Today I had a few hours off in the morning before my first show, so I strolled down Park City's downtown area. About halfway up Main street, I saw about 60 people crowding around a jewel store or a restaurant or something. I saw they all had cameras, and when one of them started saying to the others, "sorry in advance if I push you out of the way," I thought I would stick around to see mob mentality in action.Well, I sat there for 40 minutes and nothing happened. Supposedly Jim Carrey was inside, and all the paparazzi was waiting for him to emerge. It was nice to sit there and see the people go by (including Paul Giamatti again and Bill Hader), but Jim Carrey just isn't 40+ minutes interesting. I walked up to the top of main street, checked out Sundance's bitter cousin festival Slamdance, and went back - and the paparazzi was still there, waiting impatiently. I'm sure Carrey had slipped out the back hours beforehand.
The first film I saw this day truly changed the way I perceive movies. The movie was Johnny Mad Dog, but I have a hard time referring to it as a "movie." A movie generally has a story, character development, obstacles that the protagonist has to overcome, etc. Johnny Mad Dog featured child soldiers in an unnamed African country (though it was filmed in Liberia) basically yelling and shooting people for two hours. It was very well made, but honestly, the terms "like" and "dislike" don't even apply. It was an experience. It made City of God look like Peter Pan. But even that analogy doesn't apply. It was unlike any other movie that exists.
Afterward, at the Q&A, the director talked about how the kids in the movie were real child militia soldiers during the war. He lived with them for over a year, learning about how they lived and what happened, and taught them to act. I couldn't shake the feeling that it was, at some level, cruelly exploitative. I mean, this guy is asking these kids to re-enact beatings, rapings, murders - all things that they probably did in real life. And that thought disturbs me.
After a film like that, I spent a good amount of time with my brow furrowed, having dark thoughts about filmmaking. I wasn't exactly in the mood for another film, let alone a violent one, but I had Bronson coming up immediately afterward, and I'd heard it was good. So I tried to go in with a completely open mind.
It was great! It wasn't really that violent a film - more a meditation on violence. It was the story of Charlie Bronson (not the American actor), Britain's most violent prisoner. It basically tried to portray his acts of violence as, in his mind, a work of art. I thought it was actually very light-hearted for such a gloomy subject.
