Film Fest and Live Events and Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah

Sam couldn't make it at the last minute to 'We Live in Public'. So, it being too late to give his ticket away to anyone, I sent out a text to Svend. And like I'd just sent out the Bat Signal, he appeared seconds later to take up my offer of better leg-room and some prime company.

That was a highlight. I don't think I've seen Svend since last year's Fest, when I had a between films snack and post-film drink with him.

Always a thing of beauty to see him manage his time and consult, with biblical dedication, his wee time-table (which has the smallest font ever!) and whisk himself off mid-director's-speech afterwards. The show must go on - the opening credits wait for no man.

Anyhow, this was a doco about ..... internet stuff. Hard to explain. It focused on a guy who was what they called a 'visionary', combining different mediums before most people (very early attempts at online cable stations and a Big Brother type experiment, with guns). He was essentially a bit of an ass, which the director admitted, when asked in the Q and A.

He was that typical child who grew up without involved parents (travelling father and alcoholic mother) and was left to sit alone with his beloved TV most of the time. So Gilligan's Island became his family. Then he became a dot.com millionaire, lived amongst the trendy art-crowd (having never been popular before), and crashed heavily a few years later.

I didn't find it enjoyable to watch, per se. It was kinda gruelling, wading through this wasteland of reality-tv type footage (from his web-cam experiments) and listening to this rather egocentric guy justify himself. It assaulted the senses, rather than being a gentle little ride.

But the messages coming through were pertinent. What struck me was how hedonistic the people living on cameras were. They quickly regressed to orgy-like behaviour and extravagance, once the cameras were on. So, in a way, that Big Brother (TV show) type atmosphere actually links back to really ancient behaviour. To be a civilised society maybe we need boundaries. Once we take down boundaries, and see each other peeing and showering - what else is there to lose? People who think they're living in totaly freedom (and it's quite an illusion) can do whatever they want - but this is the behaviour they choose - running around naked, having sex on camera, over-indulging in basic pleasures.

And, as Svend said in his review, it was interesting how the dynamics of a relationship played out when he filmed every angle of his house for 6 months, leading to his girlfriend leaving him. The couple would have a fight, then retreat to their respective computers to see whose side the audience was on, rather than talking it out. It's taking a basic human response, but amplifying it to a whole new level. It's the girl who calls up her best friend to talk about what a dick her boyfriend is being - but now it's 100 people on the internet, and none of them really know her at all. Which means they can tell her exactly what she wants to hear.

There was a nice statement about how crap he felt when his viewers dwindled from hundreds, even thousands, to ten measly people, towards the end. This became an ever-present mirror of his dwindling self worth - listen to me, pay me attention.

And this was before we all started counting our Facebook friends or followers on Twitter. It is interesting having measurable popularity.

There was a tiny bit at the end about how internet advertisers use our emails, chats and profile details in ways we don't even realise. They'll take a couple of key words from something we've posted and put up an ad on our page that matches them. What we generally consider 'private' communications are anything but. I don't even like having a loytalty card at the supermarket because I hate the thought of my buying habits being analysed and exploited - but at least you know they're doing it. A lot of marketing going on with the internet is almost subliminal, it's so seamlessly integrated into what you're already doing. Though, as Rich pointed out, we are all getting very good at scanning the page and almost not registering the advertising at all, once we know the patterns. I would've liked to see more about this point, but it was only a one-minute tag-on at the end.

The director was interesting to listen to afterwards - she was really candid and open and told a great narrative. Someone would ask the simplest question and she would spin it into an interesting anecdote. While I probably 'got' the messages of the film, listening to her speak about it crystallised them. If only the directors could do that after every film we watched!

Essentially it was modern society, need for fame/attention, technology, willingly losing privacy, inherent dangers.

I like it when someone, sounding very gung-ho and idealistic, asked the director how we could stop this from happening. I think he wanted the magic answer, the gem of wisdom. But she just kinda laughed. She acknowledged that you can't stop it, and that it's weaving itself more and more into our daily lives. It just is. We just have to be aware of the pitfalls as well as the good things.

Anyhow..... I'm glad I saw it, from a Media teacher point-of-view, even though it wasn't beautiful.

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Live Theatre

I'm going to the ballet this weekend! Fun.

I was having a discussion with some English dept colleagues after school on Friday. They were talking passionately about their favourite ever theatre experiences and the shows that changed their lives. I sat quietly, hoping nobody would ask mine (I was totally blank about what I could offer up), but it came around to me and I said, 'Uh.... I saw Les Mis in San Francisco.... that was fun. I remember being fascinated by the attachments on the back of the seats that held opera glasses.'

I'm really a failure as an English teacher in this regard! It's during discussions like that that I feel very much like the daughter of an accountant, who liked doing maths at high school. Not like some dreamy Arts student.

I don't go to shows so much for the show itself, I just like the experience of live theatre. I like the feel of the seating, rationing my supply of chocolate raisins to try and last the entire film, trying to figure out where the stage entrances are hidden, watching the ushers guide late comers in with their torches. I could quite often have more fun observing and trying to figure out these kinds of things than I actually have watching the show.

I'm slightly Asperger's in spirit, in that I barely ever get carried away with the emotions of a show - I watch in a very detached, analytical manner. I could count the number of times I've cried during a film on one or two hands. I was reading a book by a guy with Asperger's who explained that he could feel sad for things that directly affected him, but could only ever fake being truly empathetic for other people going through the same thing.

For this reason, I'm that person who'll go to pretty much anything. I hold the ballet I'm going to on Saturday in fairly equal regard with the wrestling I went to, or the opera singer I saw for free during the holidays, or the school play I went to last year.

I like it when it's really amazing quality and you can appreciate the costumes and the charisma and the precision of it. But I also like the amateur.

I'm oversimplifying things there - I'm not totally heartless. It just seemed on the spectrum of things, I was a long way away from my booth full of passionate career-English teachers sharing a drink on a Friday afternoon.