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The 67th Venice Film Festival, where I'm currently on jury duty (although not on the jury headed by Quentin Tarantino) opened majorly pop with Black Swan, Darren Aronofsky's warmly received and borderline risible follow-up to his 2008 Golden Lion winner The Wrestler. Although a generic horror film (The Red Shoes remade as homage to Dario Argento or Brian De Palma), Black Swan is also recognizably Aronofskyian: This epic actualization myth parallels The Wrestler's blood-soaked, self-mutilating histrionics so closely that it could be described as "Mickey Rourke in a tutu." Black Swan is also an acting vehicle, but rather than fueling Rourke's comeback it's fueled by Natalie Portman's near-excruciating anxiety in the role of a dogged, delusional little prima ballerina.

Erin Broadley

Jack White

​"Make as much noise as you want," recommended The White Stripes: Under Great Northern Lights director Emmett Malloy, before the film's premiere at the SXSW Film Festival on Friday night. In practice, the audience didn't make much noise at all: we were, for the most part, stunned by this portrait of the last great epic American rock band, that somehow etched into the mystery of the White Stripes, without relieving it completely.

Shot mostly in the Stripes' red, white and black palette (one shot looks like black and white film, filtered red), Lights chronicles the band's unprecedented attempt to tour Canada, playing shows in every province. Some of these "shows" wouldn't count on the average tour roster: Jack and Meg played a bowling alley and a small private boat; they played Blind Willie McTell for Inuit elders and "The People on The Bus" on a Winnipeg city bus. And then at night, they'd rock the usual large theaters, and Malloy shows these "real" gigs as if they're all one long gig in progress. Rarely allowing a full song to play out, he montages highlights of a single night into one continuum of noise.

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As you may have heard, Sundance and YouTube have established a unique collaboration during the 2010 fest, through which three films world premiering here (Bass Ackwards, Homewrecker and One Too Many Mornings--all entries in the NEXT section), as well as two films that debuted in Park City last year (Children of Invention and The Cove), have been made available for rental on YouTube during the duration of the festival. Each film costs $3.99 per viewing, and the filmmakers will, according to a press release, "receive the majority of the revenue share."

The press release also promises that the films will be "spotlighted on the YouTube homepage," but when I went to YouTube I could find no sign of such promotion on the homepage. My "Featured Videos" included Streets Full of Bodies in Haiti and Man Makes Chocolate Records; the clip promoted as Most Popular under the Film & Animation category, The Perfect Body? is a video diary in which two teens interview other teens about style and body image.

At a press conference yesterday announcing the venture, a YouTube rep said the company wants to "give a sense of independent choice for our users," but the fact is, YouTube users seem to mostly choose the homegrown, the incidental and accidental. If the comment thread on Children of Invention (which I only found by searching the title) is any indication, some of those users are hostile towards the very idea that the video sharing site could be used to facilitate for-profit distribution of films. To quote sonicballer8888: "this is bad. soon, youtube will start charging for all videos. keep on rating these low guys."

That January is a cold, long, barren slog of a month when it comes to film releases is nothing new. But it does seem worth noting that, along with a movie about a buff tooth fairy starring The Rock, Denzel Washington is being dumped into the muck. Washington's The Book of Eli opened today, and next up is Harrison Ford's Extraordinary Measures, which opens January 22. Mel Gibson (Edge of Darkness, Jan. 29) should probably get used to the weather. Xenu knows John Travolta has--his From Paris with Love leads off the second worst month of the year, February. Tom Hanks, you are next.

This New York Times story about all the ways in which the known geniuses at NBC are trying to boost ratings for this Sunday's Golden Globe awards ends on a high note.

In addition to "turning up the volume on the marketing," hiring Ricky Gervais to host, and producing pre-broadcast, hype-building webisodes (this apparently worked for the American Music Awards but you know it really didn't cause we're talking about WEBISODES), the Globes social secretary is seating attractive, young people at ugly, old people tables so that the cameras won't melt when they are inevitably forced to focus on the less handsome casts of nominated movies and TV shows.

Lining up younger stars has been a priority. Seated with "The Hurt Locker" contingent will be Taylor Lautner, the beefcake star of "The Twilight Saga: New Moon." "He will be there to make the table look glamorous," Mr. Berk said.

This is clearly a good plan and an awesome social experiment. Which star of Gossip Girl will seat with the ladies of Precious? TUNE IN TO FIND OUT!

People of Earth:

Welcome to Voice Film, a new one of these "web logs" everyone seems to be tweeting about that will kick off officially next week, when, just a few days after packing up her life in New York, moving to L.A. and starting a brand new job as L.A. Weekly film editor, Karina Longworth heads to Sundance. To blog. What a nice, leisurely transition for her.

More from Park City, Utah soon.