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The Quay Brothers' Maska plus film without images - HP Lovecraft's The Dunwich Horror
25 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
Wednesday 23rd June. While EIFF’s programme focuses mainly on conventional feature-films, there are several one-off events scattered throughout the Festival’s 10 days, so I decided to investigate a couple of the more adventurous ones. The first was a…
Obselidia, Cigarette Girl and Chase the Slut among highlights of final stretch at EIFF
25 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
On Wednesday night I had the pleasure of spending a few minutes talking with Diane Bell, director of ‘Obselidia’. She’s very enthusiastic, lapsing into her native Scottish dialect in moments of extreme excitement, and talking in what she describes as…
Up close with Cherry Tree Lane, Skeletons and Ollie Kepler's Expanding Purple World
23 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
Tuesday 22 Jun Paul Andrew Williams’ Cherry Tree Lane was one of the first films I saw here this year, and I did not like it. No sir. As I watched the London to Brighton director’s brutal tale of suburban home invasion playing out in real time, I…
Stanley Pickle, Baby and Rita among winning films at EIFF new talent awards
23 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
Monday was quite a sedate affair – after a number of days where going to bed late and getting up early was the norm, I treated myself to a lie-in before heading into town to catch a few movies (‘Postales’, at last, and ‘Chase The Slut’ – interview on…
Pixar make Brave move with Reese Witherspoon and Billy Connolly after Toy Story 3
22 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
Sunday 20 June Edinburgh calls itself a festival of discovery, and it’s true, the majority of films playing here are by first- or second-time filmmakers, and you go into each screening hoping to discover the next great moviemaking talent. But, as…
Sean Connery on form as EIFF The Man Who Would Be King screening marks 80th year
21 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
Yet another early start on Sunday, but I’d learnt my lessons from the morning after the Opening Gala, and hadn’t over-indulged at the Ghillie Dhu ceilidh the night before. Thus, I was fighting fit to attend Der Räuber (The Robber) at the Cameo, a…
Monsters director Gareth Edwards and producer Graham King at EIFF
20 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
Saturday 19 June The days, as Calvin & Hobbes astutely observed, are just packed. Saturday began with two great things: the first was Toy Story 3, which was possibly the best threequel I’ve ever seen (I’m meeting its two chief animators later today…
Evil in the Time of Heroes and The Extra Man highlights of EIFF screening frenzy
20 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
I was feeling pretty ashamed of my films-seen-to-days-attended ratio on Friday morning (as it stood at a paltry 1:1), so I went a bit crazy on the screening front. At the crack of dawn I attended ‘Mai Mai Miracle’ at the Cameo, a Japanese anime with…
Ben Miller - Huge respect for the nicest man at the EIFF
18 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
Friday 18th June. It’s my first day at Edinburgh Film Festival 2010; the opening party is a thing of blurry half-memory and the real business of movie-watching has properly begun, but the atmosphere is a joyous one: the sun is shining, and the weather…
EIFF day one highlight is The Last Rites of Ransom Pride
17 Jun 2010
Edinburgh International Film Festival Blog
Thursday 17th June A dirty, filthy hangover from the Opening Gala after-party was not enough to stop me fulfilling my interview commitments today, although it was enough to stop me getting into town early and securing tickets for various movies.
Edinburgh festival delivers a good innings
24 Aug 2009
Steve Cramer's Festival Blog
I seem to have touched a nerve with my last blog. Today, I received an (admittedly second hand) report that it had been said of me that I was clearly a narrow minded little Scotlander for speaking ill of London. The actor friend on the receiving end of…
To tire of Londoners at the Edinburgh Fringe
23 Aug 2009
Steve Cramer's Festival blog
After Go to Gaza, Drink the Sea, I went to the Assembly bar and drank the tea. I was contemplating which was the more indifferent drinking experience out of these two, when I was cheered by a chance meeting with Candida Benson, an actress whose own…
No entry
18 Aug 2009
Steve Cramer's Festival blog
There’s a paradox to being a reviewer. On the one hand, one is constantly badgered by theatre companies to see their shows, and on the other, when you arrive at their venues, they won’t let you in. Colonel Blood had easier access to the crown jewels…
Fringe demands sacrifice of sartorial splendour
13 Aug 2009
Steve Cramer's Festival Blog
Let us go then, you and I, to the place where one wishes the streets were half deserted, and the only muttering retreat you get is two hours sleep. But the Fringe is afoot, and it really hasn’t been a bad start. Leaving aside a School for Scandal the…
Boxing clever a wise move for sons of privilege
13 Aug 2009
Steve Cramer's Festival Blog
The lizard ails! As the Fringe moves on apace, and one enters into the strange, Through the Looking Glass world of sweaty venues, crowded pubs, dreadful hacks and appalling luvvies, one’s domestic arrangements seem a distant and desperately pined for…
A weekend fuelled by comedy and cake
12 Aug 2009
Amber Baxter's festival blog
For a bit of a laugh, I put on my boots this weekend and promptly stomped the streets of Edinburgh - filling them with comedy. On Friday night I took in an early evening performance at the Underbelly by Australian, award-winning comic Sammy J. He’s a…
Eye to the future at the end of the line for Edinburgh Festival 2008
27 Aug 2008Alan Bissett's festival blog
Ah, the end of the Fringe. Goodbye rain. Goodbye bright-eyed young hopefuls thrusting flyers. Goodbye posh accents. How was it for you? Depending on who you talk to, plays this year have been too bleak/political/teenage. Given the gloomy political…
Telling stories while we can at The Edinburgh Book Festival
26 Aug 2008Alan Bissett's festival blog
Today's theme is stories! The ones we tell about ourselves, our past, our bodies. What prompted this was The Fooligan at the Pleasance, a one-man show from the Arches' artist in residence, Al Seed. Al waddles onto the stage, an obese, grotesque medieval…
Fringe hangover: Where have you been?
26 Aug 2008Adam Fraser's festival blog
That’s it. The Fringe is over. At this point, the hard-working critic, performer, theatre-goer or box office drone might wish to find a darkened room, take a moment to collect their thoughts and let the adrenalin settle, and unpick the events of the…
Medium of the masses joins debate at Edinburgh Book Festival
20 Aug 2008Alan Bissett's Festival Blog
17th August This morning I went to see Stella Duffy, Rodge Glass and Will Sutcliffe at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, promoting their new novels. Each reading was an assured affair, Duffy's in particular. Author discussion afterwards was…
London home away from home at Edinburgh Festival
20 Aug 2008Adam Fraser's festival blog
Having a gander round the Guardian's fine Edinburgh arts blog pages on their site, I noticed this one entitled 'Why Take London to Scotland?' from G2 commissioning editor Laura Barnett. Why, it ponders, are so many shows at the Fringe so obsessed with…
Speaking in tongues at the Edinburgh International Book Festival
18 Aug 2008Alan Bissett's festival blog
Thurs 14th Aug This morning I was on at the Edinburgh International Book Festival with Des Dillon and Anne Donovan, two of Scotland’s ace-est writers and who, like me, have a name mainly for writing in Scots urban dialect. We met in the Author’s Yurt…
Once and for all, it's just a matter of opinion
18 Aug 2008Steve Cramer's festival blog
I don’t know, perhaps it’s me. There’s always one show of every festival where a critic appears to be out of kilter with his peers. For me, this festival the show would appear to be Once and For All We’re Gonna Tell You Who We Are, So Shut Up and Listen…
The horror, the horror… of the Edinburgh International Book Festival
15 Aug 2008Alan Bissett's festival blog
Ah the Edinburgh International Book Festival! My home from home! My August social life! The Author's Yurt! The free tea/coffee/wine/beer/finger food! The celebs! The horror. The horror. Man, I love the Book Festival. As its director, Catherine…
The naked truth about the Edinburgh Festival
13 Aug 2008Jonny Ensall's festival blog
Last week I went to review a show called Strippers & Gentlemen at C Venue on Chambers Street. In it, girls in corsets and black pants reinterpreted the gyrating dance moves of real strippers while members of the audience, free to move about the…
