I forgot to order toast, but that ended up being okay; I was stuffed by the time I was done. The pancakes weren’t very good, though...made me a bit of a sad panda. At least the taters were omnomnommy. I have internets. I should do a search for best breakfast place in Alexandria and hope that it’s within walking distance!
Anyway, I gathered up my things and headed over to the venue:
It’s really huge, it used to be a torpedo factory for realies. I plan on walking the whole thing on Sunday before the special screenings.
By the time I got there, I’d missed the first two shorts of Group 1 and arrived in the middle of the third, but I found my place quickly and settled in for an all-day treat. I was pretty much the only one in the screening room (it’s a Thursday after all, and early in the day). In the intermission between Group 1 and Group 2, I checked my phone and saw that I had some emails. Not unusual (I get a lot of spam that isn't spam, if that makes any sense...) and among them was a letter from New York City's New Filmmakers telling me that they've accepted the music video to their Summer line-up! I was so excited, not only did I have to leave the venue for a minute, I could barely breathe so when I called my mom, she freaked out for a second. Poor mom. But OMIGOD, NEW YORK CITY! New Filmmakers! WOWSERS!!!
Back to the festival at hand...hahaha! The screening was good fun and during my flick, attendance swelled to five, including me and the projectionist! Around four thirty, they started the whole thing over again so I watched what I missed, then excused myself to get something to eat before the opening night party.
I went to the homemade ice cream shop I talked about in the last post and had a small cup of their cookies and cream. Oh my God...so much better, but the atmosphere was so cold, literally and figuratively. If one could take the atmosphere of the one store and the ice cream from the other and combine them, it would be a kick ass joint. As I stood there (I’d been sitting for six hours, after all), it started to rain. And me without my rain gear. Yay. But, I remembered that there’s a CVS in the area and was maybe a couple of blocks from it so I braved the falling water and bought one. Good thing, too, because it soon started to pour. It was raining so hard and the wind was blowing so fiercely that it knocked my umbrella into my head and almost knocked my glasses off. At that point, I went into a Books-a-Million to wait until it’d cleared up a bit.
From there, I popped into Bugsy’s Pizza on King Street and had a chicken sandwich. It wasn’t very good, though it looked delicious. I think I was distracted by the hotness of their red pepper mayonnaise. Waaaay too much capsaicin, not enough mayo, but I’m a total wuss when it comes to that stuff.
It was a little after six at that point and the opening night party was to have started already. Thankfully, it wasn’t raining very hard and I made it to the party in time for the screenings with the filmmakers present. A very good turn out it was, too. I didn’t do a head count, but I think there were between twenty and thirty people there! So, I got to see a bunch of the films I had just watched all over again. Sometimes, this was good. Sometimes, this was NOT so good. But at least the filmmakers were there!
To be completely honest, I zoned out during my film. I was trying to not shiver as it’s flippin’ COLD in the gallery, I’ve lost about 70 pounds just from when I filmed Anathema so I don’t have as much to insulate me against the cold, and I was still wet from the rain. Not a great combination. I got up for my “A Few Words on the Piece” and cut it kind of short because I know that it’s a half hour silent flick (people start squirming around 15-20 minutes in, hahaha!) and...I was shivering! But I made them laugh at the beginning of my bit and the end so that was nice.
After the screenings, a very earnest filmmaker came up to me to tell me that she thought the film was beautiful and had a beautiful message amongst the horror and another filmmaker told me that she really liked the film, especially the cinematography. Another Sin City reference, of course, but I gotta take it, I guess...not a lot of high contrast black and white with a little bit of colour flicks out there.
I left soon thereafter and started to warm up a bit, but it was a cool night in Alexandria thanks to the rain. I may have to stop and get a sweater or jacket tomorrow because the gallery is going to be just as cold the rest of the weekend.
Tomorrow, there’s a special screening at 7 pm, but I’m free until then because, well, I’ve seen all of the films already...some of them more than once. I’m either going to go to the George Washington Masonic Memorial or I’ll pop into Georgetown and see the Exorcist house. And by pop, I mean I’ll take the 45 minute boat cruise over (it’s actually the Washington, D.C. monuments tour that goes to Washington Harbour) walk the half hour to see the stairs and the house, see some other stuff, and take the 45 minute return trip. I’d get to see a lot of stuff, which wouldn’t be bad for such a short trip. I may do that Saturday and do the Masonic Memorial tomorrow. I’m not sure why, but I really want to see the Masonic Memorial. I haven’t read Dan Brown’s books, by the way, and I thought The DaVinci Code was a laughable movie.
That’s all stuff for tomorrow. For now, though, here’s a picture of my view:
Interesting, sure, but not something to throw wide the curtains to every morning.
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