I first saw and fell in love with Xan Cassevetes‘ Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival. And during that festival I got to know Xan a bit through F.X. Feeney, who talks a lot about the late Jerry Harvey in her doc. And then I noticed Xan get mouthy with IFC topper Jonathan Sehring at a Hotel du Cap party, and I remember saying to myself at that moment, “Uh-oh…temperamental.”

The next film Xan directed, a segment for New York, I Love You called “Allen Hughes,” came out five years later. And now, four years later, Magnet is preparing to release her latest, Kiss of the Damned, which looks to me like a rather typical sex-and-blood vampire film. It’s showing at South by Southwest, which begins this weekend. Pic will open on 5.3.13 after being available on iTunes/On Demand on 3.28.13. I’m hoping it won’t take her another six or seven years to deliver a feature-length film.