Maybe it was because I was still suffering from the hangover
from the
went the direction of "naked with a butcher knife" it had me
searching for the exit sign. Sometimes I think the marketing people at the
festival should go with “VIFF: some things you can’t un-see”. Yeesh.

The plot of the film is simple. A woman lives in a small
apartment. She is crossing off the days on her calendar, counting down until
February 29
. She is a writer, who works from home and spends the
rest of her time talking to family on the phone, lying about how her life is
full of love and friendship. In the evenings, she goes to bars and seduces men,
bringing them home for chilling, emotionless sex. She finally meets her match,
though, in the form of a moustached sadist who systematically degrades her
then brings her cold beer and asks her about her life. What made this film challenging was the
total lack of emotion. You feel nothing for any of the characters. And why is
it that watching someone perform the most mundane tasks (cleaning the fridge,
eating dinner, typing) so incredibly depressing? Perhaps it’s because the
passage of time becomes all the more apparent.

, in which the filmmaker Thomas Comerford follows the
Indian Boundary line between the United States and Indian territory (now Rogers
Ave in Chicago), which came about due to a treaty signed in 1816. This film was
beautiful: but in a haunting way. The camera follows the road, stopping in
parks and other urban spaces along the way. There is something strange about
seeing urban spaces devoid of people. Swings in a playground without any
children, fields without baseball, it gave me the feeling of 4pm on a Sunday
afternoon – a kind of non-time between important events, a time for quiet, and
if you’re not careful, a time for despair.

by Thom Andersen. This film also tracks urban spaces, but this time
in the form of old signs in Los Angeles. I’ve always loved old signs. It was
like this film was made for me. Old billboards, signs attached to chain link
fences, graffiti, and many, many murals of Jesus. Again, the sadness crept it.
Here’s the decay, here’s all the ephemera of capitalism stripped down,
forgotten. Buy this, buy that, it will only rot and rust, just like the signs
that advertise it. Also, have I lived in Vancouver too long or is there something
grim about sunshine? The California glare makes me want to hide in a closet.
It’s so relentless! The soundtrack of this film was great too, lots of old 60s
tunes. Wonderful.