Day Five - "I am obsessed with music, yes. I like to hear every track that comes into the shop at least once. (Pause) Sounds mad..."

Featured review of the day: Page Eight.

Other films seen today:

Post Mortem (4 stars, won't disappoint fans of Tony Manero)

The Divide (3 stars, will play well to the FrightFest crowd and I'll be amazed if it doesn't show up there in August)

Sound It Out (4 stars, delightful documentary about the last independent record shop in Stockton and the collection of music obsessives that both run and frequent the shop)

On the Shore (2 stars, somnambulistic flic flick)

Jitters (4 stars and will make my Best of the Fest list. As this blog will attest, I am a sucker for a well made Scandinavian coming-of-age drama and this was an excellent example).

Also, a) interviewed Bob Ingersoll for Project Nim and b) attended the interview with imdb co-founder Col Needham.

Day Four - "You don't even got any class..."

Today's featured review: Perfect Sense. Personally, if it had been up to me to choose which press photos to make available, I would have gone with a still of Ewan McGregor and Eva Green eating soap in the bath. I'm just saying.

Other films seen today:

Trollhunter (4 stars, clever blend of Blair Witch Project and Cloverfield that has a lot of fun with existing mythology. Pretty sure there's a Fungus the Bogeyman reference in there too. Need to see this again).

The Caller (3 stars. Enjoyable, if ridiculous horror / thriller in which the lovely Rachel LeFevre is menaced by someone who's calling her from 1977 or so. Has a couple of very effective moments and on this evidence, LeFevre deserves to be a bigger star).

Bombay Beach (4 stars. Extraordinary blend of documentary and dance that is unlike anything I have ever seen before. Ostensibly a portrait of an impoverished California community in Salton Sea, Alma Har'el's film follows around several different characters and occasionally they perform stunning choreographed dance sequences to the music of Beirut. I am not someone who is normally moved by dance sequences as a rule, but this really got to me. I'm still processing it a day later. I might even end up giving it 5 stars. Director Alma Har'el is lovely too - it's a shame there wasn't a Q&A at the public screening I went to).

Jessica Brown Findlay update: Despite repeated and increasingly desperate entreaties, I have been unable to secure an interview with Jessica Brown Findlay. I have been offered Sebastian Koch instead, which is, I think we can all agree, NOT THE SAME, as these photos will attest.

Jessica Brown Findlay:


Sebastian Koch:

Day Three - "Is that your sex hat?"

Featured review of the day: Bobby Fischer Against The World.

Films seen today:

Angels Crest (3 stars, smalltown indie drama with strong performances, slightly ruined by unnecessary ending - review to follow).

Albatross (4 stars, very enjoyable British drama featuring yet another lovely performance from Felicity Jones and a star-in-the-making turn from newcomer Jessica Brown Findlay, who I have only just realised is the sexy political one in Downton Abbey - review to follow).

In the meantime, here is a picture of Jessica Brown Findlay:

*sigh*

Day Two - "Traditionally, it's the stationery cupboard..."

Featured review of the day: Tomboy.

Other films seen today:

Arrietty (aka Arrietty The Borrower aka The Borrower Arrietty aka The Borrowers - no-one seems to be able to agree on the title, but it's this film and it was every bit as lovely as you'd expect a Studio Ghibli version of Mary Norton's The Borrowers to be - 4 stars, review to follow).

Project Nim (4 stars, fascinating documentary, see Day Six's featured film).

Page Eight (3 stars, worth seeing for performances, see Day Five's featured film).

Perfect Sense (2 stars, the first real disappointment so far - see Day Four's featured film).

Day One - "Fischer-watchers refer to this period as 'The Wilderness Years'..."

Featured review of the day: Opening Night Gala - The Guard.

Other films seen today:

Bobby Fischer Against the World (4 stars; see Day Three's featured film).

Truth About Men (4 stars, like a Danish version of (500) Days of Summer - review to follow).

Our Day Will Come (3 stars, bizarre Ginger Apocalypse drama starring Vincent Cassel - review to follow).

Tomboy (4 stars, currently the front-runner for my favourite film of the festival - see Day Two's featured film).

This was also the day of the Opening Night Party. Officially the lowest-attended opening night party I have ever been to. The dancefloor was literally deserted all night long. They did have delicious hot pork buns though, so it wasn't all bad...

Quick list of films I've already seen

Normally, by the time the festival starts, I've already seen a large number of the films on offer. This year, that number is a rather pathetic five, so something somewhere has gone terribly, terribly wrong. Edinburgh's woes this year have been well-publicised elsewhere so I won't bother going into them here but here's a blog post I wrote for The Blog No-one Reads about the Edinburgh line-up and the films I was looking forward to the most (based on a cursory glance at the programme).

Anyway, the films I've seen so far are:

The Guard (4 stars, see Day One's featured film).

Jack Goes Boating (2 stars, felt too stagey and Hoffman's lead character didn't really work for me)

Ghosted (2 stars, might have given it 3 if I hadn't seen a better British prison movie that week - liked Craig Parkinson a lot, but it was let down by a painfully contrived ending)

Meet Monica Velour (3 stars, low-key but very enjoyable, a sort of Napoleon Dynamite meets...well, meets a trailer-trash version of Kim Cattrall)

Countdown to Zero (which I'm probably going to see again while I'm up here because 1) I saw it ages ago, 2) I can't remember anything about it and 3) It's out next week).

"Hmmm. When the bloody hell is he going to get around to starting this year's blog?"