Right, I wondered whether to do this like last year and just do the films with normal reviews or go with the sort of thing I did in Venice or use my round-up style and given the circumstances I'll do a combination of the latter two I think. I went up to Leeds planning on seeing three films, La Tigra, Chaco on the Saturday (http://www.leedsfilm.com/films.aspx?id=244) then Ander (http://www.leedsfilm.com/films.aspx?id=118) and Slovenian Girl (http://www.leedsfilm.com/films.aspx?id=447) on the Sunday. I was toying with the idea of Wolfy (http://www.leedsfilm.com/films.aspx?id=660) but three films back to back was pushing it plus I was staying with friends from University I don't see too often and wanted to be around in case we were doing anything at lunchtime so I just went with the two later in the day.
So Sutton Coldfield to Leeds, depending on traffic/how fast you drive takes anywhere between 90 minutes-2 hours, but despite La Tigra, Chaco starting at 4.30pm and my leaving at 1.15pm fate had no intention of allowing me to see the film. Everything was going normally until I got on the M1 at junction 28 as it was closed from 29-30. It took 55 minutes to crawl from 28 to 29, 50 minutes to go the 6 miles into Chesterfield down a dual carraigeway and then another 70 minutes with the whole of the M1's northbound traffic going through villages down a single carriageway to get back to the motorway. The two junctions on the motorway had taken 3 hours to navigate and my film had long since started with me still 45 miles away. I eventually got there (following being further detained in and around Elland Road due to the England/Australia rugby league match) at 5.55pm and settled for the plans we already had for the night.
Which meant when I got to the cinema on the Sunday it didn't really feel like I was doing the festival at all, as in the past I've always done it on multiple days and this felt more like a normal going up to Leeds to see friends, with some films on top of that. The first was Ander and boy did they mis-sell this. I'm sorry but deliberately making no reference to the film's homosexual content (this is the first time I've ever heard the word "healing" be a synonym for having sex in the toilets 
) in the marketing and calling it "surprising" when in the opening minute of the titles a gay and lesbian organisation is credited is just cynical from the organisers. It's a good job I've never had a problem with that kind of material but at least be honest enough to let people make an informed decision on what they're watching.
When "gay cinema" is at its best, the gay aspect is almost irrelevant, Wong Kar Wai's Happy Together is just a damn good film, it isn't reliant on the gay aspect to give the film an inherent interest and it would be just as powerful were it a heterosexual story. Brokeback Mountain is another example, being a tale of a love unacceptable to society which has been done in different ways in films like Far From Heaven. This though really exploits the subject matter as it is not a very interesting film in and of itself. Sparsely paced, but without a single performance to really excite or grab hold of the film, the acting ranges from pretty good (Mamen Rivera's estranged whore) to completely wooden (Christian Esquivel as the farm-hand who tempts the eponymous character) and fails to elevate the material or inject it with any vitality. As such it chugs along at its pedestrian pace, unfolds, but doesn't engage at all in the unfolding. The festival sold the film by saying "Wonderfully understated acting makes this a must-see for all admirers of subtlety. Prepare to be impressed!" I am an admirer of subtlety, but I certainly wasn't too impressed. It's okay but without the intrigue of the gay content there wouldn't be much to write home about at all.
Slovenka (Slovenian Girl), which for some reason the festival organisers felt comfortable in saying was about someone whoring herself around (wonder why that is, young female prostitutes sell but gay farm hands don't? x_x), had a lot of potential as usually films about the sex industry at least give an opportunity for a cracking central performance and have the potential to be staggeringly moving (think Lilya 4-ever). In those terms, the lead actress Nina Ivanisin does give a good turn at the heart of the film, but overall it's much closer to something like Irina Palm in terms of overall quality as the dramatic potential is distilled and unfocused.
It starts off rather promisingly as we see our girl witness the death of a client having a heart attack following a viagra overdose (this sounds like it could almost be a comedy, 
it's not 
) and have to juggle her family, studying and living situation with the way she funds her lifestyle and being wanted for questioning by the police. About half an hour in it begins to lose focus, bringing in pimps who try to force her to work for them, which coupled with owing money to an ex-boyfriend, the bank, the police being after her, etc. just tries to pack too much in. Another example of this is that it is set during the 6 months that Slovenia had the rotating EU Presidency, which the victim at the beginning was a delegate of, but thereafter it's solely in the film to have sirens go off when a train of diplomats drive past every 10 minutes or so. It's quite literally pretentious as it adds nothing dramatically to the film and is only there for the sake of it as they've deliberately chosen to put this story in the recent past to use this, but fail to address at all.
The problem with it all is that they bring so much in but fail to satisfactorily tie any of it together, by the end the police and pimp angles have both been completely dropped, as has the intrigue over her studies, and the drama over whether or not her family will find out is a mess. There's some lazy coincidence thrown in with the writing too, which is such a shame because it's well put together and honestly acted. Sadly this needed another draft or two to get down to the heart of the matter, as it stands it's a decent watch but there's so much wrong with it and most importantly it cannot engage on an emotional level due to the characterisation (the point is more the cost of what she's doing, but doesn't address what a cow she's been and just makes other characters more hateful to make her seem okay in comparison). So an opportunity wasted indeed, it could have been so much better with just any kind of craft to the storytelling at the screenplay-level.