Last post!

Uh oh! I've gotten behind in my blogging. I haven't written about my movies since Thursday! So, here goes.

Thursday morning, I saw The Devil land Daniel Johnston, a documentary about an undergound rock musician who influenced Beck, Sonic Youth, Nirvana, etc. but who battled severe depression that drastically stunted his career. I hadn't heard of Daniel Johnston before I saw the fillm, and I felt that the film failed to justify why exactly he was hailed as a genius. It was an interesting story, though. I'm glad I saw it.

Next, we went to Strangers with Candy again. (And no Janis I am not including the second viewing in my totals!) It was just as funny the second time! Amy and Steven weren't at the Q&A, just Paul. Which was odd and annoying. But the Q&A was actually better this time around. More interesting. It was fun seeing it with Elissa and Thomas who of course loved it. Because it's great.

After that was Reefer Madness which was definitely one of my faves of the fest. I didn't quite know what to expect from this. I actually kind of thought it was going to be bad. I ended up totally loving it. It's a musical starting Alan Cumming, Neve Campbell, Ana Gasteyer and Christian Campbell (whom you might remember from the Worst Gay Movie Ever Made, otherwise known as Trick). I want the soundtrack like, now. Anyways, hilarious. Hard to explain the plot. Just be sure to watch it when it plays on Showtime later this year.

After that, I had tickets to the Crispin Glover movie What Is It? but I didn't really go. I went to the Queer Lounge party instead and by the time I left early to get to the Crispin movie, I had a pretty decent buzz. All I had really wanted to do was get a photo with Crispin Glover and I did that in the lobby, so I left and returned to the party.You've already read my party post. On to Friday's movies...

Friday morning we had to check out of our kick ass timeshare by the Library and move into a hotel by the Prospector. Audrey spearheaded the Project Clean Up And Check Out. Go Audrey. I spent the morning griefing the loss of my wallet (keychaini attached).j

Our first movie of Friday was Me and You and Everyone We Know which was superb! Artistic and fun and honest and heartfelt. It doesn't have an all-star cast and at first, nothing in the discription made it stand out for me at all. But so many people were raving about it, so I made sure to catch a screening. I'm really glad I did. I've heard this movie compared to Happiness, and I can see why. It has the whole multiple storylines thing going on, and some of them are certainly quite twisted. But Me and You and Everyone We Know is more hopeful than Happiness. It has more of a heart.

Next, I went to see Mirrormask, written by Neil Gaiman and directed by Dave McKean. I liked this about as well as I expected, which is...not very much. Don't get me wrong -- the look and feel of this movie is like nothing you've ever seen or will see again from anyone but these two. So imaginative. Just breathtaking. But the story just didn't interest me. I have to come to terms with the fact that Neil Gaiman is just not for me.

Mysterious Skin was the next movie we saw. My whole group went to this. It was the last Premiere of the festival. It's directed by Gregg Araki, of whom I am decidedly NOT a fan -- Nowhere and The Doom Generation are totally not my cup of tea. Violence just for the sake of it? Um, no. So I was kind of nervous about this. But I had heard it was a departure from his earlier work so I thought maybe I'd be okay. Anyways -- I'm so glad I went. I was so impressed. It's a movie about two teenage boys who went through the same thing in their youths and how it affected both of them. I was blown away by Joseph Gordon Levitt's performance. I highly, highly recommend this one!

My last film of the night was The Aristocrats, a documentary consisting of about 100 different comedians telling the same super raunchy, not-that-funny joke. This was directed by Paul Provenza and Penn Jillette. Even though the actual joke wasn't that funny, the way that the movie was structured made it so. I liked it. Very, very sleepy at this point in time. No more midnight movies for Dor!

Saturday is next. That's today.

The first thing I saw this morning was the Animation Program consisting of six animated shorts. I was interested in this because I saw that Don Herzfeldt had a short in it. You may know Don's work from the Acadamy-award nominated short that he did a few years ago called Rejected. Anyways, this shorts program was all right. Very welll done. Not 100% fascinating to me. I drifted in and out sleep.

Next came Live-In Maid, an Argentinian film about a rich woman losing her wealth. It was okay. Nothing special.

Then, Audrey and I caught a screening of Rock School at the Yarrow. Really good stuff!! This was the documentary on an actual School of Rock where the man who runs it is just as garish and seemingly un-suitable for children as Jack Black's character was in School of Rock. There wasn't a dull moment in this movie. Very good stuff.

Last movie of the night was the winner of the Grand Jury prize for Documentary, Why We Fight. This is defininitely one to watch for! It was political but without condemning any one person or group of people. Extremely powerful film. The Q&A that followed was my favorite Q&A of the festival. Eugene Jarecki (who also directed The Trialls of Henry Kissingers) is one of the most articulate people I have ever been in the same room with.

I'm basically done with my Sundance experience. I'm seeing, hopefully, two more movies tomorrow before we leave. Here's a list of every movie I saw, and how I would rate that movie on a scale of ONE THROUGH TEN.

1. Happy Endings -- 7
2. Loggerheads -- 8
3. Brick - 4
4. Ellie Parker -- 5
5. Inside Deep Throat -- 7
6. Dear Wendy -- 3
7. The Dying Gaul -- 9
8. Swimmers - 6
9. The Upside of Anger - 7
10. On A Clear Day - 8
11. Game 6 - 3
12. The Ballad of Jack and Rose -- 8
13. The Talent GIven Us -- 4
14. Thumbsucker - 7
15. Pretty Persuasion -- 6
16. Saving Face -- 6
17. Strangers with Candy -- 10
18. Lonesome Jim -- 5
19. Nine Lives -- 8
20. Steal Me -- 6
21. How the Garcia Girls Spent Their Summer - 6
22. The Squid and the Whale -- 7
23. After Innocence -- 8
24. Heights -- 8
25. This Revolution -- 3
26. The Girl from Monday -- 2
27. Mardi Gras- Made In China - 5
28. The Devil and Daniel Johnston - 6
29. Reefer Madness - 9
30. Me and You and Everyone We Know - 8
31. Mirrormask - 5
32. The Aristocrats - 6
33. Animation Program - 5
34. Live-In Maid - 5
35. Rock School - 7
36. Why We Fight - 8

Tomorrow, Sundance screens the award winners. I'm hoping to catch two of the documentary winners -- The Education of Shelby Knox and Grizzly Man. Then, we're driving back to Los Angeles. We will probably get in around 3 AM. Yippee!

Last thing -- here are some photos from the last day or so. Hope you enjoy!

Here's Bill and Audrey getting frisky in our hotel room:



Here's me and the supersexy Crispin Glover:



The MAN:



Me looking like total shit and Neve Campbell being her gorgeous self:



Neveness:



Audrey, Bill, and the snowball I demanded she not pelt me with:



Elissa and Thomas relax after a late movie: