Every time I've got a Climax, or an Everybody Knows, or a Vivarium -- in other words, a film I rank in a different year from everybody else because I've seen it at MIFF the year before it gets released to most of the world -- I kind of wish there were a way to avoid that, so I can be on the same page as all the other critics in assessing the year's best films.
Be careful what you wish for.
Sure, I could only see films at MIFF that I'm sure will come out before the calendar flips, though I don't know how I would know that, given that distribution deals sometimes come together late in the year.
Alternatively, they could just cancel MIFF.
Be careful what you wish for.
As the latest COVID-19 casualty, I've just received an email today that the Melbourne International Film Festival will not be happening this year for the first time in its 68-year history. I've only been a part of that history for the past six years, but it's a sad moment for me, even if it means all the 2020 films I rank this year will have actually been released in 2020.
Maybe the saddest thing about it is not that the festival will not be happening, but that they can already forecast ahead to the end of July and say that this thing will not be resolved by then.
Of course, with an event with as many moving parts as a film festival, you can't take a wait and see approach and give everyone the thumbs up to continue if things look good a few weeks before kickoff time. People have to buy plane tickets. DCPs have to be finished. Heck, films themselves have to be finished. And you have to potentially squander hours and hours of festival staff working time on something that may not actually happen.
So while it makes sense, it's just a sad reminder that we are not about to get over some hump and be almost out of the woods. Not by a longshot.
As it has been doing in most aspects related to this, the Australian government is getting out ahead of the situation. Even though the cases are fewer and the community spread is pretty minimal here, we started extreme distancing measures only a few days behind the U.S. And have already said that the entirety of term 2 of the school year -- which runs from next Tuesday to the end of June -- will be conducted remotely.
And though we have things in control far better here than other parts of the world, we're just heading into winter. In fact, I'm wearing a scarf as I write this, even though the proper start of winter is almost two months off. We could have the whole thing in good shape and then winter could wallop us with a new round of infections.
The MIFF cancellation is another thing that reminds us all how real it is. It's disappointing for the filmmakers. It's disappointing for the festival programmers. It's disappointing for the cinephiles.
But really, it's disappointing for the human race, who will have to be dealing with this whole thing a lot longer than we already have been.
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