Today, the festival got going in earnest. There are a lot more people around, and fighting your way through the queues at films can be quite a nightmare.
However, some people seem to be able to waltz past without any problems. This is the "pass-class" politics of the festival. The festival has a complicated system for identifying the beautiful people from the rest of us filmgoers. People attending the festival as delegates (including members of the public who've opted to pay the necessary cash) are given different colour passes. Pink go to filmmakers, blue to press, red to important press and grey (or "platinum") to really important people.
So how do you manage to skip the queues? Well, you need to have a little blue dot on your pass, signifying you're a film buyer. So if you are a white pass delegate (staff and festival helper) tired of seeing others swanning to the front of the queue, oen option might be to go to a corner shop and buy yourself a sticky blue dot of your own!
Whilst the Festival itself is catering well for the exhibition sector with several industry events, it appears the BFI isn't being quite as helpful. Despite having an large event to "find out more about the future of the UK's cultural film exhibition sector" they havn't even invited any of the representives from cinemas along to it - something that doesn't best please the rep's.
Two large films featured in the line-up today. A one-off screening of Time Code 2000 pushed forward the technological boundaries by being projected on video with director Mike Figgis providing a live sound mix. The film presents four 93 minute takes simultaneously, each taking up to a quarter of the film.
This is perfect for the DVD release, which will allow viewers at home to create their own film by switching between the various soundtracks.
Interestingly, having compared notes with people who saw the studio mix version on the print which will be hitting the cinemas, there were distinct differences. Most notably, Figgis downplayed the role of his partner, Saffron Burrows, in the film. The reason he gave in the Q&A afterwards was that he didn't think the audience would want to hear some of the more risque dialogue. Rumours that it was because he felt Burrows was the weakest part of the film are, of course, completely unfounded and not the reason why the couple didn't make it to the Midnight Sun Party.
One person who did make it to the party - a "celebration of Nordic Film" - was Damon Albarn lead singer of Blur. In town to promote Reykjavik 101, for which he made the soundtrack, he seemed somewhat startled by the barrage of photographers' flashes as he entered the foyer for his photocall. He fled into the darkness of the Filmhouse bar, much to the disappointment of photographers forced in to shooting their target long-lense-style from the bar entrance.
The word on Reykjavik 101 has been good and young director Baltasar Kormakur, a popular actor in his native Iceland, and actress Victoria Abril are also at the festival, which always helps.
As for me, I tried hard to get an early night, but got caught up in the atmosphere of the event and stayed on for far too long. It's only Tuesday and already I feel like I need a day off.
