If I knew that allegedly exciting and provocative films like Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky‘s Francine and Billy Bob Thornton‘s Jayne Mansfield’s Car were playing at 2012 South by Southwest, I would have applied for press credentials and snagged plane tix and arranged for lodging and all the rest of it. But as I said two weeks ago, Austin just doesn’t seem worth it.

21 Jump Street…possibly decent but clearly studio product, not enough throttle. Joss Whedon‘s The Cabin in the Woods…repelled. I saw about 60% of William Friedkin‘s Killer Joe at Toronto last September…meh. I caught Richard Linklater‘s Bernie at the LA Film Festival last June…not bad, “different”, engaging Jack Black performance. The Raid, which I hate, has already played Toronto and Sundance. Guy Maddin‘s Keyhole…maybe. Three episodes of Lena Dunham‘s Girls…fine. The one SXSW film that really has me halfway excited? Bobcat Goldwaith‘s God Bless America.

I realize that one or two special films I’m not eyeballing right now may pop through and start some conversation. That’s fine, but I can wait. I’m at peace with not being there for the first Austin showings. I’m looking at Tribeca two months hence and then Cannes, of course, and…well, that’s enough.

This was taken in the fall of ’99, a couple of months into my deal with Reel.com and about 14 months after I’d first begun writing the Mr. Showbiz column in August 1998. Every now and then you’ll find a photo or a memento lying around and you’ll say, “Wow, that was eight or ten years ago.” But October 1999 does not seem like 12 and 1/3 years ago. At all. The next time I turn around it’ll be 15 years behind me, and then 20. It just gets away from you.

Yesterday Hollywood Reporter critic David Rooney, filing from the Berlin Film Festival, posted an eloquent review of Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky‘s Francine, a.k.a., the Melissa Leo “cat movie” that I mentioned three or four days ago.

Melissa Leo, Keith Leonard in Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky’s Francine.

“A minimalist, image-based character study that is almost impossibly fragile and yet emotionally robust, Francine is a legitimate discovery. It’s propelled by Melissa Leo’s remarkable title-role performance, rigorous in its honesty and unimpeded by even a scrap of vanity. Made on a shoestring, this first narrative feature from husband-and-wife filmmaking team Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky is raw, intimate and observed with penetrating acuity.

“The austere approach and stark naturalism invite comparison with the work of Kelly Reichardt, and the subject specifically recalls Wendy and Lucy. The earliest films of Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne also come to mind while watching. But Cassidy and Shatzky, whose backgrounds are jointly in photography and documentary, have their own voice and their own nonjudgmental gaze.

“As a window into a life of seemingly irreversible dissociation, the film performs the uncommon trick of being wide open and pellucid while simultaneously shut tight and opaque.

“One of the interesting aspects of Francine is that despite the unsettling intimacy of the portrait, only sparing use is made of facial closeups — the usual short-cut to accessing an introspective character. Dialogue figures just as frugally, and psychological background is entirely withheld. But still we come to know the woman onscreen, speculating about her history and contemplating her future after the film has ended.”

Last weekend 20th Century Fox flew several junket-whore types to the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield, Illinois to promote Tim Burton and Timur Bekmambetov‘s Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter (opening 6.22). If you’ve seen the trailer (domestic or international) you know this film has as much reverence for Lincoln’s history as my two cats. For what it’s worth Burton’s black-and-white introduction, filmed in London, plays well.

N.Y. Times music critic Jon Pareles and Billboard‘s Danyel Smith spoke about Whitney Houston on Charlie Rose last night. The only stab at explaining what caused Houston’s tragic drug habit and death came at the 11-minute mark, when Smith said that Houston had all this responsibility to be great and maybe in the midst of this “she just wanted a cigarette, and maybe something else.” Okay, but what about other superstar entertainers who’ve dealt with this kind of pressure and who haven’t become cokeheads or died?

Smith also vaguely attributed some of Houston’s difficulties to her having grown up in Newark, New Jersey, which, she said, can be a “rough and tumble” environment. Except coming from a tough neighborhood tends to toughen you up and make you stronger, no? “That which doesn’t kill you”…right?

The only positive response I’ve ever had to the word “valentine” was when I saw Sydney Lumet‘s The Fugitive Kind and Marlon Brando‘s Valentine Xavier appeared in a snakeskin jacket. I feel zilch about this Hollywood montage making the rounds today. The finale of The Apartment is the only proclamation scene that has ever touched me because (a) it comes at the very end and (b) the object of Jack Lemmon‘s affection shrugs and says “fine, whatever…let’s get down to it.” Exactly.

I also love the champagne-cork gag. Perfect timing, perfect delivery. I laugh every time.

Deadline is reporting that Chris Pine‘s former agency, SDB Partners, has filed a lawsuit against the actor after he dumped them by email. SDB wants commissions on This Means War as well as Pine’s forthcoming work as Captain Kirk in Paramount’s Star Trek franchise.

It appears (emphasis on the “a” word) that Pine is dumping these guys because he’s panicking about the reception to War, the all-but-universally reviled McG action-romcom that sneaks tonight and opens on Friday. He reportedly canned them last November, at which point he’d surely realized what a piece of shite the McG was. In any event he needs to convey a message to the industry that he realizes he (i.e., SDB) screwed up and that he’s making changes, etc. “Okay, I signed off on the McG, fine, but they pushed me into it so it’s mainly their fault!”…or words to that effect.

Your typical American yahoo believes that under the skin many if not most Islamics are radical anti-Americans who have to be guarded against and certainly can’t be trusted. A more benevolent, open-hearted view is that we’re all God’s children and we have to accept our differences. Sean Stone, 27 year-old son of director Oliver Stone, belongs to the latter camp. He announced today from Iran, where he’s shooting a documentary, that he’s converted to Islam.

This is the kind of thing that bright willful types sometimes do in their 20s. Stone is trying to define himself. What matters in the end is blood, and Stone is half-Christian and half-Jewish so this is a phase — a “statement.” He’ll be sipping martinis with super-models in Paris next year or the year after. I met him once at a party in Manhattan. He believes in passion, wildness and the search for ecstasy by way of truth.

“The conversion to Islam is not abandoning Christianity or Judaism, which I was born with,” Stone said in a telephone call from the central Iranian city of Isfahan, where he underwent the ceremony. “It means I have accepted Mohammad and other prophets.” According to Iran’s Fars news agency, Stone had become a Shiite and had chosen to be known by the Muslim first name Ali.

I once made the mistake of leaning down and hugging a red Doberman Pinscher — a dog I knew really well and had played around with several times. The fucker bit me on the right cheek and ear. That never would have happened with a Golden Retriever. You can’t really trust Dobermans, Pit Bills or Mastiffs, certainly not when it comes to kissing or hugging.

Look at those cops after the Denver newswoman, KUSA’s Kyle Dyer, is bitten by Max the mastiff. They be cool, chillin’…no worries. And look at that weather guy after it happens.

Rick Santorum, who would probably get slaughtered in a race against President Obama, has essentially tied Mittens Romney in three nationwide polls among Republicans. Santorum has 30% to Romney’s 27% in a N.Y. Times/CBS News poll released today. A Pew Research poll has Santorum over Romney, 30% to 28%, and a Gallup poll has Romney at 32% vs. Santorum’s 30%.

Is there a scenario in which Santorum could realistically override Romney and wrestle away the Republican nomination? Highly doubtful. If anything Santorum, who knows the taste of butter on bread, will probably go the opportunistic-waffle route and become Romney’s vice-presidential candidate, which will probably strike a good portion of Santorum’s base — the Evangelicals, Tea Party nutters and gun-owning racist heehaw right — as a cop-out.

I say again what I’ve been saying all along: President Obama will squeak out a victory next November. There will be some (but not much) joy in Mudville among liberal moderates and progressives when this happens. The lefties felt euphoric in ’08 when Obama beat McCain, of course, but his victory over Romney will be met with great surges of…relief, I suppose. Better a mellow centrist who supports moderate measures in the pursuit of economic fairness and justice while winking at corporations than a shallow 1% guy — an empty haircut with the mindset of a corporate raider who made the family dog shit all over the station wagon.