Friday
Now feeling like an old hand at this, I show up confident, White Out poster in hand (see fig. h) ready to see what this wacky festival has to offer. My confidence is short lived when I see that, while admirable to have my poster to promote my film, most other filmmakers have gone thorough the trouble of printing up poster postcards that have such helpful things as plot synopsis and screening times. And the laurels. God help me the beautiful laurels signifying that YES, I AM IN A FILM FESTIVAL. One look at my poster reveals only bits of information: the title, the back of my star's head and an erroneous date on the bottom, leading passers by to think that they cannot see this film without a time machine as it has already shown “Only at Cutting Hall – December 29, 2007.”
Pity.
But surely I can get my groove back after greeting Nat, the beautiful “Festival Mom” Juliet (who happens to be Nat's main squeeze...and wife, don'tcha know) and several other volunteers. My poster takes a prominent position, so prominent in fact that upon reflection I cannot imagine how it got left behind. But that's beside the fact. I sit in the central hub of the festival, watching as walkie talkies are passed out, problems arementioned and dismissed, and filmmakers begin to descend. I open my festival program and take a look at the films I've randomly selected for the day. The first slot is Films About Films, second is The Chemistry of Dating. A glance at the lineup of shorts for the first slot reveals that I'd seen a number of them the night before, so perhaps I should choose a feature instead. I'm also reminded that Chemistry of Dating was an official selection at MicrocinemaFest, the small festival that I kinda sorta help with. Perhaps I can snag a copy from the vaults. So if that were the case, wouldn't it behoove me to choose another film in place of one I could easily snag???
Scanning through the listings, I find a replacement for the first slot. Before I head out to screening number one, I'm introduced to the beautiful and delightful “Why We Wax” girls Kimberly M. Wetherell and Amy Axelson. Kimberly is also responsible for “Ménage À Trios”, which is screening with White Out. I proceed to market the hell out of myself to them and Kimberly points out that of course she'll be seeing White Out because of her short, and may have said something about me not needing to try so hard. Though that last part could've been just in my imagination. They offer me a merkin.
“Come again?”
“Would you like a merkin?”
I pause. “...Yes.”
“Do you know what it is?”
I frown, I've made exactly two friends at this festival so far, they're excited about my film.
“Yes. Yes, I do.” I lie.
I know one thing, a merkin is something taboo. I know one other thing too, and I quickly share: “That's where President Merkin Muffley (see fig. i) got his name for Dr. Strangelove. Characters were named tabooly. Like Mandrake and Turgidson.” Despite "tabooly" most definitely not being a word, the girls light up and I feel like I scored big for the home team. They tell me they look forward to seeing more of me and we part ways.
Two shorts precede the film. “8 Minutes to Love,” a short about speed dating produced before Sandra Oh was someone big which has been brought to us now that she is. Its not sure if it's a comedy or a social statement and begins a bit too wacky for its more grown up ending. Then came “Fortune Hunters”, a better film about a young man working at a fortune cookie factory who just foolishly dumped his girlfriend. His apology is split up and accidentally printed into thousands of cookies. It's light and silly and boasts quite good performances, including a surprise appearance by Gedde Watanabe (Long Duck Dong himself ). The credits sequence is stunning; we see how fortune cookies are made and the cast’s names go by on the fortunes being inserted into the cookies. The quirky nature and performances call to mind the lightness of a film like Bottle Rocket, but the irreverence is dropped for a more conventional and “easy” ending where they get back together without issue because of the cookies. The best moments in the film were his angry fortunes: “Confucius say: You will die alone!” and “100's of guys will soon be banging your ex.”
