LA Story

One of the things people do here is get frantic about getting meetings, and spend their time rushing from one to another, and not seeing films. I have an advantage in that I came out here to have a good time, meet people if possible, see films, have conversations. The thing with taking meeting after meeting is that all you ever get told is "send me the script" - and so far, yesterday and just now, I've managed to have two conversations that ended with "send me the script" - and all without getting frantic! Yesterday I met up with some Americans I'd bumped into over lunch last week, and we'd set aside a time to have a proper conversation, which was yesterday afternoon. They have a company based in LA, and want to read "Modern Woman's Guide". This morning I've had a great conversation with a British producer based in LA, and he wants to see "MWG" too. So, I've more than achieved what I wanted to achieve out of this trip.

Anyway, back to films, and yesterday. Saw "A Guide to Recognising Your Saints", a hard hitting autobiographical film starring Robert Downey Jr. It's good, but could be tighter - there are some odd choices in terms of camerawork and sudden voice-overs from characters who haven't spoken yet, which is a bit confusing. But it's a good story, and will find an audience, I'm sure. Went straight from that to the Scottish Screen party on the beach, which was good - more wine and canapes, including crudities - yay!! Vitamins! Get them while they're sitting there waiting to be eaten! Irvine Welch was at the party, he's about to direct his first feature apparently. I had a good chat with the bloke who was the lead man in "Red Road", everyone from that film seems to be in great demand and having a fine time here, which is ace - a British film with a female director doing well is a good thing.

Then went to queue to get into "Salvador", Spanish entry in Un Certain Regard. The deal with Certain Regard is that you don't get tickets in advance, you just line up behind the sign that matches your accreditation badge, and hope. Luckily for me, my queue is the one that has second priority, so I queued for about 40 minutes and got in. And because it's not officially red carpet, despite the films being premieres, you don't dress up. But the cinema is smaller, you get a better view, and if you sit in the right place, you might get the star of the film sitting behind you. So last night I had the odd experience of watching Daniel Bruehl on screen, knowing he was right behind me. He's very cute in real life! And a great actor. The film itself was pretty harrowing, a powerful, old-fashioned political film about anti-fascists in Spain towards the end of the Franco regime. Not an easy film to watch, very moving and hard hitting.

Not sure what I'm doing with the rest of today - no chance of getting tickets for "Marie Antoinette", Sophia Coppola's film, but it will probably get a theatrical release at home anyway. So, I might just chat and chill, and maybe catch a couple of films. And perhaps begin the search for Babybel. I think I'm going to need sun cream, it's a hot one and the wind's dropped.

I also keep coming back to the things Richard Linklater was talking about the other day - he made so much sense when he was talking about the writing process, I just want to get going with following the advice he gave. I think I have a new hero.

And guess what, Gena? He wears Crocs!