We’ve been taking it a bit easier today as we were trying to secure tickets for the premiere of Richard Kelly’s (writer and director of Donnie Darko) new film: Southland Tales. The early morning tickets went pretty quick so we were afraid of whether we’d make it for the evening gala premiere. As it turned out, we didn’t (we were counting them down and they went before they even became available for us to reserve them), although we did manage to get tickets for the 8:30 am (on a Sunday!) screening.
Other than that, we grabbed tickets for Over the Hedge, an animated film about animals snatching food from a new housing development that sprang up while they were in hibernation. It looks pretty funny and is by the creators of Madagascar. The tickets for that weren’t around long, even with three screenings available.
We had to pop down and pick them up and while we were there we took a look around the Village International, where countries and regions put marquees with information about filming in their country, like finding locations, getting discounts, help with production, benefits, legal advice, etc. They also tend to have free stuff, talks, an area for having coffee and internet access. The UK has a tent, with the likes of the UK Film Council. We had to stroll to the other side of the marina to check out some of the other tents in the Village, one of which was the Film France tent. One of my colleagues was interested in information for a film he’s currently writing which is based in France and, by chance, the very region itself had a tent.
Next we checked out the free magazines that cover the festival by the likes of Variety, The Hollywood Reporter and Screen International. They feature news and reviews of films here as well as carrying lots of adverts for films that are having screenings for sales agents and a more complete listing of screenings (a lot screenings happen outside the main festival). Some of the movies for sale have shockingly bad titles and descriptions, it’s quite astounding the shlock that gets made.
As for the competition itself, Volver certainly looks to be the outright leader at the moment with both of the UK’s entries, Ken Loach’s The Wind that Shakes the Barley and Andrea Arnold’s Red Road getting lukewarm receptions, but showing holding 2nd and 3rd spots as we head into the second week. We haven’t seen either of them and the fact that we’ve not wanted to should tell you something. Looks like these suckers aren’t even going to be critical successes, so the UK has wasted its money on poor projects again, despite all the back slapping the Film Council seems to be giving itself. Rather strangely, Richard Linklater’s Fast Food Nation also received lottery money, the question is, why?
Anyway, on with the show. We’re out of here Monday so Sunday is really our last day, then I’ll try and write-up some of the thoughts and insights we’ve had on actually attending the festival (the first for all of us) and try and get some of the pictures I took online for all to see.
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