I did do a little writing before I headed into the shower and got ready to go to the Dobie for a 2:30 screening of "Waterborne" I had met the director and star, Ben Rekhi and Mageina Tovah, on Day One at the screening of "The Wendell Baker Story," Mageina and I had talked quite a bit and she was a very nice girl. I always think about "Seinfield" when I type her name. Remember the episode where Jerry dates a woman but forgets her name. He only remembers that it rhymes with a female body part. The punchline at the end of the episode is that her name is Mulva. Mageina's is pronounced Ma-Gain-Ah but she told me that it is often embarrassingly mispronounced at casting calls (presumably with people rhyming it with vagina).

I had parked under a tree full of bird's last night so my car, The Spermwhale, was covered in birdshit. I spent five dollars at the automated car wash by my house and it really didn't help clean it at all. I am kinda hoping it rains really hard one afternoon while I am at work so I don't have to spend an hour at the manual car wash getting this stuff cleaned off.

I turned into the Dobie garage and saw Ben and Mageina walking across the street, we waved at each other but I could see Mageina was thinking, "Who is that?" When I was about to pull in, she snapped, turned around and gave me the biggest smile and wave. She's such a sweet girl. I got to the Dobie and people were still lined up. I got my parking ticket validated and stood in line. About the time we were to go in, I realized I didn't have my wallet. I had taken it out of my pocket to get out five dollars for the car wash. I knew I must have left it sitting on my console. I couldn't remember if I locked my car as I have one of those automatic clicker deals. I decided not to be paranoid and just trust that I had locked it. We went into the theater and they were handing out bottled water with the film's logo on it, which I thought was very clever. I was a little thirsty, so I went ahead and drank some even though I wasn't sure where the water came from. (I hate tap water).

Everywhere I have went the last couple of days, people have been talking about "The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things," a film I have really been dying to see (I am going Wednesday night) and I have had to sort of close my ears and hum not to overhear someone say something I don't want to hear. All I know about the film, and all I want to know, is that Michael Pitt is in it. Someone behind me discussing it said, "It is not the feel good movie of the year." Their friend, a woman, turned the discussion to "A Hole in My Heart" and said, "It's not the mainstream hit of the year."

After a bit, a SXSW volunteer introduced Ben and some female who had produced his film. Ben did a nice introduction and mentioned how cool it was to have his film play in the theater where Richard Linklater's "Slacker" played for a year before it was even picked up.

As they were leaving the stage, someone shouted, "Is it safe to drink the water?" Ben joked, "We just found out it is poisoned." At this, the female producer interjected quite quickly, "No it isn't. We don't want any lawsuits" as if she were serious. It seemed a pretty ridiculous and silly thing to say and I was dismayed at her inability to have a sense of humor.

After the film, Ben, a couple of his producers, and a couple of the stars of the film, including Mageina took the stage and did a Q&A. It was pretty interesting until some lady from the Austin Water Authority or some such government agency began to ramble on and on about the political implications of the film. Sometimes these political type people in Austin work my last nerve.

After the Q&A, which went on as long as possible before the SXSW volunteer made us take it to the lobby so they could get ready for the next show, I went out and found the Dobie manager Dan Coffer. The Dobie is opening a film on the 25th called "Shortcut to Nirvana" and I wanted to get a screener of the film. Dan was eating lunch right by the box office in the Dobie food court and he was nice enough to get up and get me a copy. We chatted a bit and he told me that he too was surprised at how crowded the SXSW films have been this year.

I left him his lunch, which looked delicious, and was about to leave when Mageina came over and said hello. I had wanted to talk to her at the end of the Q&A but some other guy had cornered her. She gave me a big hug and thanked me for coming. I told her I liked the film but felt the ending was a little contrived. We chatted a bit more and a fire alarm went off. Now, this has been happening a lot at the Dobie lately and it is getting quite frustrating. Nobody takes them seriously and eventually a real fire is going to break out and nobody is going to leave and someone is going to get hurt. I told Mageina that it was surely a false alarm but the SXSW volunteer started trying to herd the people gathered outside. I told Mageina I should probably be going anyway but reminded her that she needed to let filmmakers know that Austin was a great place to make a film. I told her if she ever got to come to town again, she should send me an e-mail through the website. She is so sweet and so friendly, it's hard not to like her.

The theater became more full as showtime approached but not nearly as full as things had been on the weekend. Again, people were talking about "The Heart is Deceitful" and I had to close my eyes and hum like an idiot. Eventually, as the theater filled and the voices all melted into a low, indiscernible hum. A volunteer came up, didn't introduce himself, didn't mentioned SXSW, didn't say much of anything. He just said the name of the film, asked us to turn off our cell phones and pagers and disappeared.

After the movie, I drove home. I thought about going to see "Kung Fu Hustle" but decided to go write instead.

I'm going to see "The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things" tomorrow for sure.

Lodger at SXSW 2005