9-1-2005
It has begun.
Tuesday, at about 7:45am, I took my place in line alongside the other
hardcore fest goers(yes, folks, Mouthy Martha was there, too, right up
front, yapping away!) who were waiting breathlessly for the release of
the official program book and festival schedule. We waited patiently,
chatting with friends old and new, reminiscing about fests gone by and
comparing speculation about what TIFF 2005 might hold in store. As 9am
drew near, our hearts started beating faster, the pitch in our voices
started to climb, and we all craned our necks to see just when the
doors would be opened and our Christmas-morning experience would begin.
I know only hardcore fest goers (Linda, are you with me?) can
appreciate the sheer joy and excitement of being handed a big, fat
program book full of hundreds of cinematic possibilities. It’s like
walking down to your living room on Christmas Day to behold a wealth of
brightly wrapped presents under the tree – so much to choose from, OMG
where to start?!?!
Well, let’s start with the free schwag! Once again, the fest has
revamped its complimentary festival tote bag (given free to all
program-book purchasers) and made it much more user friendly. Pockets
ROCK. Plus, it’s funkier than it’s ever been. But even better than the
nifty bag was what was inside! In addition to a free can of Sobé Energy
Drink (caffeine is a fest fan’s best friend) and a $5 Starbucks card,
there was a DVD of a new cable series, a bunch of oddly assembled
coupons (um, maybe it’s just me but I don’t know what 50 cents off a
bag of pasta has to do with TIFF’n)… and something I’m CONVINCED could
NOT have been in every one of the hundreds, if not thousands, of totes.
For when I opened my bag, I found a $50 (!!!) gift certificate to the
Rosewater Supper Club (a swanky Toronto eatery) AND a $25 gift
certificate to the Courthouse Grill (another T-Dot restaurant).
WHAT THE HELL?!?!?
I went over those gift certificates with a magnifying glass, certain
that there must be some fine print I wasn’t seeing… something that would
nullify the whole deal or reveal it to be some kind of cruel
promotional scam. But no, They’re real. Holy crap! The festival just
gave me $75 worth of FREE FOOD!
Even though we’re always advised to welcome gift horses with open arms,
I have to admit I was suspicious. Could the festival really be changing
its tune? Could they somehow be REWARDING its audiences this year? It
*is* their 30th anniversary, so maybe the execs and all the sponsors
are really pulling out all the stops and rolling out the proverbial red
carpet for us. Maybe.
My shock and awe continued when I began selecting films and filling out
my order forms. What’s THIS now? Some of the movies showing at TIFF
have THREE screenings! Three! That means more opportunities to see
popular films and (quite possibly) less competition for tickets at each
of those screenings.
Good grief, Piers Handling and crew, what has happened to you since
September 2004?!?!? It’s like someone somewhere turned on the
generosity switch in their brains and we’re being showered with
goodness this year. Still, for some reason this gives me an uneasy
feeling in the pit of my stomach…like it’s all too good to be true or
some kind of grand set of typos.
Nonetheless, I agonized over my choices for a full day – sitting down
on the couch at 9:30am and, save for potty breaks, pretty much staying
there until 10 o’clock that night. Trying to slot 35 films into eight
days doesn’t sound terribly daunting, but by hour four you’re no
longer able to think clearly. Suddenly, you start to wonder if maybe
seeing that new Abel Ferrara movie might be a good idea after all
(no!), or that perhaps you should skip the Wallace & Gromit movie to
see the new Zooey Deschanel drama instead (I’m afraid, yes). You forget
which films you wanted to see, or when you wanted to see them, or WHY
you wanted to see them. But 12 hours after I’d begun, I folded the
order forms closed and put them in my bag for the next day’s delivery
to the box office.
Which brings me to my next bout of skepticism.
When I arrived at the box office to submit my orders, it was like I
walked into some kind of festival utopia. EVERYONE was super-friendly
and super-perky and in a collective AMAZING mood. Big smiles all around
and I swear there was even one girl SKIPPING from table to table. I’m
not lying – SHE SKIPPED. I half expected to see a rainbow shining above
the entrance and free ice cream being handed out by Catherine Keener.
When I handed over my orders, the shockingly helpful volunteer informed
me of a new TIFF policy this year.
“Oh no,” I thought. “Here it comes.” I readied myself for a blow to the
midsection.
“If you put your email address on the front of your order,” she said.
”We’ll email you as soon as we process your order and tell you which
films you got.”
HUH??
Seems the festival has decided that it’s cruel to make people sweat out
the Labor Day long weekend, stressed about how many of their selections
they actually scored, so they’re implementing a process whereby they
will actually send us an email that says, “Hi Vickie! You successfully
landed tickets to the following films…”, thereby giving us advance
notice of how well (or how poorly) we did in the ticket lottery, and
alerting us to the films we DIDN’T get so that we can come armed with
alternate picks when we show up at the crack of dawn on Labor Day
morning to collect our tickets.
Good grief on a cracker – WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO MY
USER-UNFRIENDLY FILM FESTIVAL?!?!? Magically, almost eerily,
they’re…nice. They’re helpful. They’re actually initiating processes
that IMPROVE their flawed system. They’re giving out $75 of free
phancy food, fer cryin’out loud! They seem to LOVE the moviegoer this
year!
Or do they?
I’m not entirely convinced. For despite their efforts to lull me into a
sense of comfort and warmth and security, I’m not comfortable or warm
or secure. I want to believe that their motives are true, and that
their sudden affection is genuine, and that their email-alert system
will not send out reams of false information by accident.
But it all seems just a little too good to be true. Too easy. For now,
I’m taking it all with a packet of low-sodium salt substitute, and will
believe our unexpected good fortune when I have my tickets in my hand.
