Movie Cricket

Longtime Newsweek film critic David Ansen — who took a buyout in March 2008 (and is No. 31 on the Cricket's list of "The Departed" movie critics) — has a new gig.

Ansen has been picked as artistic director of the Los Angeles Film Festival, set for next June. According to the Los Angeles Times, Ansen will oversee a programming staff that will select about 80 dramatic and documentary feature films from some 5,000 submissions.

"In a lifetime of watching movies, I've basically been a programmer in my own virtual film festival all of my life," Ansen told the L.A. Times. "It's so strange to be on the other side. But I think it will be an exciting and nice change."

Ansen's new boss, festival director Rebecca Yeldham, is a movie producer ("The Kite Runner") and a former programmer for the Sundance Film Festival.