43-years-old, but not middle-aged
Entering Day Five of the festival, everyone is raving about Shirin Neshat's intriguing art, exhibiting circles under their eyes from Orgasmic Cinema and overdosing on mussels-and-rice. Only festival president Theo Angelopoulos wishes the sun would go away - so he can return to shooting his new film.

The Paradox of Shirin Neshat
At yesterday's press conference, Shirin Neshat hesitated to make blanket statements about "Moslem women" or "Islam". As an exiled Iranian artist living in New York, she both mourns her dilemma and celebrates her in-between position. The political and the poetic blend in her work. Duality and paradoxes are everywhere. In her work, Neshat explains, women are the center, the evolving, active elements. They are the ones digging into the earth and setting a boat out to sea. It is the men who are stationary. She reveals the strong, rebellious women of Iran she knows, never ignoring their repression. It's not the medium, but the message that matters, as she shifts from photos, to video, to film. Images and music speak louder than words ultimately. Neshat finances her work through art installations, rather than film distribution. She explained before screenings that the split-screen films correspond to two-screen installations. Normally the spectator would be in the middle, forced to "take a stance", rather than passively view both. She is proud that her films help poor non-actor casts in countries like Mexico, Morocco and Turkey. Though she avoids characteristic architecture and language it's the animated faces that speak. Neshat needs to make art that helps people escape reality and rethink things. She has a feature film script "slowly" in the works.

Stares and Glimpses of Iran
Each of the photos in New Horizon's "Glimpses of Iran" suggests a story. In Mohammed Razdasht's "In Search of Light", a young man in fatigues rests his back against a stack of coffins, his hand wearily on his head. In color shot "Student Protests", a woman has her lips taped shut. Director Abbas Kiarostami's contribution is photographs of bare trees against white. Intriguing was Shadi Ghadirian's brown-and-white series, including a shot of a women with a radio on her shoulder.

Truly International Competition
One of the two new competition films also hails from Iran. Vahid Mousaian's "Wishes of the Land" (2pm) is about a young girl that dares to fall in love. American director Dylan Kidd's "Roger Dodger" (5.30pm) is also about amore.

Mmm...Hermosillo
As Mexico's film industry opened to new directors, Jaime Humerto Hermosillo joined in and started knocking down taboos. At noon today, Mexico's only openly-gay director (and creator of "Homework", at 7.30pm and 8pm) may address what it's like to bend the rules with a smile.

'Fists' Instead of 'Smile'
Tonight's special Marco Bellocchio screening involves a switcheroo. The famed director and leading actor Lou Castel will present "Fists in the Pocket" (11pm), instead of "My Mother's Smile".

How to Be a Web Magician
A whole lot of e-magic will take place at Mylos. This year's web-art events are dedicated to artist/theorist Lev Manovich. Events begin today with a morning workshop on web streaming and tactical media. Between 3-5pm, a "Cafenet" will be running for online surfing of key sites. Then there will be a screening of Lev Manovich's works. The opening ceremony is at 9pm. The remaining four days will feature more "screenings" (or is it "streamings"?) and a two-day workshop with the experts (November 13-14). Sessions will look at things like the challenges in showing materials made for other media (film/video) on the web. Look out for E-magic's two post-midnight screenings: "Numerique Erotique" (November 15) and "Dr Caligari's Workshop" (November 16). Starting at 8pm tonight, e-magic's netTV will broadcast their program and fest highlights at www.filmfestival.gr.

Hidenori Sugimori	Shirin Neshat	Lou Castel

How to Win an Oscar
Elegant Greek-American actress Dimitra Arliss is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences and on its Oscars selection committee. She is giving Greek filmmakers a chat on how the procedure works. Dewar's Club, Room B at 11.30am. Tel 2310-378570.

Local Directors Do Good
The audience shuffled so slowly out of Penny Panayiotopoulos' "Hard Goodbyes: My Father" it felt like a funeral. Sniffling sounds were audible throughout. In a short Q & A, the director noted: "All kids are like dough. However the director should approach the amazing innocence and creativity they all have. Not vice versa." A little later, Nikos Grammatikos filled the Olympion with his appealing, if non-streamlined "The King". Rough-faced Vangelis (Vangelis Mourikis) carries the film through rough spots, including an undeveloped girlfriend character and a fumbling ending. The film unromanticises the Greek countryside once and for all. Golden Alexander holder Yiannis Dalianidis has an 11am press conference today. Popular comedian Lakis Lazopoulos will remember funnyman Kostas Hajichristos at an 8pm screening of "The World Gone Mad". Finally Nikos Cornilios' new "The World Again" (10.30pm) considers a group of orphaned 15-year-old. For a sense of Greek right/left politics, revisit Pantelis Voulgaris' "The Stone Years" (7.30pm).

Blame it on Hendrix
Back on Sunday, Jean-Francois Stevenin explained it was Jimi Hendrix's fault he got into film. It all began when he met a screenwriter while in line at a Hendrix concert. Fifteen days later he had left school and family. His extensive acting career began when Truffaut asked all his tech people to act on the set of "Nuit Americain". Though he worked with many greats, it was seeing Cassavetes' films that inspired him to direct. A passion for the material is the most important thing, because filmmaking is a big journey, Stevenin feels. His take 2-3 years. He said, "When 'Mischka' came out, the press said, 'What freedom, what improvisation!' In fact it had all been carefully planned." The scale of his work keeps growing, with Johnny Halliday dropping out of the sky in one film and now a period piece on author Louis-Ferdinand Celine in the works.

High Definition Revelations
Yesterday Greek company AMY gave a presentation on High Definition. That it will replace digital video and film was an incredible revelation. The resolution is 1920 X 1080 (compared to film's 1828 X 1102). There are other reasons why George Lucas and the BBC alike have decided to get High. High Definition eliminates the need for digitizing footage, speeds up editing and presents the final shots as they are recorded. A million "Matrix"-like special effects become possible (if you can afford it all). The talk closed with the obnoxiously loud short "Bingo".

ERT and EKK
Yesterday, Hellenic State Television's (ERT) president Angelos Stagou took the podium. ERT has made possible over a dozen festival features, three documentaries, three short documentaries and an Italian coproduction. Today at 1pm, EKK, the main financer of local productions, will speak up.

Odds and Ends
Takeshi Kitano takes a new path in "Dolls" (5pm), a non-gangster tale. Aurelio Grimaldi's "The Whores" (11pm) is what everyone wants tickets to. Director Constantinos Yiannaris is in awe of Bela Tarr's 6-hour-plus epic.

Boogie Nights
Yes, finally, you can dance. Disco your feet off at Alisida (104 Al. Papanastasiou St) at 11.30. Cinema die hards may instead take in Orgasmic Cinema's 1.30am "Society of Mutants", where they will find: horror news bulletins, hijacked entertainment, massive celebrations, interactive porn, Ronald Reagan's prostate, modern gladiators and ever-so-quaint free airwaves.

First shot, #117, 12/11/2002

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