First IFFR short

An important IFFR lesson is: never give away your one's and five's too soon with the voting opportunity the UPC audience appreciation leaflets give you. Because you never know whats going to happen at the next screening. You can sit in, let's say, a black and white Asian film, that is extremely slow, makes you fall asleep and pray for a sudden death of the main characters in a hope that it will end the movie. Which by the way, it didn't.
But! I'm very glad I gave this one a two (2=bad), so I could donate my one to the drama (not the genre) I witnessed today. One aka 1 aka very, very very bad; the kind of bad that makes you wish the sponsors pulled the plug a long time ago and possibly even change your political view in order to prevent such catastrophes from ever happening again. All I thought was: "I still have an episode of the Mentalist on video" and "I could be at home knitting right now". When I felt a pang of jealousy when someone did leave, and that person wasn't me, I decided it was time to ... give it another ten minutes. You know me, I'm an optimist and want to give things a chance. But even the subtitles were lacking. No realy; from every whole sentence that was spoken only 3 words came back at the bottom of the screen. So I saw crappy pictures of a cruiseship, with people speaking obscure languages and words like: 'aids money Bulgar', which left me clueless and wanting to go to H&M. Or at least go home and blog 'n bitch about it. The best bit about the film was a cute youtube-film about two kittens meowing a boring passenger watched on her laptop (I could tell even she was bored with the whole ordeal) and, eventually, tearing up the paper at the double thumbs down section. It was deliberating and should be a privilige extended to the rest of society. Nice checkout-lady at supermarket, kgggg, a 4. Dumb bastard cutting of with his car, kgggg, 1!
I'm still waiting for my 5, better luck next time.

Film festival widow

It's been a year since I wrote my Iffr tribute blog (I ffr, U ffr, we all ffr). Mainly because it's been a year since the last International Film Festival Rotterdam and let's face it, the rest is merely details.
So it's that time of year again. Even my regular colleagues are excited for me: "wow, two whole weeks of doing nothing but watching films". They think work ends as soon as a film is sold out, and how many films can you play? Sigh. The average of 70 screenings per day across 29 venues is just to abstract for them. So I had to correct this image; it also involves a lot of parties, dancing, fun people, drinks in the theatre (Schouwburg) and cruising from one cinema to the next depending if you're looking for the best film or the most comfortable chair (naptime advise: Pathe 7, back-corners). Oh, and work, lot's of hard work, obviously. You don't just take two weeks off of work just to watch films. That would be silly.
I started well this year, the crew-pre party was fun and I sat through the whole film without falling asleep! Fortunately it was a good one; a Chinese romantic comedy (Love in a Puff). So that's one down, 14 to go, if I don't want to look like a complete wimp in the eyes of my Iffr-friends.
I also attended a Q&A already. So what if it was by accident and had nothing to do with directors and actors but with Spanish Flamenco dancers who happened to perform in the Schouwburg for the Flamenco Biennale, when I was there for a birthday-party. Questions were asked. Answers were given. So I can cross Q&A of my list.
This year I also had to prepare my boyfriend Hook for his role of Film Festival widow, for he will suffer from movie-related neglect. I'll supply him with a stack of dvd's and a spare Therese-doll... My other preparation for the whole ordeal don't go much further than making the mother of all lasagna's so that I can eat something other than Daily Wok during these weeks, practising my poker-face; you never know when some-one wants his money back for a crappy film. For yes, this actually happens and I can't wait to blog about it.

Scent of a boyfriend

Today (tuesday) it's my boyfriend's birthday. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I have a boyfriend, now all the lack of blogging makes sense, right? I was too busy doing other stuff. Now why does this man make me so happy that I temporarily had nothing to left to write about? He has a great ass and a lovely personality. And this last sentense will make him smile, for he thinks I am funny. Unlike my ex-boyfriend who did not think I was funny. He thought Vinterbergs 'Festen' was funny... Bare in mind, this is the same ex who told me to 'put your clothes back on then', when I sat halfnaked on his coach, looked him meaningfull in the eyes when I asked for a blanket because I was a bit chilly.
But back to my birthdayboy. He wasn't shy about his wishes, in fact the list that circulated the house was carefully put together and from me he wanted a new fragrance. Now I hardly made it through any of my exes birthdays, I even think the first and last time, I got away with buying a bucket of Sesamestreet crayons. And he turned 18. So calling this a 'challenge' would be an understatement, let alone buying men's perfume, which is really personal. I don't know the first thing about male scents. I've worn CK Obsession for 10 years now, before that, 5 years of Angel. So I'm very loyal, only occasionly flirting with CK One, and not without feeling guilty about it. Even free samples remain unused. My dad doesn't even wear deodorant. He covers his armpits with some sort of eco-friendly Tea Trea-stick. The office has been empty since before Christmas, so my colleagues can't help. I even started sniffing strangers in the street and on the bus, but apparantly blasting your music out loud through the speakers of your phone is deemed more appropriate. So after some warning glances from girlfriends and slightly annoyed busdrivers (come on! the sign says 'do not talk to the busdriver', it doesn't say 'do not not smell your busdriver'), I gave up that tactic. And randomly asking for 'Boss Men' at your local perfumestore doesn't help either; because, just so you know, there's more than one.
Eventually I did what any sane woman would do. I asked my Facebook friends. That triggered quite some usefull response (Boss In Motion, Chanel Allure, Kiton) and some not so usefull (onions? N. you are such a douche. And my FB wall is not the place to instigate a bitchfight, people!).
Eventually I got him Chanel Allure Sport, a home-sewn blanket (he seemed to like it, so he past that test) and I wrote him this blog. For he (I'll call him Hook) now belongs to the list of relevant topics in my life I want to talk about. You know, finding another job, new shoes, festivals and baking cookies.
Happy Birthday Hook!