When the Lights go Down

Saturday is always a popular day for going to the cinema, and last Saturday at the Glasgow Film Festival was no exception. Stuart had been out late the previous night filming the live Anvil gig that took place in Cineworld following a screening of Anvil! The Story of Anvil (he sent me a text message saying simply 'Anvil rule'). It was a busy night for him, as he had two other bands to photograph as well, but he was impressed with the way Lips performed for the camera, as well as with the band's musical competence and - as everyone who meets them reports - the fact that they're just lovely guys.

This didn't save him from an early start, but he wasn't complaining - not when it meant a chance to go to see Errol Flynn swashbuckler The Adventures Of Robin Hood. Sadly, the live fencing demonstration which was supposed to preceed this had been cancelled, and the ukelele performance of the theme tune was hardly an adequate substitute. But the film is always a delightful experience, and the children in the audience were particularly excited by it, cheering when Robin won the archery contest and shouting out in warning when his enemies tried to sneak up on him. This is such a crowd pleaser that we hope the GFT will bring it back after the festival is over.

For my part, I spent the morning catching up on reviews, then headed out to Cineworld for a screening of Tricks, a charming Polish film about a young boy who uses magical thinking to try and bring home the father he has never met. It proved popular with what was quite a mixed audience. Outside the cinema the queue was stretching round the block, with a lot of people there talking about the festival as well as their regular Saturday night viewing. Squeezing past it, I made my way up to the GFT to drop off a screener before walking to the CCA for Meet The Talent, an industry networking party.

Plenty attended the Meet The Talent mixer at the CCA

This event had been scheduled for the upstairs bar, but for some reason had been shifted to the restaurant downstairs, hardly an ideal venue for circulating or for hearing what people are saying - all we could do was make the best of it. There early, I got talking to a group of actors who use the space for regular meetings prior to running workshops. They seemed to be mostly theatre folk, but were very friendly, and bravely held onto their space as other people flooded in.

Stuart arrived a little while later and began taking photographs. He also found us two glasses of rather unpleasant but, crucially, free, red wine. I caught up with Penny who runs regular short film showcase The Magic Lantern, and she kindly introduced me to some of the other guests. Most were short film directors looking for opportunities to finance new projects or distribute finished work, but there were also a few successful feature film directors present and some more actors and writers. I met several people who described themselves as fans of Eye For Film and one who follows us on Twitter, my first in-person evidence that Twitter users really exist.

The party went well, with everyone seeming to enjoy themselves, but fizzled out after the free bar ran dry. Stuart and I were pleased to call it quits and get a bit of Valentine's Day to ourselves, to spend with sushi and Kubrick far away from work. Later I caught up with Donald, who had watched Johnny Mad Dog followed by two sessions of short films. I think 23 movies in one day would be too much for me!

Mark Of An Angel

The following morning I worked on transcription and tried and failed to hunt down the rest of my team. Donald was off to yet another short film programme, including the award-winning Ma Bar, whilst I made my way back to Cineworld for Cherry Blossoms. An absolutely exquisite film, though it would have been better without the running commentary from the two women beside me, who seemed to think that emphasising their disapproval of certain things the characters did would somehow win the respect of those around them - where do these people come from? Most other people present seemed moved by the film, though judging by the gossip in the lobby afterwards quite a few had let it whoosh past over their heads. More evidence, if it were needed, that one cannot make (or review) a film for all audiences.

Quickly ducking home for a curry, I returned for an evening screening of Mark Of An Angel, a tense thriller starring Catherine Frot and Sandrine Bonnaire. Festival organiser Allison Gardner popped in to let us know that ticket sales had passed the 15,000 mark, a new high for the festival. She remarked that this film had completely wrongfooted her; myself, I found it played out much the way I'd expected, but that didn't detract one bit from the suspense and the two central performances were superb.

That was it for me for the day (apart from all the writing that awaited me at home), but Stuart's shift was only just beginning, as he headed out to the Optimo festival party in the Sub Club, due to last into the wee small hours for anyone who could last that long in a strobe-lit red room playing the short films of David Lynch...