Thematic content; dice. A symbol of the randomness of our modern condition. Also the premise of many of the films.
A while back (21/02/10) Me and a couple of mates went down to fed square on a whim to catch Tropfest, a short film festival run by Movie Extra.
As we ascended the steps of fed square we were greeted with a teeming mass of people engrossed by the film playing on the huge screen. The festival had officially kicked off at Five in the afternoon, but in rigid adherence to festival convention the first few hours must have comprised of people milling about muttering things like “It said to get here at five’’ or ‘’do you think it’s going to start soon.’’
Luckily however, we didn’t actually get there until around seven thirty so we didn’t have to engage in such irritated banter ourselves, we could get straight into the watching of short films.
The first couple we saw were ‘’interesting’’ to say the least, the sort of thing you’d expect from a short film festival: disjointed images, non-existent plot threads, that sort of thing. But towards the end of the first half of the festival there was a run of witty, whimsical and playful films which managed to comment profoundly on the nature of contemporary media driven society without a trace of pretention or using intentional ubiquitous ambiguity as a means of covering up holes in production quality or logic.
The highlight of these standout films for me was one that centred on two police officers on patrol. Evidently one of these officers was enamoured with the cultural pervasion of the Star Wars saga. As such the police officers engagement in serious duties is sporadically broken up by crude emulation of a Wookie yell. The extroversion and playfulness of this cry finds itself in stark contrast to the seriousness of the police duties at hand and the absurdity of the action was the source of hilarity.
Throughout the course of the short film the emulation of Sounds and actions from the Star Wars saga increases in frequency and intensity and the film culminates in a sequence in which the two officers engage in a lengthy role play sequence in which they play out key scenes from the star wars films. With their appetite for role play satiated they returned to the police vehicle and receive a report of a gunfight between two individuals in their vicinity, to which they reply with a Wookie war cry, possibly some sort of symbol of the erosion of oppressive authoritative and professional protocols.
It was a brilliant comment on the mundane quality of everyday life and the role that cultural iconography and media have in alleviating this cultural condition.
None of the other films were really worth synopsising or analysing, that’s not to say they were bad, I just wouldn’t want to read about them in great detail personally.
More interesting than the films in many instances was the audience, it was a fascinating mix of people: artistic types, high school kids looking for a foot into the door of a cutting edge cultural experience (probably so they could go on about it at school and impress persons of the opposite gender), elderly couples, a virtual cross section of society: united by a common interest in film (or possibly margaritas as the people sitting behind us were loudly mixing their own, or in the instance of a guy a couple of rows behind us laughing brutally loudly at the most awkward of moments) needless to say the quirky vibe was tangible.
It was a great night out, I’d thoroughly recommend checking it out next year. Don’t bother getting the festival Dvd, go out and experience the live vibe, it makes the pretentiously poignant ones bearable.
The festival website site is here.
