Best laid plans - times two - go awry

I regret to inform that I won’t be attending the Windsor International Film Festival’s edition after all. Well, the large majority of it anyhow. And in its celebratory 20^th year! And despite the fact I’d made it a point to attend the edition in full (usually I miss a few days due to other commitments). I had planned all this out carefully. I was first going to attend, as I usually do, Montreal’s Festival du nouveau cinema in mid-October, arrive home and gestate a few days before buying my pass and joining the joyful line at the Capitol Theatre or surrounding venues for the remarkable “little festival that could” (one of the most successful smaller city festivals in the country) 10-day event Oct. 24 – Nov. 3. And then, hot on its heels, Windsor’s experimental film festival, Media City Nov. 7 – 11. But because of new and unavoidable travel plans I won’t be able to make any of those glittering days except for opening night. Which I haven’t attended (nor closing night) in the past. So at least we’ll get to see Canadian filmmaker Sophie Deraspe’s Shepherds. As per description: “Mathyas trades in his Montreal life as a young advertising executive to become a shepherd in the South of France. But the harsh realities of the pastoral world force him to question his romantic vision of the profession.” In 2019 WIFF nomonated Deraspe’s Antigone for its Canadian Film prize.

This seems to be an autumn for bad luck, film festival wise, and ironically enough. My partner and I were planning to attend the press conference last week for this fall’s London (UK) Film Festival at the beautiful and sprawling British Film Institute on the Thames’ South Bank, sandwiched between the stunning Royal Festival Hall and Britain’s National Theatre complex. The conference was supposed to start at 10 am. Our flight arrived at 6.30, so no problem, right? Wrong. Heathrow airport’s accessibility services were very slow in transferring one of us from the aircraft through security and to baggage claim. We’d ordered an airport taxi to pick us up at 7.45. (I was looking forward to seeing our names on a small placard held up by the driver!) But by the time we cleared the Arrivals gate it was 8.30. And those cabs don’t wait forever. So, $124.04 down the drain. And hiring a London Black Cab at the regular taxi rank, iconic as they are, cost an additional $206.17. But the worst was missing the press conference itself. The BFI, by the way, is the epitome of film venues, and has including several cinemas, a wonderful bar and restaurant, café, bookstore and Mediatheque room of pods where you can recline in comfort and call up hundreds of films and videos to watch at your pleasure.