Keep Those Wagons Rolling

You know when you've done a really awkward interview and you told the panel you were writing a Western... when you're not in fact writing a Western.....

Filth and Mince

So the EIFF has ended. This was my first whole film festival as a delegate (last years was a part-time affair), and I'm proud to say I made it through the entire couple of weeks without a whole day off. Frankly my brain was mince by the time it ended, but it was glorious, damp (it rained a LOT) and rather inspiring.

I'm already missing the buzz of always having something filmic available to see, but am buckling down to write the feature that the final part of the MA requires. I've sat for over an hour now staring at my screen. I want to be swanning about at the Cheltenham Screenwriters Festival but that will have to wait until next year. For now, it's comedy and a balancing act along the fine line that is bawdy rudeness whilst avoiding straying into filth. Although filth has its place.. but here's a question - how rude is too rude for a screenplay?

And I would walk 500 miles...

EIFF up-date : saw Death Defying Acts, A Film With Me In It, Brian Cox Q&A, Shane Meadows Q&A, various Happy Hours (Team WA won the Delegate Pub Quiz which netted us some Marx Brothers dvds), couple of parties - one of which had an experimental slide show (very Woodstock) and a magic igloo - personally I found it hard to see what was magic about said igloo, but it was very white - favourite party had free bar all evening (but they obviously worried a LOT about the wine drinkers as there was a little sign at the bar saying 'a SMALL glass of house white wine') and have been hob-nobbing. Feeling like I've hobbed too many nobs if truth be known now, 9 days in, but still sad there's only 2 days to go (though my credit card will not be sorry).

Attended the BBC Writersroom event at the Traverse in Edinburgh yesterday - the first of their roadshows around the UK. Met Kate Rowlands - very friendly, enthusiastic and approachable. Haven't yet put anything in to them but plan to later this year - informative presentation, and Kate made herself available for chatting in the bar afterwards!

My mate and MA classmate, Ronnie has got through to Sharps - well done! He's off to London on the 30th for the next stage.

Nothing fell from the sky - not even manna or frogs - how disappointing.

EIFF update

Too knackered to report much on today but you MUST go to see Terence Davies' 'Of Time and the City' - it's beautiful and poetic and I shed a tear even though the man beside me smelled of chips, threw a delegate pass at me (unintentionally), fiddled EXTENSIVELY with his mobile (with the LIGHT ON the whole time throughout the film) and then fell asleep on my shoulder. Thank you.

Tomorrow I am mostly having some lovely soup, then a writers event at 1pm, then some Horror discussion later, and a Happy Hour fiesta at the delegate centre. I will also be checking out the pigeon-holes to see if anyone has offered me anything free, and generally swishing about.

If I can, I'm also snaffling a ticket for this : 'Pageant' - With charm and endearing exuberance, Pageant follows five male contestants competing in the Miss Gay America female impersonation contest. From choosing sparkly outfits to rehearsing amazingly complex dance routines (and one strange ventriloquist’s dummy act), the film offers an intriguing insight into the lives of the participants. With no surgical enhancements below the neck permitted, these men are truly dedicated to the art of illusion.

May no-one fall asleep on your shoulder.

Pssst - nothing (except a delegate pass) has fallen on me from the sky yet... only 3 days to go until the curse is lifted.

And they're off...... EIFF

Brief and to the point as I'm expending ALL energy (ok not all - some is kept aside for breathing and laughing, but just a tiny bit) on the EIFF (or Edinburgh International Film Festival to give it its full title) which started officially today.

Picked up my delegate pass (which to my delight is for a longer period than I expected hurrah and ssssh in case it's a mistake), and saw 'Edge of Love' - I swear Matthew Rhys is channeling Richard Burton, in a GOOD way. Have to return tomorrow for the full cotton BAG full of delights that has schedules and stuff (and a free pen - don't get excited, ok don't get excited, its JUST a free pen... free pen ooh!). Last year there was a free pin badge - it's free - therefore it's exciting.

Tomorrow's itinerary :

pick up free and important stuff, and obviously look professional while doing so;

have bacon and egg roll and tea - this festival jaunt constitutes my holiday this year so therefore I am entitled to the odd inappropriate snack - you wait till I'm 4 days in, if last year is anything to go by, I'll be mainlining anything with E numbers;

see films - Patti Smith : Dream of Life, Stone of Destiny, Of Time and the City, and then Scottish Screen's Happy Hour;

plan the next day, go home, do some work to pay for all the inappropriate snacks, return;

repeat.

See you there!

Show Us Your Memes

Thank you kindly to Mr Jason, Ms Lianne and Ms Laura for meme-ing me with this : "List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re not any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now, shaping your spring. Post these instructions in your blog along with your 7 songs. Then tag 7 other people to see what they’re listening to."

I am mostly listening to these (in no particular order) :

1) Aisha : Death in Vegas
Rumbly, thumping, threatening, wonderful stuff.

2) Human : Goldfrapp
Love love LOVE Goldfrapp - they're sort of quirky odd, and wonderfully mad along Kate Bush lines. Alison Goldfrapp also runs around in her videos with giant owls, dressed like harlequins and such - what's not to like. Mad.

3) Rainy Rainy Day : Brownie McGhee from Angel Heart soundtrack
This is probably my favourite soundtrack, and the fact that it's full of bits of dialogue and noise from the film just makes it more atmospheric.

4) Ballad of the Broken Seas : Mark Lanegan and Isobel Campbell
Mark Lanegan is a wonderful thing - when he sings, he sounds like gravel and hurt. Combined with the sweet manipulations of Isobel Campbell, they make grubby little beauties like this one.

5) Evangeline : Icicle Works
Bit of nostalgia here. Wasn't a massive fan of the 'Works but I love the story in this song.

6) Heart-Shaped Box : Nirvana
Nirvana were my first proper grown-up gig (I don't count Wham as it was merely a teenage mistake thank-you), and I have a soft spot for this song. Cobain sounds like a wounded animal.

7) Butterfly : Screaming Trees
Lanegan again in one of his former incarnations. Ahh, flannel shirts and grunge, sweet memories.

Will tag if I can find 7 bloggers not already taggified.

Is it a plane?

I'm not one to take horoscopes seriously, but this weeks one is rather worrying. All Librans look skyward :

"Beware of random objects that fall from the sky"

!

So You Want To Be A Writer?

If it doesn't come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or
fame,
don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don't do it.
if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,
don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody
else,
forget about it.


if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.


if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you're not ready.


don't be like so many writers,
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.


when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.


there is no other way.
and there never was.

Charles Bukowski