The line-up of this years EIFF has been announced.  Like many years before it the line-up of films are bound to cerment, yet again, the festivals reputation for some of the most spellbinding films of 2010.  We are honoured to be covering this years film festival and will be bringing you more previews and updates leading up to the festival as well as features interviews and reviews during the festival.

The festival statement said:

The Festival will showcase one hundred and thirty three features from thirty four countries, including nine European premieres and sixty-three UK premieres in addition to the World and International premieres. Highlights include: Ryan Piers Williams’ THE DRY LAND; Werner Herzog’s MY SON, MY SON, WHAT HAVE YE DONE?; Floria Sigismondi’s THE RUNAWAYS and Chris D’Arienzo’s BARRY MUNDAY in the Gala section; Rafi Pitts’ THE HUNTER, Koji Wakamatsu’s CATERPILLAR and Academy Award® winning THE SECRET IN THEIR EYES by Juan José Campanella in the Directors’ Showcase, with AND EVERYTHING IS GOING FINE by Steven Soderbergh in the Document section.

British Galas competing for the UK Film Council-sponsored Michael Powell Award for Best British Feature include seven World premieres: Paul Andrew Williams’ CHERRY TREE LANE; HUGE by Ben Miller; Edward McHenry & Rory McHenry’s JACKBOOTS ON WHITEHALL; Nick Moran’s THE KID; Viv Fongenie’s OLLIE KEPLER’S EXPANDING PURPLE WORLD; PELICAN BLOOD by Karl Golden and SOULBOY by Shimmy Marcus. British Galas also compete for the PPG Award for Best Performance in a British Feature Film, which also includes: Ashley Horner’s brilliantlove; MR NICE by Bernard Rose and Nick Whitfield’s SKELETONS.

World Premieres Include:

ACT OF DISHONOUR

CHASE THE SLUT

An indi film making the rounds at film festivals comes to the EIFF.  The film centers on a girl with a reputation.

CHERRY TREE LANE

THE CRAB

CRIMEFIGHTERS

DONKEYS

GIRL WITH BLACK BALLOONS

HONEYMOONER

HUGE

JACKBOOTS ON WHITEHALL

Jackboots on Whitehall is a satirical alternative history of WWII in which the Nazis have seized London and England must band together at Hadrian’s Wall if they are to prevent a German invasion. This comes on the heals of last years critically acclaimed remake Inglorious Bastards and is the first film of its kind to feature animatronic puppets.  The film also has a host of well known British actors including Ewan McGregor, Rosamund Pike, Richard E. Grant, Timothy Spall.  As well as Rocky Horror creator Richard O’Brien, Tony Award winner Richard Griffiths, and iconic TV actor Hugh Fraser, Captain Hasting in Poriot.

THE KID

THE LAST RITES OF RANSOM PRIDE

OLLIE KEPLER’S EXPANDING PURPLE WORLD

OUT OF THE ASHE

PELICAN BLOOD

Set in the obsessive world of bird spotters, this film follows Nikko, a young man living in London who throws himself into birdwatching as a means of getting over his break up with his girlfriend.  There is something so quintessentially British about this film and is one am sure if going to be a firm favourite at the festival.

POSTALES

ROAD TO LAS VEGAS

SOULBOY

A SPANKING IN PARADISE

SUPERHERO ME

THIRD STAR

VACATION!

The Edinburgh International Film Festival 16 – 27 June 2010
EIFF Box Office opens at 12 noon, Thursday 3 June

The Rural Alberta Advantage, or The RAA as they’re often known are a Canadian Indie-Rock band with a loyal following here in the UK. Their great vocal harmonies and simple songwriting are what makes their music so unique. After their awesome performance at The Great Escape, I had a chat with them in their lovely hire car.

The RAA are Paul Banwatt, Amy Cole and Nils Edenloff.

Mark – How long are you guys in the UK for?

Paul – We landed in London, played the Camden Crawl, played Manchester, and then we went over to France for 5 or 6 days. Then we were supposed to do a show in Spain but we got caught in the ash cloud. It kinda sucked as we were supposed to do a festival there, but we’re back for all the London stuff.

M – Must be quite big shows for you guys in London?

Paul – Oh yeah it’s great, everywhere we’ve been playing has been good…

Nils – …One of the many highlights was to play at the Royal Albert Hall. Like, not in the main room but in a side room, but we’re still there. We totally still snuck into the main room and watched them rehearsing the classical Brit Awards….

Amy – …It was unbelievable, we’re sitting in box seats drinking beers. The only different in it was everyone was wearing jeans and hoodies, but everything else was so classical and refined.

M – This is your first time in the UK, have you had a good reception?

P – I feel like the response has been pretty awesome….

A …Definitely! It’s always been beyond our expectations. This last year of our lives has been amazing, touring the United States and trying to build our record there. Every time we go to a new city we’ve been surprised to find a pocket of really fervent fans of ours who are really into the record. Here it was even more unexpected because our record was even really out until now, so to come and have what just happened is really exciting….

N – the music world has got a lot smaller, as it gets huge its gotten smaller. Everyone in the world knows your music. Last night a guy was telling us about all these people in Johannesburg who are into our record, and how they plug our music. That’s something that would never had happened 10 years ago…

M – Yeah, you can just share anything in an instant now…

A – It’s great?! (laughs) We’re one of the bands who is benefiting from this new world of music sharing. You could be on the flip side, and be Metallica getting angry when people download your music.

M – For some bands it’s pretty fundamental to their success.

P – Yeah I mean I don’t think we would be where we are. From the get go we’ve always been of the belief that the music just needs to get out to people. For the longest time we had an EP and at shows we would sell it as ‘pay what you can’, and we’d just give it to people, tell them to share it with their friends, come out to a show if you like it. It’s really important for bands to be receptive to their fans, and believe that if you create something good, it will spread. For a long time we had it out on our own, and we didn’t want to have the wrong person put it out. We had something we believed in.

M – Was this whole process of putting it out yourself to begin with important for you then?

A – I like how we’ve done it, this kind of grass-roots thing that grew organically. We were able to find something that fits with us, we don’t feel uncomfortable. It still feels like we’re doing it on our own terms, but we have great people supporting us.

M – Are you planning on coming back over here soon?

P – We hope to. Umm, I think there has been some talk of coming back in the fall, but right now there are so many things our manager is looking after… (laughs)

N – It’s the kinda thing where you can’t book second tour before your first tour has gone OK.

A – ’Yeah, about the fall, we hate you…’(laughs)

N – Now this has gone as well as it has, hopefully…

M – What’s the plan for the next 6 months? Touring? Are you still writing?

P – This summer, probably in July we’re going to start recording the new record. We’ve got a bunch of stuff that we’ve been touring, 6 or 7 songs that we’ve earmarked for the album. It’s just a matter of gaining the time for the 3 of us to flesh out the other songs. We’ve got the ideas but we need to actually break them down and make them work our songs work for us.

M – Do you get much time to practise on tour?

A – Only if we really need it, and we seek it out…

M – Is it like if you have a bad show you’ll have a practise?

A – We never rehearse for shows anymore because we’ve been playing these songs for several months now, but back when the new songs were really new songs we reheased them…

N – We have rehearsals if there is new material that we want to get into the set on the fly.

M – Do you find it gets monotonous playing live/touring?

A – I won’t lie, this year I have missed home increasingly (laughs), but at the same time, a show like tonight? That will never get old, I could play songs like that to an audience like that forever.

P – I think so much of playing shows is not just playing shows and going through the motions. There is so much of that interaction with the audience. If the audience wasn’t giving that energy back, yeah it would get boring. We try to give as much of ourselves as we can, and the audience respond to that. It keeps it exciting, it surprisingly hasn’t got boring.

After talk about driving in the US and Canada, we got onto the discussion of London driving….

N – Everything is so close here. In London, you don’t see a highway for like a hour! (laughs)

A – We’re like ‘so does London end at some point?’…

N – I’ve never appreciated our GPS until now. That things a genius for getting through these roads. (laughs)

As well as The Network the Media Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival also host Fast Track which is aimed at people who have already been working in TV. If you, or someone you know, has been working in TV for 2-4 years and have all the gumption, drive, and passion then you (or someone you know) can gain access to some of the biggest and most respected programme and policy makers in the business.

“Over the past 15 years, Fast Track has been fantastic at helping to identify and nurture those individuals who have the talent, abilities and drive to be the future of television. It might sound worthy, but it helps make the industry better.”
Andrew Zein, Managing Director of Tiger Aspect and Patron of Fast Track

Not only will the Fast Track participants get a full weekend delegates pass to the festival you will also get to pitch your idea and win a possible commission on it.  In terms of who the wider media ias and how difficult it can be to get noticed even let alone have your ideas picked up by a major network is, am sure, a dream come true for those who have just started their career’s within TV.

Fast Track is, much like it’s sister scheme The Network, one of the most innovative schemes within the industry and goes right back to the core of what these schemes are aimed at doing, giving young people the opportunities to get in TV.

Some of the previous Fast Trackers had this to say about the scheme:

“I was a Director/ Assistant Producer on Blue Peter when he came to Edinburgh in 1998 for TV25. A weekend’s exposure to the George Bar gave me a taste of working within the commissioning side of the industry. Within a few months I became a Development Planner for BBC One – running the channel’s Entertainment and Factual development slates. A year later I moved back to BBC Production- working for Lorraine Heggessey as Head of New Media and New Channels. In 2000, I was poached by Dawn Airey to the position of Controller Interactive Programmes at Channel Five. I was appointed Controller of Youth and Music the following year, then the Controller of Special Events and Pop Features and am now Creative Director at Amaze TV.”
Sham Sandhu, Creative Director, Amaze TV .

“I shared a flat with other people on the scheme and we lurched bleary eyed, but excited from the masterclasses to comedy nights and the major sessions with lots of time in between spent in earnest discussion putting the TV world to rights. I had worked in TV for a few years at that point, but only knew my own small corner of it. Fast Track was a whistlestop tour of the whole TV landscape and gave me an ambition to expand my horizons. And it was a lot of fun!”.

Katy Thorogood, Head of Features , North One.

Closing date for applications or nominations is 13th June 2010.  There are only 40 places available meaning you will get up close and personal with some of the biggest hitters in the industry, this opportunity is not one to be taken lightly and is, as the former Fast Trackers have testified, one that can change the course of your career within TV.

Over the next few weeks there is going to be a hugh host of news, previews, and interviews heading our way from this years Edinburgh International Film Festival and the party has truly started.  News today that Oscar winning actor, former Bond, and patron of the EIFF since it’s inception in the 1990s Sir Sean Connery will attend a special screening of The Man Who Would Be King on 20th June 2010, which we are told is one of Sir Sean’s favourite films.

This classic British film also stars Sir Michael Caine and Christopher Plummer and if you should look out for Lady Shakira Caine as Roxanne.  Iconic director John Huston (father of Oscar winner Anjelica Huston) was at the help of this truly beautiful adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s classic novella.

The film follows two rogue ex-non-commissioned officers of the British Raj who set off from 19th century British India in search of adventure and end up as kings of Kafiristan. Like much of his writing, Kipling’s original story takes a nuanced, and in the end cold-edged view of imperialism and in Huston’s telling, both East and West have their faults and virtues.

Sir Sean’s passion for his hometown and for the EIFF is as high as it was when it first started.  Last year during the main award ceremony he left a stinging attack on the BBC for not sending anyone to the EIFF even though they had sent close to 300 staffers to cover Glastonbury.  As the time Sir Sean told the audience:

“I would like to make a point. We have more than 300 BBC technicians that have gone to another festival [Glastonbury] and not a single one that has come here. I think we should all do something about it…”

The BBC in response had said that they have covered the EIFF online, news and local radio but that “Obviously, Glastonbury is a huge event and cannot be compared as like for like.”

Though Glastonbury is an important event for a broadcaster to sacrifice other festivals for one seems unfair, you only have to look at last years Michael Powell award winner to see why. Duncan Jones “Moon” won the top award at the ceremony winning the  Michael Powell award for Best New British Feature.  Since seeing ‘Moon’ one thing is clear Jones has lifted the bar for what a ‘British movie’ can and should be.  This film, being premiered in Edinburgh, went on to win the Bafta for Outstanding debut.

The EIFF clearly knows a great film when they see it and their line up of features from last year have all gone on to blow away and stun audiences worldwide. And this years gala screening, which is open to the public from the 3rd June, is just another way in which we get to see how much passion and dedication Sir Sean has for the EIFF.

Hannah McGill, Artistic Director of the EIFF said:

“This event is a fitting way to celebrate Sir Sean’s 80 years – almost twenty of which he has given to support of EIFF as Patron! He is a great friend of the Festival and we look forward to celebrating this amid the glitter of the Festival Theatre.”

This year’s line-up is going to be released on the 1st and The New Current is proud to be heading up to Edinburgh for the festival and will be bringing you more news, updates, and reviews during the festival. For more information on the EIFF you can go to their website HERE.