The Pundit

Warning! Too Many Movies Will Rot Your Braiiiiiiiins!!!

By Mel Campbell ⋅ August 7, 2006 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

It’s a shame George Romero isn’t in town for the Festival, because Melbourne has become a city of zombies.

In a way, it’s heartening that Melburnians throw themselves into cinema spectatorship with such gusto. No casual ‘How about a fillum tonight, dear?’ for us. Oh no. We have MIFF schedules, and we plot them with the steely resolve of battle-hardened army generals.

But some people take it too far. When the only topic of conversation is what films we’re seeing, when birthdays are forgotten and dinner parties skipped, when rent cannot be paid, when favourite city haunts become crammed with film buffs’that’s when the horror begins.

The first sign of impending zombification is the Festival Guide. It appeared mysteriously some weeks ago, and now dog-eared copies litter cafes across town and can be spotted peeping from people’s bags. MIFF zombies in the early stages of infection can be found leafing painstakingly through it, looking confused. In restaurants, they shovel food absently and ignore dining companions as they ponder What to See.

And once the spectatorship escalates, so does the zombification. The second stage of infection is the Mass Email of Doom’an obnoxious form of correspondence that is sent to all the sufferer’s friends, peppered with self-deprecating jokes about square eyes, caves and the need for coffee. But the basic message is always the same: ‘Hi everyone! Here’s my MIFF schedule. If you want to see me in the next two weeks, you’ll have to come to one of these films.’ One of my more sadly afflicted friends even proposed a ‘palate cleansing’ expedition to IMAX between MIFF sessions.

The Mass Email is terrifying proof that MIFF zombies have lost all interest in any social plans that don’t involve seeing films. Indeed, just as regular zombies feed on the brains and flesh of the living, MIFF zombies assume that everyone else in Melbourne is there to feed their obsession. Friends. Family. Bar staff. The hapless MIFF workers who book and take their tickets. They are so zombified that they aren’t even troubled that the DJ at the Coopers Festival Lounge has the absurd name of DJ Le Coq Funkee.

It’s in this final stage of infection that our loved ones grow hollow and bleary-eyed, shambling from queue to queue, stripped of all social skills beyond primitive mutterings about genre, auteurism, mise en sc‚àöÔø?ne, woeful miscasting and ‘was that just Spike Jonze I think it was do you think he’s scouting locations for Where the Wild Things Are?’

While it’s impossible to stop this depressing escalation of zombie behaviour once it takes hold, it is preventable. Here are my tips:

One Film a Day. Surely you will enjoy your cinematic experience more if you make it about the film rather than the Schedule. Rather than hurrying off to the next screening, take time to ponder what you’ve seen in a bar or over a meal. But for the sake of your fellow Melburnians, do it quietly.

Be More Spontaneous. Don’t agonise over what to watch, or let yourself be paralysed by choice. MIFF doesn’t have to be about research and meticulous planning. Why not check out a movie on impulse, or open this magazine to a random page and read what someone else thought?

Do Other Things Too. Why not catch a play or a band, see an art exhibition, hang out with friends, cook a meal, or read a good book in the crisp winter sunshine? Don’t neglect the people in your life for the sake of the people onscreen. And rather than watching the world mediated through celluloid, take time to appreciate your own world.

Melbourne is a lovely place. Please don’t turn it into Zombieville.