April 26, 2005

What a long strange trip it has been...

It was never acknowledged on MCN or here, but Happy Passover to my fellow Jews...

Of course, you are aware of the Ten Plagues mentioned in the Passover service;
1. Blood
2. Frogs
3. Vermin
4. Beasts
5. Cattle Disease
6. Boils
7. Hail
8. Locusts
9. Darkness
10. Slaying of First Born

And the Hollywood version;

1. Money
2. Actors Who Think They Can Open Movies Because They Were In One Hit
3. Representatives Who Want Producing Credits For Not Doing Anything
4. Blondes
5. Increasing Marketing Costs
6. Wrinkles
7. Internet Piracy
8. Reality TV Producers
9. Bad Opening Weekend
10. Another Production Chief Fired

The festival of Ebert lights was interrupted a bit by the passing over. Unfortunately, I missed one of the most prized films from Sundance this year, Me, You & Everyone We Know, by Miranda July. The mere fact that the film was in the festival, a couple months before it is released into theaters, tells you that not everything at The Overlooked Film Festival is overlooked anymore. Some films have not been looked at all.

Roger Ebert's little festival that could just completed its seventh year of showing films that aren't just overlooked, but also formats (70mm, Todd A-O Vision, etc) and forms (silents, intelligent children's films, musicals, Bollywood). It's my fifth year in attendance and I can attest that the event has reached a comfortable maturity. This year, guests from Mario van Peebles to Jean Firstenberg to Jason Patric to Jon Sehring to Jason Scott Lee turned up (among many others) in the Land of the Steak & Shake. I'm also happy to report that Roger has returned to the habit of late night burger imbibing, taking over a section of Steak & Shake each night of the festival. And while stud boys Jason & Mario got some attention, it was The Mighty E who drew the most demand for autographs and photos.

Murderball rolled into town and before the opening night film, Jacques Tati's Playtime, ended, Mark Zupan had walked/rolled out of the film on his way to check out the Champaign nightlife. But that is part of what is so much fun about this festival. Ebert pushes the audience and, every once in a while, they push back. Of course, what it really, really special is that we get to see a movie like Playtime on a giant screen with great projection and sound. If one person mentioned how they couldn't connect with Tati's vision via the DVD but finally got it seeing it on screen, there were 100.

Surprisingly, the Tati experience kind of reoccurred at the Passover seder, where childhood development "genius" (according to MacArthur Foundation, which gave her a genius grant) Vivian Paley and I chatted about whether the idea of using blocks, which we so associate with childhood, is not a lot like adult life lived happily. When do we get so caught up in the universal angst that we can't see how simple the blocks of our lives are... how many cool things we can build... how easily we can start all over again with just a little bravery and imagination?

In Playtime, Tati created his own odd vision, maximized. And it isn't for everyone. But why should everything be for everyone? When something achieves universality and quality at once, it is the rarest of occasions. We must look for other standards in our artistic demands.

Paley and I later talked about the internet... and her steadfast choice to remain disinterested until the end. In her 70's, she still writes her books in longhand on pads. And she is no less the genius. And each time we face someone who is a retro-lutionary we must decide... are they rebelling against the modern or simply embracing the power of what works so well for them? You don't much hear about the courage to remain the same. But why not?

What did the Urbana audience embrace more dramatically, the two pre-release films at the festival or the Lon Chaney version of The Phantom Of The Opera with a live performance by The Alloy Orchestra?

I'm feeling as ancient as The Phantom these days... yet, just as spry. I'm, glad to be back in the saddle. Thanks for putting up with the traveling irregularity.

As the week continues, I'll clue you into a couple of great books I read over the last two weeks, I'll look at more Tribeca movies, the summer starts with XX2 and The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy and who knows what else?!?!?

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