love under mercury

the ann arbor film festival starts tomorrow night. for the rest of the week, ann arbor will be flooded with celluloid geezers and digital hipsters. cue your ipod to your digitally restored vinyl collection.

four years ago, i believe, chris sauchak and i attended the a.a festival--fresh, young meat ready to engage what the artistically experienced had produced in the last year. while a large majority of the films i saw that night i have forgotten, there are still some which stand out to my high school senoir year memory and i have not forgotten them. i remember sitting in the balcony of the michigan theater, watching the animated film mosschops and then trying to fit my head in between people's shoulder blades for the next week...or constantly referencing love under mercury because the title was so cool and mercury looks so much more cooler in a wine glass, especially if while holding the glass, you spin in circles. i do remember it being about science, and i do remember vaguely that it had something to do with changes.



i just found out that film was made by a man named steve hawley, from the UK. the film actually won an award later in the festival, which i didn't know at the time. here's some other places it exhibited: lux cinema london july 2000. telluride international experimental film festival oct 2000. rotterdam film festival feb 2001. dahlonega international film festival USA 2001. image forum festival tokyo 2001. 13th onion city film and video festival chicago 2001. he's been making video art since 1990.

regarding this years festival, well i'm still not sure if i'll be attending much of the gala. its the 43rd year, i mean, it has to be way too over saturated by now. well it probably maintains a lot of freshness, i just get nervous around the concept of a once a year artistic community type thing, shouldn't we all? but, there are some things to keep in mind:

wednesday 1pm
FILM JAM! visting filmmakers are invited to bring film and video works not included in the program to share in an intimate, informal setting. i will sit in the back (like in film class) and judge this intimate, informal setting until i get sent home. actually, i might go here with my mom, if she's up for it (she asked me to teach her how to watch movies this evening).

thursday 10pm
an 80minute 35mm film titled sugar will premiere, directed by reynold reynolds (NICK, is this an alias?). here's the description of the film: A young woman takes a shabby one room apartment. it is anthony's home, but he appears to have vanished mysteriously leaving everything behind. she comes to understand that anthony is living below the floor watching her every move, opening the door for uncanny occurrences, visions, nightmares, memories, and revenge. (hmmm....)

plus a lot of other great filmmakers worldwide will be showing their films and talking about them to probably anybody wearing a satchel (i'll bring mine, don't worry: don't want to be left out of the once a year conversation!).

so much has changed inside me since those young days in high school, and to some degree i miss them. a bitterness towards ann arbor and the university which occupies it has boiled up inside me since sauchak and i charged thru parking garages and film theaters in ann arbor. the love i once had for that city, just is not the same love anymore. its not even a real love.

mercury is poison and love is mercury.

to paroose the festival digitally, at your own leisure: http://www.aafilmfest.org/