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Our Man Moze’s Post Humor Festival – Part 1

Film festivals have a reputation as glamorous events during which one may overhear egregious name-dropping, brazen attempts at social climbing, and the loathsome clacking of that actress whose heels and career are just a bit higher than yours– how does she do it? Festivals like Cannes are reputed for the releasing of decent films with big-name directors out into society, but they are equally reputed, nay– revered– for their unabashed luxury and star credibility, and the films are often obscured by the cleavage, the Bee-hives, and any variation of protuberance. This is one reason why it is so lovely to get to experience a fledgling (just having celebrated, in festival-form, its 5 year birthday) festival like ÉCU. Still too familial and intimate an effort to not be run out of its creators’ apartment, ÉCU is a festival yet too young to have washed over its idiosyncrasies in cubic zirconium– the visit I made to the office the week before the festival, for example, was hectic. The apartment was disheveled, interns were scurrying like just-slaughtered chickens, and a cacophony of Australian/French/Serbian/ Swedish/German/English/American/Estonian/ Portuguese/Flemish accents pulsated in-and-out of my doubtlessly professional talks with the festivals’ overseers, and one was lucky not to get clobbered by roles of gargantuan posters. It was pretty fantastic. Just like their website, ECU is a near bi-lingual experience with an Anglophone leaning. It takes place in Paris, and seems a proud member of this very cinematic city (I hesitate to do Paris an injustice in glorifying it with terms like “cinematic,” but if we reflect on the number of films made in/making reference to/making love to Paris, it seems “cinematic city” is a respectably modest title), but makes no attempts to veil its Anglophonic roots. Over half of the staff, both from what I gathered in my office-cameos and in attending the festival were native English speakers, and those who weren’t were enviably multilingual. The introductory speeches to each event were mostly held in English, with key points translated in French, which merely reinforced my penchant for linguistic laziness as a globalization-spoiled native English speaker.

ÉCU was held in the Latin Quarter at the Cinéma Grand Action and theater le Triomphe. As a Belleville resident, it is rare that I cross Paris’ southern, socioeconomic equator (as an honorary member of Parisian society, I am likely trying to grasp onto an identity and thus grasp for extremes)– the right bank is fun, funky and mixed, and the left bank is a gorgeous, miniaturize-able bourgeois wasteland. At least, this was my very uninformed assumption. I was indeed very glad to have these preconceived notions debunked and to have a reason to further explore the left bank; in between events, I found myself ogling at the gastronomical offerings (ranging from the ubiquitous Turkish kebab to Moroccan restaurants to a candy shop whose presentation was so picturesque that, since I had nothing edible in my hand, made me simply want to start eating my hand), fawning over surprise patches of park– I found the playground quite an opportune place to perfect my French, as its fellow climbers and swingers, for reasons that will go unmentioned, had a very similar speaking level to my own. Also, I visited the Panthéon just up the hill (if you are of the name-dropping breed, Voltaire’s corpse is always an exemplary person/object(?) to say you kicked it with between screenings).

To be continued…

The Shorts

Before the films started, the owner of the Cinéma le Grand Action, an intense-looking woman with miraculous cheekbones and a stubborn, unwavering coiffure that could only have been coiffed here in Paris, took center-floor to speak.  She was excited and gracious, and her energy zapped away my roly-poly wine catalepsy.

Well.  Enough pussyfooting.  I’m going to plunge right in and say that these were some of the most bombastic short films I’ve ever seen.  To watch one right after the other gave a lovely sensation akin to that of a healthy machine gunning, in which, from each bullet hole oozed bubblegum amoxicillin, a licentious puppeteer, chintzy funeral parlors and beak-nosed puppets.  And this was just the first short film, Curtains, which, indeed, showcased all of the above. Another film was equally striking and deliciously repugnant- Konvex-T. This was a Swedish film, and, having just returned from Stockholm, I had trouble not doting on it with a very biased nostalgia.  Still stupefied by Stockholm’s charm, I found myself associating this bleak dystopian film about nefarious anal cists with riverside walks, snow-covered rooftops, and toasty cinnamon buns.  I can’t say I identified with the main character plagued by his grimy green-tinted, isolating society and aforementioned anal cists, but I certainly found myself thinking, “well, at least he has these pustules in a delightful country with one of the best universal health-care systems and top-notch church spires!”

What amazed me most was that there seemed an odd continuity to the films. They fused much better than many films in intentionally clustered groupings (Paris, Je T’aime comes to mind).  Most had an overhanging/underlying/middlesquatting sense of the macabre, they all shattered expectations, and, unlike many all-too-long short films, none of them overstayed their welcome.

Day 1 – Reaching Roise

(Reaching Roise director Jessica Morris)

I am tumbling through a rainbow of identification tags, frantically scouring for red– a red tag means a filmmaker.  In my as yet futile hunt (not for lack of red tags, but rather for penetrable conversations), I overhear someone British.  This is a plus, in that it means that the only language barriers between them and myself can be avoided by not talking about elevators, cookies, or different methods cooking potatoes.  The British woman is saying “yes, I made it,” and I swoop in– vulturous.  “I’m sorry, I was certain I overheard you saying, ‘I made… something, and I was hoping that something was a film…?,’ and I realized I should probably talk to you.  Might I interject with a few questions?”  The British woman giggles warmly.  There is another with her, likewise giggling warmly. “Oh, to be famous,” director Jessica Morris (the first of the two Brits) replies.   Through most of my discussion with them, I assume I am talking to director and co-directors of the documentary Reaching Rosie, about an autistic girl and her parents’ acceptance and appreciation of every aspect of their daughter’s autism as “magical and beautiful.”  Actually, it turns out that the second woman I’m speaking with is Rosie’s (the subject of the film) mother.  I am moved to see that she isn’t merely a documentarian’s subject captured and encaged in 8mm, but an active and vocal member in the whole process; it is also a testament to the quality and delicacy of the film that Rosie’s mother so wholly embraced its handling of hers and her daughters’ lives.  Unfortunately, the touching display leaves me without words (for I fear my questions will only trivialize), and I tell them to have a great evening and duck out.

I bump into Jessica Morris again the next day, after having attended one of the G-Tech workshops.  Her screening had been that afternoon; apparently it had gone wonderfully, and she said that she was relieved to have managed not to sound too ineloquent during her Q & A, regardless of her fatigue (euphemism) from last night’s after-party.  She mentions that it was the first time she’d seen her film on a large screen (a phenomenon which we all know necessitates heavy drinking).  This was, indeed, the film’s world premier, and she was able to perceive it differently with the addition of audience response:  people were chuckling during parts she wouldn’t have expected, she says, and some laugh-worthy moments passed silently.  It must have gone well, though, I assume, as she confesses that she’d already been asked for her autograph once today.

Day 1 – The Grand Entrance

Something of a novice as far as film festivals are concerned, I’m caught off guard as I’m stampeded out of the intimate hall (really, though, a corridor that compensates with the title “Le Grand Bar”) of the Cinéma Grand Action in Paris’ Latin Quarter, in which the entirety of the Friday night ÉCU film festival crowd are packed like stylish and remarkably prolific independent-film making sardines.  Tonight people have gathered for a series of 8 short films, each one of a caliber worthy of an “official selection.”  It’s a sea of accomplishment and post-toil catharsis– half of the people in here have made a film in the far reaches of Europe (and even the world), and here they all are chatting over bar pretzels.  It’s a sight to behold– only I cannot, as I am being swept away, up the screening room.  I have a macaron (Paris’s best flour-based offering) in one hand, a delicious albeit amorphous and alien berry sandwich cylinder-mini in another hand, and my third glass of wine somewhere in my third hand.  I’m feeling antsy to talk to some filmmakers, albeit unsure of who is who, what language I’ll be expected to speak in, and inevitably afraid I’ll somehow accidentally blabber something cinematically sacrilegious like, “yeah, I really noticed Mermaids’ influence on your style.  That actress of yours is beautiful, kind of Meg Ryan-ish circa 2008.”  Well, only time and a couple of interviews will tell.