South By SouthWest Diary Day Three - 3/13/2010

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Parent Category: Blogs

Category: Eric Lurio

Published on Tuesday, 16 March 2010 17:03

Written by Eric Lurio

Day Three

Another day, more movies. I saw three today and four yesterday. This was due mostly to luck, and I haven't actually seen the beginnings of a majority of them.

Take this morning, for example. The country's clock had changed from Standard to Daylight Saving Time, and while it was certainly mentioned in the papers, the hotel didn't bother to turn their clocks forward! Very nice. So, I was about half an hour late to a screening of Clay Liford's Earthling at the Alamo Drafthouse. The director was there, as were several volunteers telling me I was too late and the place was full anyway. But there was another film showing in the multi-screen venue at the same time, which had only been playing for 15 minutes, they said they had "a seat or two left."

I went in to that, or so I thought... But I made a wrong turn and did wind up seeing Earthling, or at least the last three-quarters of it. And by the way, despite what the volunteers had arrogantly sniffed at me, the room wasn't full. Assholes.

Then I had to run all the way to the Paramount Theatre, where I only missed two minutes pre-credits of Mike Woolf's Richard Garriot: Man on a Mission. I did see the IMAX masterpiece Hubble 3D from end to end, but I had to use my SXPpress ticket to bypass the huge line at the History Museum.

And that was good (for me at least) because the line was very long. Hubble 3D was the kind of thing IMAX was made for: Huge vistas filled up your mind, with some of the footage animated directly from data sent by Hubble after the mission to repair it. The IMAX people also had film shot during a couple of the previous missions, so the narrative was able to tell the entire history of the telescope from before the launch.

While seeing this as a documentary on television isn't a horrible idea, I wouldn't recommended because it won't blow your mind like it does viewing through the full effect of IMAX 3-D. Harry Knowles did the Q&A with director Toni Myers, which was all gushy, as one would expect from him. The hors d'oeuvres were decent afterward.

But as much as it was about movies, the day was also about food. For what I expect may be the only time for the festival, I got all my meals free at receptions along Sixth Street by people touting projects. Basically, they're for everyone who can get in. I walked in, ate and left. And had a good time.