My First Experience at the New York Film Festival

I've been living in New York a few years now and I had never been to the New York Film Festival. I can fully blame it on my working schedule for most of it, but I also think to check for screenings of movies I'd like to see way too late and they'd all be sold out. 

But this year is the first year where I heard about their trivia nights. I love trivia, and I know so much useless stuff, a lot of which is pop culture related. Now, I'm not a bar person, so I don't go to bar trivia nights, which is a shame. Mainly because I've never had the chance to compete in a public forum and put my trivia brain to the test. 

There were a bunch of different trivia games played, and the one I volunteered for was a game called Filmography. You and your opponent go back and forth naming films in an actor’s filmography, and you go until one of you blanks and then the other person has to name one more to seal the win. The actor I got was George Clooney. And lucky for me, I spent this past summer watching ER, and sometimes when I’m watching a new to me show, I go to the actor’s Wikipedia pages and look at what else they’ve done and look for future recommendations, so I had looked at Clooney’s filmography quite recently, on top of me having actually seen a bunch of his movies. As the game was going along, I felt like I was getting non-obvious picks in. I remembered Good Night and Good Luck, which I have seen, thanks to the new play, and Midnight Sky, again thank you Wikipedia. I also got in Return of the Killer Tomatoes because I've seen enough interviews of him bringing it up, and my brain stores information like that for seemingly no reason other than trivia. So, I ended up winning this game. And the prize for this round was a free ticket to the first screening of Noah Baumbach's Jay Kelly, starring George Clooney, at the fest. 

Then the final game of the night, where everyone who wanted to could compete, was a game of Movie-Actor. You're given a card with an actor's name and a movie of theirs, and then the next person has to pick another actor in that movie, then the next person has to pick another movie of that actor's, and the line keeps going until someone breaks, that person is eliminated, and you keep going like that until only one is left standing. I managed to make it to the last two people, and I had to name an Elle Fanning movie, and just went blank. Somewhere was my lead in for her so I couldn't say that, and then I kept seeing two different characters of hers but I just could not pull out a title. So I came in second place. My consolation prize was a free ticket to a screening of Richard Linklater's Nouvelle Vague. 

And then going to the screenings and getting to go to the actual festival was so cool. To be in Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center and see all the NYFF signs around, it felt like more than just seeing a movie at my local AMC. It felt like it was a special thing. I loved it. I can't wait to go back next year.

cinema, journal

Haven't Listened to the New Taylor Swift Album and Feeling Smug About It

I also haven't listened to The Tortured Poets Department. And the -more albums. It would be dishonest to include Midnights, because I did listen to a few songs when it came out, but then never listened again. So I’ve been pretty out of Taylor Swift for the last five years. This is something I am perfectly okay with. I don’t feel like I’m missing out, because what she does is so pervasive in the culture, I feel like I get the gist of the music. 

The fact of the matter is, she’s just not doing anything interesting. She’s not taking big wild swings musically. She’s writing about the same old things she’s been writing about since she was 16, with seemingly no new perspective. Frankly I’m bored.

But the worst parts of the Taylor Swift Experience, especially of the last few years, are her fans and her seeming greed.

Her fans are no longer a fan base, it is a cult. The way they mobilize around her, talk about her, and defend her against anybody who dares say anything negative about her, is wild. They have no concept of pop culture out side of her and relate everything can back to her. I’m sorry but Taylor Swift is not the center of the universe, and it’s fine if people don’t like her. Chill out.

The thing that really kills me is the greed. Just the amount of different variant covers of albums, and certain songs only available on certain additions. And because her fanbase is a cult, they buy it all. Not to mention all of the merch. I know trademarking is important for art ownership, but I remember when she tried to trademark “1989”. Just the number. There was no art or image as a part of it, she tried to trademark the year 1989. 

So yeah, feeling a bit smug not listening to her.

earworm