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| Ron Holloway |
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Fest junkie has a top year
Sometimes, it seems, the only thing I am really good at is getting on and off a plane. Gene would have laughed. And he would have said: “As long as the fest toppers are that dumb and the invitations keep rolling in, why resist?”
Last year, I covered 22 festivals on a hit-and-run basis. There was a reason to that kind of madness. I wanted to show it could be done after a layoff due to a gut cancer operation.
This year, Dorothea (Click for pic) made some of the rounds with me. We were together at the Berlinale (not hard – we live here), Cannes (another Moving Pictures stint for
John Campbell), Moscow (Faces of Love , rubbing shoulders with Catherine Breillat during her Anatomy of Hell screening), St. Petersburg (splendid balmy
White Nights weather), Cluj in Transilvania (Bela Lugosi debuted here in Hungarian legit), Sarajevo (10th anni of fest that began during “longest siege of 20th century”), Bitola in Macedonia (25th anni of film camera fest dedicated to
Manaki Brothers), and, starting tomorrow, the Second Tirana International Short Film Festival (planes land at Mother Teresa Airport alongside a cow pasture).
Jury work, although easy, should be shelved, if at all possible.
Among other notable fests of this long season, I heartily recommend Singapore (cinema cum cuisine or vise versa), the Dutch Film by the Sea Festival Twins (Vlissingen closer to Brussels, Scheveningen closer to Den Haag) honoring
Milos Forman and Saul Zaentz, Karlovy Vary in famous Czech spa (my favorite watering hole), Sofia (why not – I wrote a book on Bulgarian film history), Montreal (best festival in Canada – just ask the Variety faithfuls), Kiev Molodist Youth Fest (forget the films – watching tanks roll along Independence Square on the eve of the election was a shot I won’t easily forget), and Cottbus near Berlin (gala welcome for new EU members from Central Europe).
If the above sounds touristic, well, you’re probably right. Next year, I may cut the fest count down to a baker’s dozen.
Holl Berlin -- Dec 16, 2004 |
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| Ron Holloway – Count on him to show if you are running a film fest |
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