A day at the film fest

Last week the Utah Arts Festival rolled into town, taking over the downtown library and old courthouse. As a reporter for the Daily Utah Chronocle I got to cover the corresponding film festival Fear No Film. My piece for that will be printed on Wednesday, but I just wanted to talk about a few things that didn't make it to print.

First I must say that I love the art shows in Utah. I went to the Provo one almost every year when I was a kid and always got a kick out of them, and when I moved to Salt Lake I've continued the tradition. This year was just as excellent, and I would've had pics if I didn't keep spotting "No Camera" signs everywhere. So, sorry, you're just going to have to go next year to see for yourself.

One part that wasn't around when I was a kid was the security line, complete with invasive bag check. I didn't mind this a Disneyland but it's just sad that I can't walk into an art show without a cavity search. Next thing you know you'll need to be a member of SHIELD just to check out a book.

The art show was good, lots of Steampunk stuff, including where I think Steampunk was going to naturally going to go anyway. One artist had working watches with the displays off. The watches had all the gears and whatnot ticking away but with absolutely no display. I thought the idea was that it was cool when things worked without electricity and microchips, and that it actually did stuff. For me taking the displays off is like a cowboy getting all dressed up to do data entry. I think we're missing the point here.

So as for the films, again you can read about my favorites in the Chronocle, but let me talk about independent films. See the problem with main stream films is that Hollywood will try to generalize films as much as possible with similar characters and themes, basically so that the general public will know that they're going into something familiar and safe. For example: explain to me what the major differences between Julia Roberts in Runaway Bride, Meg Ryan in You've Got Mail, and Reese Witherspoon in Sweet Home Alabama. You may see different careers and slightly different situations, but really what you get is a typical romantic comedy heroine. This creates a ton of films that all look and feel exactly alike, with the only differences being who's pretty to play the characters at the time and what stupid references they can make that will be dated by the time the film comes out.

Independent films have the opposite problem. Independent films usually are out to innovate, since they generally have smaller budgets, crews, names, and studios behind them, they just try to use innovative stories and techniques to make a film. The problem is that this can lead to those interesting "Art House" films you're always hearing about. Films where a clown slowly flips a pancake while a woman lies in the fetal position under the table. The films can actually reach the point of being so innovative that nobody, even the people who study films, can wrap their heads around them.

Most of the films I saw were cinematic treats compared to what I usually watch. I love a film where I'm challenged intellectually and feel like I've been given an insight into someone's mind and soul. On the other hand, I hate it when I feel like I've been lead into someone's political statement or just been lead around into something nonsensical.

Some examples:

A film where the dialogue consists of nothing but sitcoms from the 1950s and animation comprised of mosaics of the same. The film included spousal abuse, racial stereotypes, and infanticide.

A film about an iPhone that falls in love with its owner (it sounds cute but I feel it could've been tighter to say the least). This one included a very hairy Israeli man in Superman briefs.

A film where Goth chicks scrape knives against a woman's skin in a room that looks like Dexter's garage.

And the one I actually fell asleep to: A film about how corporations can now fund candidates to political positions (Admittedly this is a situation I didn't know much about, but here was an opportunity to get a new advocate on their side and their presentation was so bad it bored me to sleep).

Don't let this discourage you from attending smaller film festivals near you. Sitting through these was a small price to pay for some of the wonderful and creative pieces I had the privilege of seeing. I highly encourage you to check out whatever you can that interests you on the independent circuits, your favorite movie may be out there and you just haven't seen it yet.
-JOE