From November, a glimmer of May

As November heralds the slide towards winter, here's a reminder of the Borderlines 10th birthday treat: the very idiosyncratic May Festival. New boundaries were broken in terms of open air screenings and pop-up cinemas and we even left the ground with the trial flights that accompanied our weekend at Shobdon Airfield. It's worth remembering however, that it was bloody cold in May, blankets, fake furs, woolly hats and scarves, even hot water bottles were much in evidence.





We certainly won't be able to do anything on this scale on a regular basis but if we  held some outdoor or pop-up screenings in September (often more reliable weather-wise) would you come along?

Showcase for the old, on with the new!

Balmy was a bit optimistic in terms of adjectives but the May Festival starts today and there's talk on the BBC Weather monthly forecast of high pressure for the South and West arriving next week. So, much like the giant Airscreen that will be used for the open air screenings at Berrington Hall, ever buoyant. 

The screen will be here - from a Berrington Hall recce in March

We have accumulated quite a few images from festival past on Flickr but have now assembled a selection in our new Tumblr blog for easier viewing. And the weather in February/March looked amazing!

Motovun Film Festival: gypsy bands, shoe-waving, corruption trials, prison cinemas

Everybody shoes up @MotovunFF opening to denounce corruption in Croatia ©@esubira yfrog.com/h4jq4olj

Two members of our team - Festival Director, David Gillam, and Executive Director, Naomi Vera-Sanso - are currently attending Motovun Film Festival in Croatia, following an Independent Cinema Office course on 'Developing Your Film Festival." It sounds as though they may come back with strange and wonderful ideas. Here are some of the short reports they have sent back so far:

Motovun is like a Croatian film Glastonbury. Thousands of young people come from all over to camp, watch films and party. The whole film fest infrastructure is built from scratch each year - toilets and all. A little medieval hill-top town transformed - amazing!

A test of endurance so not for everybody but if you can stay the course Bella Tarr's The Turin Horse is a film experience like no other. One that changes the way you see the natural world and our relationship to it. The final work from an uncompromising genius.



Opening ceremony: A gypsy band performed a specially written song to 'The Ragged and the Barefoot' and the audience were encouraged to take their shoes off and clap along - I did. The festival was officially opened by the two lawyers who are defending the assistant prime minister who is in jail awaiting trial on corruption charges. They have become Croatian celebs and it links to an 'In Prison' sidebar at the fest where you have to pay to get out of the screening. All very wild and mad.

Summer in the Cinema/Cinema in the Summer

What better way to celebrate the dregs of a summer that never quite made it than a lingering hymn to outdoor cinema, I thought. There's no pleasure quite like it - though my experiences are almost exclusively bound up with being abroad and in holiday mode. It's something to do with being caught up with what's up there on the screen while remaining aware of your surroundings at the same time, light fading, cricket noises, smells, pulses of hot air. And like Flicks in the Sticks there's always an interval for refreshments. Just love it, I'll go see anything, anything at all.

So here's Cine-Paris, a rooftop summer cinema in the centre of Athens (ramparts of the Acropolis just over the wall). More pics on our Flickr stream.



Nearer to home, Garway Flicks promoter, Magaret Oke recalls one memorable August screening of Shrek on Garway Common at the close of the village fete. The film was projected on the side of a lorry with seating on straw bales. "Wonderful atmosphere" unlikely to be repeated because of health and safety and the vagaries of the weather.

Regular outdoor screenings in this country include the Film4 Summer Screen events July/August at Somerset House. Plus this very Bank Holiday weekend, the Sunset Screenings on Grantchester Meadows in Cambridge, a prelude to the Cambridge Film Festival towards the end of September, Mamma Mia! on Saturday 30th and on Sunday 31, intriguingly, Big River Man starring endurance swimmer, Martin Strel, who'll be present (swimming?).

A long way to go, though my obsession has led me to the far reaches of the Open Air Cinema Blog where the possibilities are seemingly limitless...