film fest: wrap up

best movie
it's a tie between "edge of heaven" and "flight of the red balloon"

worst movie
mr. cinema (my lesson to never select a movie based on a still)

most annoying audience member
that guy who likes to read comics and grunts in response to interesting plot developments. after sitting one row behind him, i knew to look for him and sit far away.

best film moment
before the showing of the very last film of the film fest (paranoid park), the older film fest geeks sang to the kyoto planet commercial and shouted out lines to the "funny" film fest ads.

how the film fest could improve
1/ hire a web development company to design a better functioning and better looking website. the current tired website has been there for about 4 years now. this includes revamping the poorly conceived "myfest" page on the viff website that ONLY allowed you to see your calendar based on on-line ticket purchases and did not allow you to add films to your calendar. idiocy.
2/ have ushers forcibly remove viewers that insist on looking at their cellphones during a film and thereby casting a 3 meter radius of light around them.

otherwise, it was a pretty good film fest this year. i didn't get to see as many films as i wanted but i was very pleased with the ones i did get to see. i think the vancouver international film festival is one of the best film festivals in north america because of the large amount of films that are shown and the great range of films. we're lucky.