That Was The London Film Festival

As recycling bins around the land groan under the weight of discarded LFF brochures and film bloggers lie awake wondering what in the name of sweet Mary Poppins they're going to write about for the next eleven months, The Incredible Suit takes a look back at what made the 54th BFI London Film Festival the only Film Festival to be seen at in London between the 13th and the 28th of October 2010.

It was a good year for...

Some Films
Not all films were good. In fact some were shit. Some that weren't shit included The Peddler, Blue Valentine, The Tillman Story, Never Let Me Go, Let Me In, Womb, Black Swan, Catfish, The Pipe, 127 Hours and Kaboom. The Incredible Suit's prize for the least shit film goes to the funny and touching The Kids Are All Right. Congratulations lesbians!

Sandra Hebron
Maybe it's just my imagination but the BFI's Artistic Director seemed to enjoy a much higher profile than usual this year. Perhaps it's because she featured in 99.9% of Ultra Culture's Twitter feed over the last month. Perhaps it's because she was interviewed live on Film 2010. Or perhaps it's because her name is an anagram of "Bear's Hard Onn".

Wanking
Not that I mind, but at least a quarter of the films I saw contained scenes in which people took matters into their own hands, which seems like a high proportion to me. Still I suppose that's art. Of those that didn't feature any self-service, Violante Placido in The American probably prompted a couple and Upside Down: The Creation Records Story was just full of wankers.

Sausage Rolls
The sausage and leek rolls at the BFI's Benugo bar are amazing. It's like there's a party in your mouth and everyone's invited, but the coolest people at the party are the sausage rolls and they're only interested in you and want to go upstairs and make sweet love to you underneath the coats on the spare bed. Oh yeah and they come in a pint glass.

The Incredible Suit
Thanks to the Wonka's Golden Ticket that is the LFF Press Pass, I was able to see lots of films for free, meaning I saved almost enough money to buy a portion of sausage and leek rolls at the BFI's Benugo bar.

But it was a bad year for...

Some Other Films
Out of 200 or so films you would expect some to be a bit rubbs. Fortunately most of what I saw wasn't, but the turds among the sausages this year included The American, It's Kind Of A Funny Story, Heartbeats, Upside Down, Route Irish and Edge. The Incredible Suit's award for the biggest load of old Shia goes to the painfully boring Living On Love Alone.

The Surprise Film
Every year there's a surprise film that people willingly pay to see before they know what it is, in the hope that it'll be a sure-fire future classic or a hotly-anticipated new film by an established director. This year it was Brighton Rock, which went down like ejaculate in a bowl of tomato soup. I didn't see it so I can't confirm whether or not it tastes of jizz.

NFT2
Most press screenings took place in NFT2, which isn't a terrible place to watch a film, but it is a terrible place to watch several films in a row, especially if you value your spine. It's also a terrible place to hold a screening like The American which attracts about four times as many people as there are seats. AND there's no mobile reception or WiFi. Speaking of which...

WiFi
Trying to connect to the internet at the BFI is like trying to catch a fish with a hula hoop, which is infuriating if you're trying to write a blog, check the screening schedule or tweet about sausage rolls. When you do manage to connect you're allowed approximately four minutes before the exclamation mark of doom appears and you fling your laptop into the Thames.

The Incredible Suit
Specifically, my amazing LFF preview. I only managed three films from the ten I recommended and two of them were crapples. Most annoyingly I failed to see Submarine, which is by all accounts Tick VG, and The Great White Silence, which looked like it could have been bum-blowingly great. Damn you, "day job"!

So that's the London Film Festival: the only time it's OK to sit in in a dark room with 200 strangers, stuffing yourself with sausage rolls and watching people masturbate. I can't wait to do it all again.

To comment on this post, click here