Monday, September 26, 2005

Festival Diary: Vacation Day 4a: Glorious Friday Continued

Saturday, September 24, 2005

10:10am – And finish last night’s blog in the morning I will. My ears are faring a little bit better after leaving the Commodore last night, and I woke up around 9am, a bit angered since I wanted to wake up at about 10 or so to really shake off the long day yesterday. All of last night and this morning I have been listening to The New Pornographers, which you will find out why later.

So let’s begin talking about Friday, my first real day of festivalgoing:

After I chomped down on some lukewarm bacon and eggs, along with some very cold hashbrowns and crappy coffee, I began my first official walk into Vancouver to take in some press screenings (I say official since I already made a walk into Van last week as mentioned in my entry last Sunday). It was sunny and warm outside, a very good blessing to begin my vacation (although one thing tells me that it’s going to start pouring rain in a week in paying for this good weather). I find myself having my now official route for VIFF; down West 12th to Granville and then a straight shot north across the bridge to find myself on Seymour street. When the weather is good, it’s a very enjoyable and energetic walk. And I should be doing it since I will be sitting on my ass for the next six hours.

I arrive at the Vancity Theater about 9:40 and my first festivalgoer encounter is Gary, a chap from San Francisco who has been here since the very first festival screening and is planning, like me, to do several movies a day. We shake hands and exchange pleasantries, and he thanks me for mentioning him in my coverage for VIFF last year. He is worth mentioning since he saw 115 films by the time the festival ended.

Suddenly, in walks Sascha, a good friend from VIFF last year whom I also had the pleasure of spending time with when he was in Victoria earlier this year for a teacher’s conference. Sascha is one opinionated, storytelling, joke-making son-of-a…I jest. We have seen many movies together and have had several fun discussions and arguments about VIFF films.

And then I encounter one of the staples of my festivalgoing, a true film-fest friend that I have had for over two years now…Ralph Henderson. This is a festivalgoer for the books. I met Ralph at one of my very first media screenings back in 2003 when I was a wide-eyed, bouncing off walls kid (oh wait, I still am!!) and we have attended many of the same screenings both at VIFF ’03 and ’04. Ralph is a helpful volunteer that works hard early on in the fest so he can do just about as many films as Gary. I yelled out his name from a few rows away and gave the gent a big hug. It was truly a pleasure to see him again.

I also encountered a few other faces from last year that I have met and had the pleasure of speaking with, along with the occasional new face in the crowd. I mention all of these people because I have to; the VIFF would not be the festival it is without the amazing community of film fans within. You find some of these people at various other film festivals but certainly not the major ones; it is all about business at Toronto, Sundance and the like, whereas Vancouver is a true audience festival. And it’s just “not” big enough to give us the room to actually do this.

Anyway, more about the new Vancity theater. The cinema seats about 185 in a tiered seating fashion, so the cinema is right up to date with all of the popular stadium seating cinemas of today. But the real winner of the cinema is the seating…ultra wide, European seats that are so amazingly comfy that all I could hope for is a foot-stool to come out. For those of you who dislike strangers sitting in the seat right next to you, the double-arm rests take care of that pretty quick. Suddenly those seats at the Tinseltown just aren’t the same…

The projection booth is also enormous and therefore viewable directly from the auditorium, so you can see the huge double Kinoton projectors and the projectionist working hard to get his work done. The screen is a curiosity, using “Grid masking”, meaning that there are black borders around the image as usual, but the unused portions of the screen are still visible around the edges. Perhaps this is a system that I am not familiar with but it did take a while to get used to.

The first film of the day was the Portugal import “Odete”, an intentionally slow moving drama named after the film’s lead character, who is a supermarket worker who may or may not be pregnant with the baby from his dead boyfriend, who, as it turns out, also had a gay lover. Odete meets the gay lover at the boyfriend’s grave and the two create one of the oddest relationships I’ve seen in a movie in quite a while. It doesn’t always work, but the timing of certain sequences along with some truly bizarre sequences towards the end make the film stand out as a whole. Add to that, the actress playing Odete, the lovingly named Ana Cristina de Oliveria, reminds me of a cross between Audrey Hepburn and Keira Knightley. Nothing wrong with that, in my opinion.

The next screening was “State of Fear”, a telling documentary about the war status in Peru told through various testimony of people who were afflicted before the terrorist takeover to afterwards when the country was overrun with the Shining Path who was against the Peruvian Government. The film has some truly horrifying video footage (including the secret taping of bribing big wigs in the government with millions of dollars) along with a sad testimony from a connected woman who was raped and tortured. The film also has room for some mild humour, including a scene where Carlos Raffi, the spokesman for the Peru president, who ignores the interview while taking a call on his cell phone.

I do not know much about the Chinese propaganda films made during the 70’s (for several years around that time, these operas and the cinematic versions were the only thing allowed to play in China!), but “Yang Bax Xi: The 8 Model Works”, the next film on the press screening roster, focuses on the Yang Bax Xi opera today as the film follows several people – mainly many youthful dancing groups – and gives us a look back to the cultural change of communist China before things changed a few decades ago. The problem with this movie, despite its great subject, is that the film is plodding and slow, and did not hold much interest despite its thesis (kind of like the film “Scaredsacred” which is playing in Vancouver right now). While some of the street dance sequences and the old film footage are fun to watch, the slow interviews and performance footage later in the film (one of which is so boringly shot entirely from a backstage angle) sadly take away from the overall idea.

And finally, the last screening on tap is the terrific “Souvenir of Canada” which is about the country, through and through, told from the perspective of novelist Douglas Coupland, who creates a “Canada House” built from a home that is planning to be demolished. The film intercuts the documentary footage with commentary on many aspects of Canadian culture such as the dead-and-gone slogan “Chimo”, French/English cereal boxes (and as you may have noticed, DVD covers as well), universal health care and those pesky Canada geese. As well, the film is a sharp commentary on the fellows down south who always poke fun at us and the slight but noticeable differences. You Americans would also be good to watch this film.

Crap. After writing so much I realized I have to get ready to go for a Tinseltown run! Egad. I will be back tonight with more commentary on Friday, which you may actually get to see on Sunday. J

12:40am – Okay I’m back after viewing not one, not two, not three, not four, but FIVE movies in the span of a day. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. PHEW!

I must continue on with my wonderful Friday. As the press screening ended, I decided to for a walk to help clear my head of viewing four movies. Keep in mind that this is downtown Vancouver and I have many favorite walking paths. At around 5:30 or so, I find myself walking towards the Skytrain Stadium station and find Nicholas Campbell, Mr. “Davinci Inquest” himself, strolling slowly up Dunsmuir with his head pointed towards the ground. Quite an odd local celeb sighting, I must say.

So after killing some time, mostly involving grabbing some dinner and quickly visiting an internet bar, I make my way to the Commodore to check out The New Pornographers. I find myself in a queue of about 50 or so ahead of us. A few moments pass and a few panhandlers go by, and then I start chatting it up with two really interesting people in line named Nick and Lindsay. All three of us immediately into conversation about our favorite Pornographers disc (mine is “Twin Cinema” though “Mass Romantic” sure gives it a run for its money) which winds up helping kill the time quite well.

We find our way into the Commodore at 8 and get right to the stage. Luckily Nick, Lindsay and myself have secured a choice spot right infront of one of the keyboards set up. Boom. I am there. Lindsay excuses herself for a short while so she can meet our friend while Nick and I chat up music and movies for the 45 minutes or so until concerts begin. I must say at this point that I really enjoy meeting new people, and Nick, a VFS student in the computer animation sector, is a true blue music nut, frequently hitting up many of the indie bands that make their way to the rainy city.

At roughly 9:00, the first opening, Immaculate Machine take the stage. This is a three-person band from my home town of Victoria, and as luck would have it, the adorable lead singer and keyboard player is standing right infront of me as she begins to lay down a very catchy opening tune. The band do about 6 or 7 songs, all with a very good, “fun” rock sound. A few around us were mentioning afterwards that they sounded “plain”, but I thought they were pretty good.

Destroyer hit next at about 10:00 as I get my first full view of Dan Bejar who looked like he fell out of bed dressed in his pink shirt and jeans. The gang launch into a roughly 8 song set, where a few of the tunes are full rock versions of his masterful “Your Blues” album from last year. Bejar’s voice is addictive, including a poetic finishing line to one of the songs in his set. The crowd is beginning to get fuller and crowd towards the stage at this point. Suddenly, my “bubble” is starting to get smaller, thinking that the arm space will be non existent after these guys get off the stage.

I was right. As Destroyer finished their set, people began to get as near as they could to the stage. I was standing next to Nick at this point and we held our best so people couldn’t squeeze in. The LAST thing I wanted was to be was pushed to the right or the left out of frame of the band. My eyes were like they were recording a personal documentary on the fest, and my digital camera is my rock and roll Zapruder stock.

Finally, The New Pornographers take the stage. Newman has his mic set up almost directly infront of me; complete within spitting range. Neko Case is off to the left a little, but I can still get a view of her in a complete yellow gown (with wings!). The crowd goes absolutely wild as they launch into their title track “Twin Cinema”, which is just as awesome live as it is on stage. Almost immediately after they seal that track, they launch into “Use It” and then continue afterwards…

For a total of 28 songs. Twenty-freakin-eight.

Every single track of theirs was played by the NP’s with complete energy. There was even time for improvisation, where the drummer starts playing Rumours by Fleetwood Mac as Newman fixes up his acoustic guitar, and even after Newman gets the guitar fixed he joins in to finish the song. There are also several occasions where Bejar is needed but he’s backstage sucking on Corona’s like they are candy. “One moment while Bejar is throwing up in the back,” jokes Newman. Or is he?

Through and through, they’re having fun doing this, and so are we. I did not realize how much I was dancing along with the music until I bumped into a guy next to me. And I then continued to dance crazily as they went through one wonderful song after another. “HEY-LA!!!” Even as they wound towards a close, they still came out for two more encores and banged it out of the park. One of these days I will have to scan their set list, which Lindsay nabbed from the stage and gave to me. I owe that girl a coke.

After the concert, I said goodbye to Lindsay and walked with Nick for a few blocks before parting ways, and had one of those wacky conversations where you praise the shit out of the concert while yelling at the top of your lungs, thinking that you are talking at a normal volume. My ears were completely shot as I walked home in a daze, playing Mass Romantic at a very low volume to take care of my ears.

Once again, PHEW!!! I’m off to bed. Watch tomorrow night as I post my weekend-wrap up, and afterwards I will not be making blog entries for a few days so I can get my festival work ready for my efilmcritic.com coverage. Hey-la!

Until then,

Jason Whyte
Efilmcritic.com

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