My Film Festival Found Family (or whatever)
What I've learned from four film festivals in one year.
My Uber driver was particularly chatty on the way to the airport. I know, I know, that sounds awful, but in this case I was happy to converse; he wanted to talk about movies. He had found out that I was in Austin for the Fantastic Fest Film Festival and thought that was intriguing, though I imagine the bar is pretty low at 5am.
“I haven’t been to a movie theater since The Batman,” he said. That movie premiered in March of 2022, 2 and 1/2 years before our conversation. I don’t know how many movies I’ve gone to see in that time—300? 500?—but it immediately struck me, the inescapable truth of the universe:
I was the weird one. As my backpack and I slid to and fro along the god-knows-what stains in the backseat of that Nissan Versa, with my talkative temporary chauffeur forsaking safety in favor of his next fare, I knew beyond a doubt that his experience was the more common one. Most people don’t care that much about movies.
That made me sad. No, not because they’re missing out on life-changing art, that’s none of my business. He probably does a bunch of cool shit I don’t do. I knew I was leaving my people, people that were going to catch a flight home after watching thirty movies in a week and likely catch a screening of Megalopolis as soon as they unpack. True celluloid sickos, the screen fiends, motherfuckers raised by John Carpenter and Hayao Miyazaki.
Look, I’ve got a lot of friends at home. Loyal, wonderful people, most of whom I met when I was getting sober over twelve years ago, so we’re trauma-bonded for life. One I’ve known since I was ten. I would quite literally die if that would help them, for some reason (what are we, in Squid Game in this hypothetical?). I’ve got a beautiful wife and two children that mostly enjoy my company. They’re my world, entirely and for all time, but my daughter doesn’t know shit about Park Chan-wook, and that’s a bummer (she’s two).
What I’m trying to say is that it’s a bizarre feeling, spending so much time around the same people a couple of times a year. They understand a huge piece of you in a way most people never will. Will you rewatch all ten Saw movies when the eleventh one comes out so that you can rank them? No? Then you don’t get it, sorry.
You might be thinking, “well, that’s your job,” but that’s not true! Most of us don’t do this full time and I just quit my real job a few months ago. We’re just weird! We have no choice, the power of cinema compels us. I stood out in the Austin heat talking about God and Hugh Grant with a guy named Zach for an hour in the middle of the night, a guy I'd only physically met two or three times prior. I’m opening up like he’s the priest from my village who helped deliver me into this world but he’s just a nice guy who occasionally likes my tweets.
He’s my friend. They’re all my friends, some of my best friends, but I don’t fucking know them. I’m not even positive they like me all that much because they’re so damn nice I would never know but they can quote Hot Rod and they laugh when I do my Forrest Gump impression. No one ever laughs when I do my Forrest Gump impression at family functions or the DMV (which is stupid cuz it’s fucking hilarious). It might be offensive now that I think about it, I’m not sure.
I suppose people get to feel this sort of thing in many different ways. Maybe it’s why so many people join religions, or cults. I drank the kool-aid of cinema. I have a friend that loves rock climbing and perhaps he feels similarly when he meets someone who also knows forty-seven different ways to tie a knot. Maybe he should go to a knot convention or something. If they don’t have those they should make one. Call it Knot Or Nah?
Find your tribe, because life is a strange thing. You may find yourself surrounded by friends and family and feel more alone than you’ve ever felt in your life. I don’t know why that is. But sometimes, in a foreign place and in the company of strangers, you can share a moment of complete understanding. It’s fleeting so you have to pay close attention.
It’s like a movie.
And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures.
For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.-Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
