal.  This is where she enters the wacky world of contemporary dance, which hones Rachel's angry, primal bedroom spaz-outs into something more controlled and sensual.  There's some peripheral stuff going on, too, but it's mostly about the dancing.  And it's pretty impressive dancing, I might add.  Too bad the film is not.

Zebraman – Were it not for a huge lull as it geared up for its big finale, Takaski Miike's Zebraman might have been one of my five or so favorite films of the festival.  I've been a fan of Miike's prolific work for a few years, but mostly in a Holy Cow, That's Some Far Out Gore kind of way.  Zebraman caught me off-guard with its sweetness and, well . . . it's lack of Miike Gore.

Shinichi (Sho Aikawa) is a sad-sac teacher with a family who pretends he doesn't exist.  His wife is having an affair.  His young daughter experiments in bizarre sex acts with older men.  His son, a student at Shinichi's school, routinely gets picked on because his dad is such a loser.  Instead of trying to remedy the situation, Shinichi instead locks himself in his room, where he creates a costume based on Zebraman -- the titular teacher-turned-crime fighter from a short-lived 1978 television show.

As luck would have it, aliens have invaded Shinichi's town, which also brings two Defense Department agents (posing as a gay couple -- one with pubic crabs) into the fold.  What follows is something akin to a Stephen Chow film: Madcap comedy and over-the-top violence.  But not over-the-top in the traditional Way of the Miike.  This is something you could take your whole family to see.