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Off-topic Rants
With last year’s tragic The Wedding Party opening last years festival, I think that it’s fair to say that my bar had been significantly lowered in terms of what I was expecting. Luckily I was pleasantly surprised with Belgian/French film The Fairy, a film that was also written and directed by its three lead actors. The film is a slapstick romance which revolves around a man working the night shift at a hotel who is visited by a woman claiming to be a Fairy. With strong links to the likes of Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin and Jacques Tati’s work, the film itself feels like a series of sketches that have been worked around a really rough storyline. Unfortunately with this being the case, the longer the movie went, the more the audience became restless - possibly getting antsy to get to the Town Hall for their free booze and canapés. That said, I still thoroughly enjoyed The Fairy with it’s surreal “Boosh-like” moments which included a strange under-the-sea dance and also the very clever use of rear projection in a chase sequence.
What would be a more fitting way for a former child actor to officially start his festival than with a documentary about child actors trying to break through in the states. The Hollywood Complex follows a dozen or so child actors and their families who are staying at a complex called Oakwood during the 3-4 month pilot season in the states. To be honest I went to see this because I thought it would be a bit of a laugh, children and their pushy stage parents trying to find fame and fortune in Hollywood. I was right to some degree with these vibrant young children spouting off some dialogue that only a child could, however between these moments of sheer hilarity were moments that made my skin crawl. From one set of parents showing their 7 year old YouTube clips of sick and dying children to prepare her for her audition as a sick child on Grey’s Anatomy, to the mother who became a Scientologist to help improve her daughters chances of becoming famous (she got cast in something almost immediately after her mother joined), there were some really stomach churning moments.
SO. How are you? Good golly, miss molly, it has been some time since I posted any kind of update. Thanks for sticking by, and having a glance every now and then to see what’s going on. And although all may have seemed to come to somewhat of a stand still at SHOTGUN! HQ, we have been busy, busy, working away at developing the script, meeting with people (some of the LateNite team were over in the USA with their short film FALLOUT!!).
Unfortunately, due to horrible traffic in South Beach, Miami, I missed the start of this film – which is a real shame, as I’m sure I missed some really important set-ups and character development. I also ended up having to sit in the aisle of the theatre, as it was completely sold out, which wasn’t tremendously comfortable. However, regardless of what actually happened at the start of the film, or the fact that my seat was in fact the floor, as soon as I started watching, I was instantly hooked. This is a really sweet movie, and there was definitely a few people exiting the theatre with tears in their eyes.
We didn’t really plan to go and see this film – we were supposed to head to another film on the other side of Miami, however the large taxi ride didn’t really seem that appealing. So instead, we decided to stay at the same theatre, and just see whatever was up next. I misread the program, and was expecting to see a depressing, but critically acclaimed South African movie. However, what we ended up seeing was a crazy musical masterpiece! This is probably one of the best films I’ve seen at the festival. The only problem was – within the first 20 minutes of the film, the movie stopped, the lights went up, the fire alarm went off, and we were forced to evacuate the building! Boy, oh boy! We haven’t had much luck this week with theatres! Luckily though, after the fire department did what they do, we got to go back in the theatre and watch the rest of the film. The only issue – we missed about 5 or 10 minutes! What a pain! Never-the-less, even taking to consideration the unexpected intermission, this was a very clever, and aurally epic film!
Last night was the official awards night for the 48 Hour Film Project International Competition – strangely named Filmapalooza – in which our film, Fallout was competing. Although we didn’t exactly have the most enjoyable experience on the night, as both our film and ironically the Sydney team’s film experienced several technical hiccups and false starts (which was slightly nerve-racking as you can imagine!) – both films eventually screened perfectly in front of a very excited and packed audience at the final awards screening. It was great to be amongst so many talented like-minded film-makers! There were so many amazing films on display, from cities all over the world.
We have seen a lot of documentaries and low-budget films so far at this years festival – however Elite Squad 2: The Enemy Within is certainly at the other end of the spectrum. Having already enjoyed public and critical acclaim, Elite Squad 2 is the current all-time largest box office ticket seller and highest-grossing film in Brazil, ahead of massive Hollywood blockbusters such as Avatar. This film was epic – it had massive action sequences, a soundtrack that shook the walls of the theatre, and even an opening title sequence that makes Michael Bay look like a wimp!
After seeing the movie poster and promotional stills for this film – who wouldn’t want to go and see it? Nim is just so darn cute! Project Nim was the name of a Columbia University experiment led by psychologist Herbert Terrace seeking to discover how much chimpanzees and humans could communicate through sign language.
One thing that has really surprised me thus far at the festival is just how many fantastic documentaries have been on show! Boundary-pushing Oscar-nominated Morgan Spurlock is a true expert in his field. With profitable and Internationally successful films like Super Size Me and Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden? under his belt, I had quite high expectations for The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, but Morgan delivered. This is a hilarious, educational and seriously well crafted documentary that is based around such a simple, yet such a clever concept.
A Quiet Life is the story of an Italian expatriate Rosario who runs a quiet, yet successful roadside restaurant and hotel with the help of his beautiful younger business driven wife, Renate. Rosario is the head chef in his kitchen, and pushes the boundaries of what’s normally on the German menu by dishing out wild boar and crabs in the same sitting (something that’s obviously not the norm in Germany given the reaction from the rest of the staff in the kitchen!). They live a quiet life, where running the business, looking after their young son Mathais, and trying to kill a whole bunch of trees with copper nails (as the council won’t allow them to cut them down unless they are dying), are their only joys, priorities and challenges.