At Telluride Airport looking out over the private jets and the (actual) Coors Mountain in the background. Funny that at the very last minute I did a bit of proper networking! The legendary film author and critic, David Thomson presented a film from 1948 called PORTRAIT OF JENNIE, which he billed as “This film is not Vertigo” and proceeded very wittily and learnedly to contextualise the film, which was produced by David O. Selznick as an over expensive vehicle for his mistress, Jennifer Jones and perhaps sowed the seeds for Hitchcock’s masterpiece. The two men ended up despising each other and Thomson took us through the convolutions of their rivalry. (Hitch won) Curate’s Egg doesn’t quite cover it. Is the film pure kitsch or a surreal journey? Bunuel loved it, so I’ll go for the latter. My moment came at the end, when I introduced myself to David Thomson, my hunch being that he’d be well disposed to John Banville, as John wrote a glowing review of Thomson’s last book, The Big Screen. I tell him about THE SEA and that it’s screening at Mill Valley Festival next month, which is near San Francisco where he lives. “I can’t wait to see it!”. I believed him. And the last of the last? IRISH FOLK FURNITURE by Tony Donoghue, with whom I got chatting at the Labour Day Picnic. Ten minutes of deliciousness!
Notes on THE SEA 