Somnopolis

From this rough material I shall fashion an article suitable for civil servants nationwide! This I vow.

Though I returned from the northernmost city of culture a week ago, I’m only now attempting to put my thoughts on the trip in order. First I should probably start with how a lowly deskjockey like myself wrangled a free festival media pass. A month or two back the lovely Melinda txted to ask if I was free to attend the premiere of her father Basil Gelpke’s film A Crude Awakening in Edinburgh. Of course I jumped at the chance. As the weeks pass I got to thinking though. I work for a magazine – more or less – the festival offers passes to journalists – more or less – and there was no reason, no real reason, why I couldn’t apply myself. So I did. I sent off a copy of the magazine, a completed application form and a sample of my writing. Several days pass and I receive notice that I will indeed qualify to attend all industry screenings for the festival.

So we were off. The first day was typically sleep deprived thanks to an early flight from Dublin Airport with Ryanair (which in turn meant an even earlier start – queues stretched right round the ticket area and proved a complete nightmare). It’s still amazing that we two travellers mangaged to stand on our own feet for the duration of the day. But once we arrived back in my favourite city everything fell into place. We met Basil at a screening of Colour Me Kubrick (a comedy starring John Malkovich about a Kubrick impersonator ligging his way about the country during the filming of Eyes Wide Shut). The screening was held in the Cameo cinema on Lothian road, which had flatscreens dotting the walls displaying interviews that had already been held with the likes of Kevin Smith & Charlize Theron. During the afternoon we caught Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth, which hopefully may startle some special interests into pursuing some action on environmental controls, but which I found overall condescending and simplistic. Animated sequences involving a sad polar bear and a jocular frog reminded me of the Troy McClure public information shorts from the Simpsons. Gore himself was in town that weekend and the red carpet was duly rolled out. What a strange figure to be transformed from failed presidential candidate to festival carpet padder, numbered now among the ranks of celebrity.

Basil’s own film A Crude Awakening I found far better. Hopefully the picture will acquire adequate distribution, but it is far worthier, as it features interviews with actual experts on the oil crisis, who can articulate the attendant problems with peak oil, alternative energy sources and the current international political climate. Together with fellow film maker Ray McCormack, the director answered questions afterwards from an audience of mostly expat Americans. It’s striking just how little the issues involved in this situation are discussed publicly or in the media, yet so many are aware, only choosing to speak out at cinema q & a sessions.

Finally I claimed my journalist pass and discovered it entitled me to more than free screenings. I was also able to view films that had already screened which I had missed. There were a number of pictures available, but I tried to choose ones less likely to get distribution in Ireland, so nix to Wristcutters A Romance (based on a novel by an Israeli writer, which I’d already read serialised in Bi-Polar and starred Will Arnett – GOB from Arrested Development – Tom Waits and Sharon Sossamon); LoudquietLoudetc. the Pixies doc (out soon in the IFI, so why bother); An Unexpected Guest (a fantastic looking Spanish Hitchcock style thriller about a man haunted in his own house by an intruder). So in went the dvd titled Al Franken – God Spoke.

I have beheld the face of evil. Ann Coulter. Brrr. She’s tall, leggy, blond and hasn’t a frickin’ clue what she’s talking about. Along with Bill O’Reilly, Franken has selected her to be his nemesis in his book Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them. The film tracks Franken’s progress from the publication of the book to the disspiriting second successful Bush election. Among the highlights is his encounter with Henry Kissinger at a crowded party, were he chooses to treat the Nobel Peace Prize awarded warmonger to his ‘Kissinger bit’. Priceless. It’s also a very affecting film, as we witness Franken’s deep personal politicial convictions be tested at every turn, pushed further and further into the political fray each time he chooses to open his mouth. Well worth seeing if you have the chance.

Later after dinner (oh god – I’m a man who likes his food, but oh my sweet lord that was good) I went to see Micky and Nicky, Elaine May’s second film starring John Cassavetes and Peter Falk. Difficult to find, I’m glad I got to see it with an audience as taken with the picture as I came to be. It’s a film about male friendship and the destructive nature of relationships in general. It’s very funny and brutal. If I can track it down on dvd it’s on my lend-to-friends list.

Then I wound up at a Diesel Jeans party. Now guys who bring their girlfriends to a party are always running a risk. Maybe she’ll meet someone else, someone more attentive (at least for that evening), someone more attractive and funny. It goes both ways of course. Introducing your significant other into a social gathering always carries with it the attendant pressures of a new dynamic. But think of the guy who brings his girlfriend from the movie industry to a party filled with well-to-do directors and producers, who could well advance her career. Feel sorry for that guy. I witnessed such a man get crushed right in front of me on the balcony of a penthouse suite, smoke fogging the air and booze clouding the brain. Poor fecker. And then came sleep.

The next morning brought us a neat lil sugar rush (hmmm aniseed. The Scots may have very unhealthy food, but feck it, I want my childhood sweet shops back!) a cholesterol raising fry and a return trip to the videoteque to watch first Clerks II and a documentary on the recent elections in Iraq: My Country, My Country. Clerks lifted us up before the sadness of the Iraqi film, directed by a fearless female film-maker who managed to acquire footage from both the Sunni community and the US military. Excellent picture.

Clerks II has so many class lines in it. Randall’s diatribe on LOTR is a laugh out loud moment, as well as his campaign to redeem ‘Porch Monkey’. Overall it’s a very sweet movie with a dirty mouth. And Jay’s homage to Silence of the Lambs proves to be possibly the best scene ever performed by the addled Mr. Mewes. See it with friends. Kevin Smith’s pic went on to win the audience award at the festival – hopefully enough to reward a man brave enough to cast his own wife as a controlling bitca.

Now Melinda had never seen a stand-up comedian before, so I in my wisdom took her to see Doug Stanhope. Y’know, the man who was chased out of Kilkenny for suggesting that Ireland has so many paedophile priests because Irish women are so ugly. He’s a pretty brave man too. He opened his increasingly drunken set by trying to set the record straight on media accusations of anti-semitism. Now this was a hot topic at the festival, as two comedians were accused this year of anti-semitism based on their performances. Somehow Stanhope got lumped in with this group. So his opening remarks on the night went as follows: ‘I never said I hated the Jews…I said if Mel Gibson can get so much free press by saying he does, well than why can’t I get a piece.’ Nervous laughter followed. He’s not Bill Hicks, or Lenny Bruce, or Richard Pryor, as some of the trades have it. But he can be funny. Like so:

“If marriage didn’t exist, would you invent it? Would you be like ‘hey baby, this love we got is too big for just the two of us. Lets get the government involved! Lets federalise this! Do you know any lawyers?”

Of course Mel hated it.

Afterwards we were invited to attend the festival Best Documentary awards. Unfortunately A Crude Awakening did not win (that honour went to a picture on Osaka rentboys), but a fine time – and some fine wine – was had nonetheless. Brian De Palma was in attendance, as was a drunken Sean Connery (though honestly how could one tell?) as chair of the festival and a personal highlight Marc Cousins, the former head of the festival committee and host of the long lamented Videodrome. Ten years ago he summarised the appeal of Dazed and Confused in an introduction to the movie as follows:

Adolescence is that time in one’s life when one is sure that someone, somewhere else is having more fun than you.

On the last days we ran to get tickets for the final showing of Aurora, by the director of Nine Queens Fabian Bielinsky, who recently passed away. Before that we caught a showing of My Name is Rachel Corrie, adapted from the diaries and e-mails of a student activist from the States who went to protest the incursion on Palestinian settlements by the Israeli military and was shortly thereafter murdered, crushed beneath a bull-dozer. Adapted and directed by Alan Rickman, it’s simply the best piece of theatre I’ve seen. Doubtless it’ll never make it to Dublin, but if you get a chance to catch it in London do. Aurora afterwards proved to be a slow moving heist movie concerning an Argentinian epileptic taxidermist prone to fantasising about robbing banks. After his wife leaves him he goes on a hunting trip and through a series of accidents, becomes involved in a casino robbery.

And that was it. A final day’s shopping around the city followed and then the 10pm flight back to ol’ Dublin. I’ll be back next year of course. But not with Ryanair. Feckers.