SXSW 2005 Film.

This year's SXSW Film Festival was probably my least active in the past seven years that I have been attending... Even the years I didn't have a badge I managed to see and do more than I did this year. Oh well... I got to see a couple of things... And when I say a couple, I mean like 2.

Started off the Film Festival by going to the A&E party. A&E was touting "their" documentaries this year in Murderball and Rock School. Murderball is a great doc about wheelchair rugby players... That's right... Wheelchair Rugby... And you thought you were fuckin' hard. Pansy.

Murderball won big at Sundance, so you gotta figure A&E is pretty proud. The party was also a bit of a toast to the upcoming Rollergirls Series set to hit A&E next year... The girls made a nice little "appearance" at the party... Skates & all. Had the perfect formula for a hot-rockin' party, but the shit was entirely too crowded. Even if the drinks were gratis...

Saturday morning I watched the music video showcase. (What kind of a timeslot is that for the fucking music videos? Jesus!) I cut a couple of videos that were in the competition this year. The Flaming Lips' "Sponge Bob & Patrick Confront The Psychic Wall Of Energy" and Bavu Blakes' "Play The Role" video made the cut, but didn't win anything big. Bavu was excited about rollin' up like Jay-Z and Rocafella...

Pretty standard music video fare this year, with an over abundance of animation treatments. Badly Drawn Boy's video for "Year of the Rat" was very sweet and touching enough to win the hearts of the jury as it walked away with the award for Best Music Video. My vote all along was with Kanye's "Jesus Walks" video. Sorry Kanye, but your song and it's video are fulfilling its own prophecy...

Spent Saturday night DJ'ing a birthday party out on a farm in East Austin. It was one of the Rainlily girl's 30th, so it was a big one! Had the goats and other attendees shakin' it, rural-style. The highlight of the night was the Crazy Pizza Guy who apparently just hung around after making his delivery, drank himself into oblivion, invented new crazy-ass dance moves while hitting on my girl ALL NIGHT. (wink wink) The party was a blast. Happy B-Day Kim.

Was able to make it to see Todd Solondz' new film Palindromes on Sunday. If you're in for a little mind-fuck, then be sure to check this film out when it hits the theatres... Mr. Solondz was in attendance and gave a nice (and awkward) little preface to the film and hung around for his version of a Q&A afterwards. It was cool getting to hear him speak. It left me with hope... "See! You CAN still be completely socially mal-adjusted and "make it" in this world!" That's what I kept telling myself...

The movie centers around a single 13 year old girl, Aviva, who in a fit of self-discovery decides to get pregnant... Here's the fucked up part... Aviva's same 13 year old character is portrayed by 8 different actresses... (And I swear one of them was a little boy.) Jennifer Jason Leigh makes an appearance as Aviva... Even a very large 30-something black woman (did I say she was large) takes a stab. (That would explain the movie poster if anyone has seen it...) BTW... This must be some new kind of trend among the cine-geeks. Todd Haynes is using a similar approach to tackle the complex persona of Bob Dylan in his upcoming film... Beyoncé as Dylan? Oprah as Dylan?!?!? WTF? But I digress... back to Palindromes...

Throw in some abortion issues, the trademark Solondz pedophelia theme, and a virtual freak show by way of Mrs. Sunshine (you'll know it when you see it), and you have yourself one crazy fucked-up movie! But still. It was good. And if you like his work, I think you'll find it... What's the word? Challenging. Maybe too challenging for its own good. Still, you should watch it.


Let's fast forward to Wednesday night shall we?
You will notice that I didn't watch a god damn thing between Sunday and Wednesday. Damn the man...
Anyway, the second screening of The Fearless Freaks was this night, and DJ Fuckin' A played the after party at the very poorly named Progress Coffee Shop. Here's a little word of advise... If you know there is some sensitivity toward the gentrification of East Austin, then what you DON'T do is be white, open up a coffee shop on the East Side, and then call it "Progress". Got it? Okay.

The movie is fucking great. Read here to see what I've already said about it. Can't say enough how proud I am of Bradley. He definitely deserves some props for putting it all together.

I was a little worried before the night of the party because I wasn't quite sure what the hell I was going to play... But in the end I think things came together nicely. Started off the night by playing some cuts off the soon to be released Late Night Tales featuring selections by the Lips themselves. (That Lips cover of "7 Nation Army" always gets some really funny reactions.) Threw in some new Beck as well... And then as the night progressed I played everything from The Beatles and Led Zeppelin to some Baile Funk and LCD Soundsystem. Topped it off with a couple of the exclusive bootleg tracks that they were giving out to promote the film. I decided as eclectic as fuck was the route to go. If you want a CD of some of the set, drop me a comment, and I'll send one your way.

I was 3 deep into the free beer when I realized what I had been chugging was actually Chimay, so I was pretty sauced for the remainder of the night. That always makes for a fun DJ experience... You want to see this DJ shake his shit on the dancefloor? Just give him lotsa free alcohol... You won't regret it, I promise. One of the highlights of the night was seeing that someone had defaced the coffee shop posters in the bathroom so that they said "Regress Coffee". Now who would do such a thing? Funny duddies...

I didn't realize then that this party was going to be the end of my 2005 Film Festival. I carried my badge around with me like a dope for the next few days, but I didn't use the fuckin' thing. There were a ton of movies I missed... And what I should really do is compile a list of things that I heard I should have seen, after the fact. But one thing at a time I guess...

Here's one I should have seen...

Any Sarah Silverman fans out there? No? Well then peep the trailer for Jesus Is Magic and you'll know why you should be.

Ha!