Flatpack Festival Assembles Creative Crowd

30th March 2011

Flatpack Festival Assembles Creative Crowd

 

Digbeth is the only area of Birmingham that would do justice to hosting Flatpack Festival. While it’s geographically only a stone’s throw from the insanely busy shopping Mecca of the city centre - which would leave Sarah Jessica Parker and co exhausted – Birmingham’s industrial birthplace is a million miles away in spirit. Its quiet, museum-like aura and streets of disused factories, warehouses and archways is randomly dotted with vegetarian restaurants, nightclubs, vintage clothing shops, the city’s oldest pub (which is haunted), creative hub The Custard Factory and a radio station.

It just makes sense for a film festival to happen somewhere so inspiring, and from Wednesday to Sunday last week (23 – 27 March), screen junkies from all over the UK (and some from even further afield) meandered Digbeth’s maze of red brick looking for galleries, pop-up cinemas and parties in temporarily converted warehouses with excitement akin to the thrill felt when searching for a secret rave.

But none of it was a secret. In fact it was Flatpack’s fourth and biggest outing, with scores of events, performances, presentations and parties happening daily as well as screenings of features, shorts, promos and documentaries. shots was there to check it out and just like everybody else, we had a brilliant time. Here were our highlights from the weekend.

shots’ Flatpack highlights (Friday to Sunday)

Los Angeles Plays Itself

Named after a ‘classic gay porn film’ (so be careful when Googling it) Thom Andersen’s essay on the depiction of the City of Angels in film is a fascinating tour of both the ‘real’ and the ‘fake’ Los Angeles. Hundreds of clips and a witty commentary made three hours fly by. 

Mind Bombs

This collection of morphing, psychedelic, animated music videos was an assault on the senses and hard to watch at times. However it kicked off with an entertaining short presentation by director David Wilson, who introduced and explained how he made one of last year’s best animated promos (Let Go by Japanese Popstars) in just three weeks, and why Sesame Street has had such a huge influence on his work.

Open Cinema

Cristoph Warrack deserves a knighthood, or at least a big pat on the back for his services to society and film. He was at the festival to talk about his Open Cinema organisation, which runs screenings and workshops to teach homeless people how to make films. Keep your eyes on shots.net for the full story about the wonderful initiative, coming soon.

Rubber

If you’re the kind of person who moans about a lack of original ideas in films you need to see this, and get ready to eat your words. Quentin Dupieux’s (AKA Mr Oizo) third feature is the story of a murderous tyre with psychokinetic powers that harvests as many laughs as it does disgusted groans. The soundtrack is handled by Oizo and Justice’s Gaspard Auge, and while the film loses some pace towards the end, there was enough to keep the sell-out crowd riveted, cackling and grimacing until the credits rolled.

Burningham (Fierce)

Part of sister festival Fierce rather than Flatpack, but the landmine-like fireworks, hog roast, cut and paste face masks and excellent live jazz/hip-hop band deserves a mention, doesn’t it?

In bed with Chris Needham

The first screening of the cult documentary in 20 years (excluding YouTube bootlegs) was followed by a Q&A with its star, who as a 17-year-old, provided a poignant snapshot of an adolescent’s hopes, fears and dreams of becoming a rock god in his BBC Video Diary. At times he was funny. At times he was insightful. At times he was talking complete shit.

Paper Party

There was some kind of paper theme but that was easily lost in the mayhem of the festival’s big bash at the worryingly named venue The Dirty End. Sculpture mesmerised the crowd with their audio-visual show (pictured above) combining tape loops with electronica and turntable zoetropes, before David Wilson (see Mind Bombs, above) and Sam Potter whipped the crowd into a frenzy with their VJ show, Beyond Gold. shots sipped super-smooth Auchentoshan whiskey and stared in disbelief at the impromptu limbo contest that erupted in the middle of the dance floor in the small hours.

every minute, always

When you’re told you need to bring a close acquaintance or an ‘adventurous stranger’ to the cinema, you know you’re in for something unique. We can’t spoil it by telling you too much but it’s an interactive experience between two people who follow instructions from different audio tracks via headphones while watching the film. If you do end up with a stranger for a partner (like we did) expect to get to know each other pretty quickly.

Check out some pictures (black and white by Lee Basford, remainder by Fabrice Millet) from Flatpack below and to find out more, visit the festival’s website here.

Image gallery

Related videos

The Japanese Popstars Feat. Green Velvet: Let Go

The Japanese Popstars Feat. Green Velvet: Let Go

Here's director David Wilson's mind-warp of a music video for The Japanese Popstars.

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