Kat: Festival Diary Sept 15
Posted by Katarina Gligorijevic on October 6, 2010 · Leave a Comment
Day seven. It’s all slowing down to a crawl for me at this point. Reviews are piling up, the number of meetings I’m supposed to schedule and attend before everyone leaves town seems endless, and most of all, I’m completely exhausted. Still, it never feels right to complain about seeing too many movies, or attending too many parties, so instead I grab a jumbo coffee and go to a screening of Trigger, then retire to my office for a bit of email catch up and general brooding.
But not before I zip to the Hyatt for an interview with Belgian director Koen Mortier, whose film 22nd of May is playing at TIFF, but who really first caught my eye with the bizarre and fabulous Ex Drummer back in 2007. I talk to Koen about his latest film and about upcoming projects, and then Colin joins us briefly to chat. He programmed Ex Drummer, so they’re old friends. I pray that recording the interview on my iPhone worked (it did) and that I’ll have time to transcribe it later that evening (no chance in hell, as it turns out).
Since breakfast was a coffee and lunch was a random pastry, I look forward to some kind of dinner this evening, which materializes in the form of a lovely meal at Marben with a few Midnight Madness guests and the two stars of Monsters, Whitney Able and Scoot McNairy (married in real life, and quite possibly the cutest couple I’ve ever met). Whitney talks some of the non-Canucks into trying caesars, our national drink (and one that’s done quite well at Marben). She’s not Canadian, but she’s got great taste.
Stake Land director Jim Mickle gives the caesar a thumbs up, A Horrible Way to Die screenwriter Simon Barrett reacts as though we’ve forced him to taste barf flavoured poison, and orders some kind of mojito instead. All the cocktails, and the food, were excellent.
After walking off some of the food in the pleasantly cooling early autumn air, we head to the Imperial Pub (a pre-Midnight drinks tradition) then off to Red Nights. It’s a film that definitely divided audiences, but I’m firmly rooted on the “pro” side. It was just slick and just pervy enough for my tastes, without becoming campy or overwrought.
Tomorrow, I get up at 8:00am in order to catch the Herzog doc, Cave of Forgotten Dreams, at 9:00am. I’m not sure why press & industry screenings are stacked so heavily in favour of early mornings, but I’ll tell ya, I do not look forward to getting up at that ungodly hour!
Top three highlights of the day:
1) Eating venison ragout for dinner instead of some stale crust of bread that I find in my purse (or worse yet, a whopper from the Scotiabank), and in delightful company, too.
2) Getting to meet and interview Koen Mortier, whose Ex Drummer totally blew my mind when a friend showed me a bootlegged version in ’08. I hadn’t even met Colin at that point, so when months later we started dating and he was like “I gotta blow your mind with this movie”, I was able to say “already one of my faves”. It was a sure sign that he was the One. Or that I was. Either way.
3) Meeting Bobcat Goldthwait (again). Did I mention yesterday that he was at the A Horrible Way to Die screening, as well? Well, anyway. I have been a huge fan since around the age of six or seven, so I was pretty damn thrilled to find out that he’s actually a super nice, down to earth, regular type guy who just wants to hang out, watch awesome movies and go to Midnight Madness.
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