quiet trickster

The Edinburgh International Film Festival opened it’s box office today, so I spent my lunch booking my summer holiday. 22 films, fairly miscellaneous - I’m now going to spend the next month paranoid that I’ve made the wrong choices.

That’s partly a consequence of always trying to book at the earliest possible moment, in order to get tickets for the films I know I want to see (after the trauma of failing to see Serenity at the EIFF in 2005) - this year, the latest Pixar, WALL-E (Yay!). And unlike the last few years, booking online wasn’t even slightly traumatic (their server didn’t crash, and I got all the tickets I aimed for)

So, the 22 - actually 18 films, two of their animated short film collections and two real-live people events:

• 19/06/08, 17:15: McLaren Animation 1
• 19/06/08, 20:15: The Song of Sparrows
• 21/06/08, 15:00: Tiramisu
• 21/06/08, 18:45: Stone of Destiny
• 22/06/08, 14:00: Roger Deakins & Seamus McGarvey: In Conversation
• 22/06/08, 17:30: Standard Operating Procedure
• 22/06/08, 20:00: Strange Girls
• 23/06/08, 14:00: International Animation 1
• 23/06/08, 17:15: Bananaz
• 23/06/08, 19:15: Warsaw Dark
• 24/06/08, 19:00: The Surprise Movie
• 25/06/08, 17:30: Ray Harryhausen: In Person
• 25/06/08, 19:40: Dreams with Sharp Teeth
• 26/06/08, 15:00: Milky Way Liberation Front
• 26/06/08, 17:15: Sleep Dealer
• 26/06/08, 20:00: Idiots and Angels
• 27/06/08, 14:30: The Bride Wore Black
• 27/06/08, 17:15: Fear(s) of the Dark
• 27/06/08, 19:05: Encounters at the End of the World
• 28/06/08, 14:15: WALL-E
• 28/06/08, 16:45: The Fall
• 28/06/08, 21:30: Faintheart

Fewer than last year (there’s even a day I’m missing completely - but I’ve realised that I really can’t watch four films in one day). And the move from August to June means that, with my daily commute to the festival, I can’t see any of the later films, as the last train out is at 11.30pm. The only film that risks leaving me stranded in Edinburgh at midnight if the closing film, Faintheart, but it’s about battle re-enactors, so how could I resist?

I’ll go through my rationale for my choices nearer the time (or, not now), but did I mention WALL-E? Yay! (Pixar-induced glee…)

I wasn’t going to do this, was I? (The “It’s not going to be No Country for Old Men is it? If they’d gotten that, they’d be shouting it from the rooftops. And it’s more likely to be Seraphim Falls than 3:10 to Yuma. How about that Clooney one they were trailing with Bourne? It does have Tilda Swinton in, after all. Maybe it’ll be Planet Horror…”) I wasn’t going to torture myself pointlessly with all the good films it won’t be, or the shite films it might be.

But I did, and it’s just as well I didn’t think of The Kingdom…

It’s a glossy star-strewn political thriller from actor turned director Peter Berg, filmed with the same gritty, faux-verité style as films like Syriana, but with politics far more to the right (or simply a liberal-baiting sensibility…), that charts the aftermath of a massive attack on the American ex-pat community in Saudi Arabia.

It’s undoubtedly a punchy film, but what starts as something pitched as a criticism of US double standards w.r.t. Saudi Arabia, as outlined in its striking title sequence, quickly descends into first an unthinking prejudice, as F.B.I. investigators show the Saudis how to do their jobs (not simply a criticism that Saudis might be reluctant to see their compatriots implicated in a suicide bombing of American ex-pats, but an assumption that the Saudis wouldn’t know evidence if it blew up in their face), and then finally into a more-or-less Rambo-esque “Gunfight at El Al Corral”, as the Feds descend on the bad guys’ hideout after one of their number is kidnapped.

I’d have to look into Berg’s politics to know whether the film is sincere in it’s “We could win the war on terror, if only…” sentiments, but his feature debut, Very Bad Things, was a largely unpleasant, shamelessly controversy baiting black comedy.

There are things to like about the film - Jamie Foxx, in the lead, hears about the bombing while talking to his son’s class - though of course, he doesn’t stare blankly at “My Pet Goat” for the next five minutes, instead striding off manfully to do enterprising F.B.I. things. There’s a sparky interplay between the four Feds - Chris Cooper as good as ever, Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner neither better nor worse than you’d expect, Jamie Foxx doing much the same thing as in Jarhead or Miami Vice (basically Denzel Washington without the charm and a fraction of the sense of danger)

The film’s real casting strength is the sympathetic turn from Ashraf Barhom as the film’s “Good Saudi” - the police officer assigned to babysit the Americans (I can see a long career for him, playing sympathetic Middle Easterners confounded in helping Americans before dying tragically…) Like Alexander Siddig’s (yes, off Star Trek: DS9) turn in Syriana, it’s likely he’ll be missed by any spotlight shone on the film.

It is curious to see so conservative a film made in a style so associated with liberal Hollywood - it makes the film harder to dismiss than if it had been made by as disposable a film-maker as, say, Michael Bay, whom it emulates in volume if nothing else. It’s a little disturbing to fin the myth of American supremacy abroad so thoroughly entrenched, and I’m not sure if I’d worry more if it was sincere, or if it was merely cashing in on sympathy for that world view.

It’s just enough ficiotn, perhaps, to escape the kind of solid critique it needs, hiding neo-con wish-fulfilmnt in a solid, ‘non-judgemental’ political thriller.

East, then, on clattering stock. A few resolutions for this year’s Festival:

I will not give flyer distributors the least impression that I’m interested in their wares - nor will I scowl at them as if they are evil (I’ve been practicing my contrite ‘Sorry’ on the charity muggers of Buchanan Street).

I will not scowl, either, at overly loud English people talking crap. I will rise above it, so I will. (This particular resolution may not last long)

I shall not be suckered into paying over the odds for coffee and other refreshments - but will not become paranoid about the same.

I shall not succumb to the tyranny of the popcornless film festival attendee (but see previous resolution).

I shall seek out brave new worlds of free wi-fi, and actually keep this website updated in something approaching real time.

I shall not become jealous when it turns out I’ve missed the one true break-out hit of the festival (even if it turns out it was really obvious).

Likewise, I shall not become bitter when the Surprise Movie is, once again, underwhelming (particularly if it’s just something I wouldn’t choose to watch). However, if it turns out to be both crap and on release one week later…

I shall take the time to see the Warhol show. And visit the calming fish.