Sorry Robert, but there's really no contest here. Quentin's Inglourious Basterds is going to lay an out-and-out whuppin' on your Shorts and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. Such is life and everybody knows it.  No great drama there. But what I do find interesting is that new films from Rodriguez and Tarantino - at one point great personal friends who would help out on each others films rather than releasing them competitively - are coming out head-to-head at all. Is this some left over competition from Grindhouse? 

Here's the thing: When the Grindhouse double bill was nearing release here in North America, everybody was all smiles and laughs and 'we love working together', etc etc etc. But then the film tanked, and tanked hard. And, honestly, an awful lot of the criticism was directed at Tarantino's half of the picture, with most declaring Death Proof boring and overly-talky. What to do if you're the Weinstein Company and you've just taken a huge financial bath on this film - a loss that they're still reeling from, incidentally? Well, for the release everywhere else in the world they split Grindhouse into two separate films, releasing Tarantino's Death Proof and Rodriguez's Planet Terror individually. Which would be fine except they then took the two directors out on an international press junket and spent all of their time praising Tarantino's film while punting a visibly annoyed Rodriguez off to the side and ignoring him throughout. And so began the end of a long relationship between Rodriguez and the brothers Weinstein.

Which leads us to tomorrow. Shorts is the first film of his entire career that has not been backed and released by the Weinstein brothers in some form. Despite a relationship that has been very lucrative on both sides, Rodriguez has taken his ball and gone home, setting up his new film with Warner Brothers and a whole new set of investors. That part of things is a very clear shot at the Weinsteins for his treatment on Grindhouse. But releasing the same day as Basterds? Hard to see that as anything but a jab at Tarantino, who happily accepted all the attention for Death Proof while his friend quietly took one for the team.

But enough of the speculation... What of the films? Shorts is Rodriguez very much in kids mode, an effects-heavy adventure story about a social outcast who comes into possession of a 'wishing stone' that will grant him anything he desires. On the Rodriguez scale I rate this one slightly under Spy Kids but way ahead of the horrible Shark Boy And Lava Girl. Warners made the clever move of allowing press to bring their kids to the advance screenings of this one and the Temporary Tattooed Boy absolutely loved it, so it definitely hits its target market.

As for Basterds, there's been so much written about this one and audiences are so firmly rooted in their love-or-hate stances on Tarantino that there's not much point or need in saying much about it other than the cut that will release here is significantly improved over the very rushed and not-quite-ready version that screened earlier this year in Cannes. Like all Tarantino films, it's very heavily dialogue driven, so there are fewer scenes of the titular Basterds than you might expect, but there's a whole lot for fans to love.

The dueling directors are far from your only options, however. I'm a HUGE fan of Armando Iannucci's In The Loop - a Sundance hit that is quite possibly one of the sharpest and funniest pieces of political satire ever put to film - which hits limited release today and is without a doubt one of the very best films of the year. It also features one of the sweariest characters ever created for the screen, who you can see in action here. And for local folk the annual Toronto After Dark festival wraps up on Friday with a screening of Paul Solet's creepy Sundance hit Grace which comes preceded by Denis Villeneuve's Cannes' award-winning short Next Floor which is pretty much worth the price of admission all on its own.