Web was going to his son's game (baseball?) in the afternoon and he told me that he might call me in the evening to hang out and maybe go to the Driskill. I was so tired and hurting so much that I was almost glad that I didn't hear from him. I did drag my ass out of bed to go to the Paramount and see "Chrystal" and "P.S."

Got to the Paramount just a little before the movie started and sat towards the front. Some guy from KGSR radio came out and introduced the film. I had looked and the program and noticed that this was the film by the guys who did the short film "The Accountant," which was one of our major finds when I helped program films with Courtney Davis for AFF about three years ago. At 40 minutes, "The Accountant" is more of a mini-feature, and a damn fine film. The filmmakers, Ray McKinnon and Walt Goggins were really nice guys and I got to meet them at the Bar-B-Que at the Governor's mansion that year.

It was really exciting to hear that they won the Academy Award for "Best Short Film - Live Action" that year. "The Accountant" was certainly worthy of the title. I was looking forward to seeing the film.

There was a Q&A after the film and the guy from KGSR was joined by Goggins, McKinnon, and star Lisa Blount on stage. During the discussion, the group talked about getting Billy Bob Thornton for the film (Goggins starred with him in "The Apostle"), and it was also exposed that Blount is McKinnon's wife. I took some pictures of the group on stage but they turned out horribly out of focus for some reason.

Between the two films, while I was waiting in line to go back in, I saw my friend filmmaker and actor Ryan Williams talking to Barbara Morgan and a girl named Maya of AFF. They were deep in discussion and I decided not to bug them. I was really feeling cruddy and just didn't feel like socializing.

But it did remind me that Ryan had a film in the festival, a short called "The Flood" that was running before a competition film called "The Street." And that reminded me that Courtney Davis' animated short "Milton is a Shitbag" was also running in the festival. The blurb that always accompanies Courtney's short is so funny. I assume she wrote it herself. It goes: "Milton is a small orange kitty. He hates your guts. He works for Pat Buchanan. Why do you love him so?" C'mon, that's funny. I really want to see this thing and I have never had the chance. I really need to make Courtney give me a copy.

Inside the theater I heard some guys talking about the Indian movie, "Dil Chanta Hi," that had run the night before at the Paramount. I tried to see if Web wanted to go see it but he scoffed at the three hour run time. Anyway, this loud guy behind me said that after the intermission, they went back to watch the second half of the film and there were no subtitles on the print! Can you imagine. What a monumental fuck up! Didn't the person who built up the film notice this?

Also behind me, some lady was talking to some other folks about how she wrote for her brother's on-line windsurfing site, Hybrid Magazine. I've run into a lot of writers for Hybrid at sneaks at the Dobie and they are always college students. She was complaining about how young people today couldn't write proper English and how she always has to edit and re-write their reviews for "Hybrid."

Phil Scanlon, the Film Programmer who gets the studio films for AFF, got up and introduced Dylan Kidd, the director of "P.S." Kidd had been at AFF a couple of years ago with "Roger Dodger," a fantastic film, so I was really looking forward to seeing his latest effort.

The last reel ran out of focus but it was starting to be a moot point with the film. Kidd came out and did a Q&A after the movie but just kept crying about how they had gotten a bad review in the "New York Times" the day before and it got to be like a broken record. A pretty unpleasant Q&A. I was feeling even more anti-social and tired by this point, so I didn't do anything but go home and rest.

Lodger@AFF2004