On the third night of what turned out to be the best Mill Valley Film Festival ever, I was about to have dinner at Frantoio with Bay Area actress Natalie Xu when a striking blonde of Amazonian proportion breezed into the restaurant, offered a broad smile and greeted me warmly. It took two or three gulps of air to realize it was Uma Thurman. Her role in the forthcoming Motherhood was a conscious departure for someone often remembered as the femme fatale Mia Wallace in Pulp Fiction. "They try to pigeonhole you, which is why my roles are all over the map," she confessed. "I started acting at 16 and didn't really think it would pan out. I was supposed to get an education, but I kept getting work--even though I was never what they expected. Foreigners thought I was American. Americans thought I was a foreigner. With my name [Uma Karuna Thurman, some even thought I was African-American." (She was named after a Hindu goddess.)

At 20, San Francisco director Phil Kaufman cast her in Henry and June. At 24, Quentin Tarantino put her in Pulp Fiction. She recalled that during a long day on that shoot, "It was 3 o'clock in the morning and my phone rang and I was in a hole in the ground somewhere [on the film set, which had become my home. [Tarantino roared, 'If that phone rings again, I'll make you regret the day you ever became an actress!'" Uma's response: "Bastard!"

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At his tribute last week, Woody Harrelson was talking about his role as a transvestite in Anger Management. "I now know why it takes women so long to get ready," he said. After being presented with the statuette that comes with the MVFF award, he shrieked, "It's got no head and no genitalia!"

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Director Jason Reitman, whose entry into the world of filmmaking was expedited by nepotism, went to college for pre-med but says his producer/director dad told him, "I don't think there's enough magic there for you." Said the dutiful son, "He's the first Jewish father in the history of Jewish fathers to say, 'Don't be a doctor'." Reitman was 11 days old when he was schlepped to a Hollywood set during filming of his dad's low-brow comedy Animal House. "Imagine the effect that had on me," he joked. But his films, Thank You for Smoking, Juno and the forthcoming Up in the Air, would make one think he came from a more sophisticated gene pool. "If you're the kid of a famous director, the presumption is you're a talentless, spoiled brat with drug and alcohol problems, so there aren't a lot of expectations." To attend an evening in his honor, Reitman, who crossed the Golden Gate Bridge for the first time in his life, was prompted to say, "I am way too young to have a retrospective. I feel the best thing I could do is die tomorrow. I would really go out on top."

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From Our Annual Exorcism Dept.: After the death of her father, filmmaker Marina Lutz found "boxes and boxes of film, audiotapes and photographs chronicling 16 years of my father's abuse" that she turned into her short The Marina Experiment. After landing it in half-a-dozen festivals, she is on her way now to the Dok Leipzig fest in Germany...

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The Opening Night reception was packed with estrogen, with more women in attendance than at any time in recent memory. The fact that Clive Owen was there in support of his entry, The Boys Are Back, may have had something to do with it. During his onstage appearance, I announced to no one in particular, "There's too much swooning going on here." A woman sitting next to me leaned over and whispered, "We can't help it."

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Best of the Fest: Fish Tank, Youth in Revolt, Storm, Miracle in a Box, Imbued, The Horse Boy, The Girl on the Train and A Year Ago in Winter.

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