And Then There's The Matter Of Us....

You know, when I set myself up the other day for a fall I really thought that would be the end of it. I had raked a stranger over the coals for their lousy English, had my correction corrected and I moved on. But it's always when life seems to be functioning at it's basest, simplest level that the most complicated things can suddenly happen.

I responded to Dan's e-mail with the following, which I thought would be the last word on the subject:

Now that's interesting -- I had no idea the U.K. spelling was different from the U.S. spelling!

My apologies, as a huge percentage of Craig's List ads are riddled with misspellings, but I have to admit it was worth my error to learn something new today.

Good luck on your search and have a great evening!

Sincerely.

Scooter McCrae

What humility, eh folks? Seriously, it's at times like typing up an e-mail like that I think I should be elected Messiah of some fourth-world nation and worshipped from afar. But I meant every word of it and accepted my mistake like a man (if you'll excuse the sexism of that phrase for a moment).

The next day I found another e-mail from Dan Carbone sitting in my queue. Surprised to be hearing anything more from him, I opened it up and this is what I found:

you are truly amazing indidual. I was, in fact, covering my own error with a sly remark. You are in fact correct, and I do not believe the UK spells it any different. Although, they should, it adds a bit of character id say.

Ordinarily I would have proudly walked away with my head high, but due to your truly genuine and kind response, I felt the need to admit defeat.

Well played.

Daniel

"Well played", I guess, though I'm not quite sure that was my intention. Generally speaking, I am a nice guy (too nice to point out the fact that he left the "vi" out of "indidual" until now, of course) but that doesn't mean I don't like being a smartass every now and again. Of course, if I was really as smart as I sometimes give myself credit for, I would have looked up the British spelling on my own to confirm this instead of accepting what he said at face value in the first place. Which should also give you some idea of what a trusting little knot-head I can be as well.

Nonetheless, as someone who goes out of his way to publically admit when I've been wrong about something, I find that quality refreshing in other people because I find so few people who can do this simple little thing. So I took an immediate liking to Dan and sent a reply:

Well shit.... you do learn something new everyday!

I have to say, as someone who prefers "colour" to "color", there is definitely something to be said for tossing in the occasional "u" where you least expect it, so in fact I was happy to hear that it was spelled "volounteers"! I'm glad you wrote back and told me otherwise before I started using it in any correspondence!

Please don't take offense to my next comment, but I've always had a love-hate relationship with the NYUFF (more hate than love, I'll be the first to admit), but I have to say you're one of the politest folks I've dealt with over there since the early days of the festival when Todd was in charge.

Thanks for getting back to me again and continued good luck in finding folks to help out.

Sincerely,

Scooter McCrae

See what a pussycat I can be? Meeeee-ooow! Don't let nobody tell you otherwise.

And of course, I only thought it fair to finally make some mention of the fact that I've had previous dealings with the NYUFF. Why? Because, just in case you didn't take my advice in the previous post and check out my open letter to the NYUFF from a few years back (I'll save you the trip and repost it here in a moment so you can see where I'm usually coming from with these folks), I said a few harsh things about the festival and the people running it. I have to admit, though, that I was probably thinking of Village Voice film critic Ed Halter when I wrote that letter (is that hack still even writing for them?) and not this guy Daniel, who seems too nice to be a part of their group.

Now about that letter.

You know what, for the sake of drama, I'm gonna hold off on showing you that letter for a moment; I've got another e-mail or two I'm gonna clue you in on first. Because once you see this letter, I think you'll get a better idea of what probably went through poor Daniel's mind once I kind of reminded him about it.

(No fair going to sixteentongues.com now to check it out. You had your chance the other day and now I'm running things over here for the next couple of minutes. Next time, you'll just have to take my advice the first time. Say what you will; I'm sure I've been called worse things.)

Dan responded thusly to my riposte:

haha.

love hate is really the only way you can watch "underground" cinema. I take no offense whatsoever. If everyone was into it, it wouldnt be "underground". A term that is too often synonymous with poorly-made and talentless.

I urge you, though, to learn to sift through the garbage. There are people out there making really fantastic stuff that doenst quite fit in anywhere else. That is when I feel festivals like this are important.

Also, I have only been involved for the past three years, so I cannot speak for the Todd days. But yes it can be a mixed bag of personalities.

Godspeed.
Dan

Dan is such a nice guy he accepted my love-hate comment without even thinking I'm some prick who wrote them a terrible letter eviscerating them back in 2004 (jeez, was it really that long ago?).

So I decided it's time to go all the way now, for Daniel's sake, and out myself. I'm thinking maybe we can put all the nasty stuff I said into the past and move on. After all, we're having a good time yakking it up back-and-forth and I've always tried to put a human face on even my worst enemy; what have we got to lose? I'm not holding a grudge against the star-bellied Sneetches. So I reply with:

Funny! Yeah, trust me -- I've done my share of underground time. Fucking WAVELENGTH nearly killed me, but I like Brackhage and Belson, and I can assure you that half the Jess Franco films I love would challenge the patience of even the most dedicated underground film fan.

I was just giving you a hard time because my last feature (SIXTEEN TONGUES) was rejected by the festival a few years back, while my first feature (SHATTER DEAD) was screened back when Todd was running things. And while I make no claims to making particularly great movies, I can definitely say that they don't fit quite anywhere comfortably.

You're obviously in love with these movies and that's the best thing I could say about anybody who tills this rare cinematic earth. Good luck with the festival this year and looking forward to seeing what's on the schedule!

Scooter McCrae

Okay, I guess it's now about time you see the letter I sent to them in the mail, via e-mail, and then published onto the SIXTEEN TONGUES website for the whole world (all 7 of you) to see. Put the kids to bed and strap on your welding visors. I meant every word of it and there's no turning back now. Uhm.... enjoy:

An open letter to The New York Underground Film Festival from director Scooter McCrae:

Well the schedule has been posted and congratulations are in order to this year's 11th Annual New York Underground Film Festival (hereafter referred to as NYUFF). Congratulations, you scumbags, for demonstrating your absolute irrelevancy to New York and the Underground filmmaking scene. You've demonstrated above and beyond the necessary limits that you have completely sold out to both corporate interests and your own greed at being recognized as a supplier of goods to the television industry. And please don't let the tightening of the sphincter catch on the tip of your nose as the warm turd slides down your open throat. No, really; you've earned it.

First of all, how dare you adopt Andy Milligan as your patron saint for this year's fellated fiasco. He was an idiosyncratic filmmaker who made use of genre trappings to create films that were meaningful to him. No one would ever mistake a Milligan film for a great film (or anything BUT a Milligan flick!), but the man left his fingerprints on a unique body of work, and in the new Millennium leaving any personal stain on the celluloid output that clogs the corporate owned and approved cinemas of today is a cause for celebration. Unfortunately, his works appear to be the only genre offerings in the entire NYUFF schedule (sorry, THE MANSON FAMILY doesn't count as it's technically a bio-pic, however twisted it might be). Yes, it must be difficult to choose any genre works that have not yet acquired a cult following or become established classics of their kind. To actually make a choice, to put your neck out on the line and decide that here-and-now, we have a work of science fiction or horror that is worth looking at which is separate from the slick Hollywood trappings of most modern day selections trying to pass as genre offerings would take some backbone and taste. And pardon my ego for saying so, but despite whatever flaws SIXTEEN TONGUES might have (in abundance, perhaps), it is a unique, passionately un-Hollywood and UNDERGROUND flick that deserves to be shown at any festival that purports to support that community of film or video practitioners.

Most of this year's selections look like they are ready to be popped out of the NYUFF playback deck, handed over directly to a PBS or HBO executive (once the finder's fee is paid to you, of course) and be screened as part of any number of documentary series on either network. Good luck to you folks; you're obviously working very hard to earn your commissions. Maybe you should consider rechristening yourselves the New York Underground Documentary Film Festival. See how nice I can be? I even left the (apparently meaningless to you) word 'underground' in your official name. That way you can still cash-in on pretending to be 'edgy' and 'cool' -- you know, the stuff the evil mainstream would never touch! The documentary on Al Goldstein looks like an especially notorious work that no other festival would EVER have the courage to screen. You should be really proud of yourselves to have programmed such daring and subversive material. Maybe next year you'll have documentaries on sex industry workers or issues of masculinity and femininity in the armed forces (Ooops! Too late! Looks like A FEW GOOD DYKES takes care of that this year after all); you know, the kind of stuff that network television never covers to death on any number of primetime news programs.

The only stab at so-called 'underground' filmmaking seems to be supplied by the experimental short films, most of which sound much more interesting than many of the feature-length main-event programming. One can only assume that the people making decisions concerning non-narrative and experimental entries weren't indoctrinated by New York University's commercial film program or write film reviews at The Village Voice. And it took a lot longer for both of those institutions to become meaningless shadows of the glory that they once were than the sheckel-sucking, glory-hungry puppeteers tugging the veiny skeins of the NYUFF.

My initial disappointment at being rejected by the selection committee was ameliorated by finally seeing the list of films that did make the cut. What at first glance appeared not to contain a single dud in the bunch (yes, there are some good looking selections this year) also quickly revealed, frankly, not a whole lot of what I'd call truly 'underground' films in the group either. Has the definition changed so radically in the last few years, or is it simply that the jangling sound of money ringing in the NYUFF's ears has altered the tune to which they dance? I'm proud that my first feature, SHATTER DEAD, was screened at one of the earliest Annual NYUFF way-back-when. I thought it was an odd choice, frankly, but then again I thought damn near everything on the schedule was an odd choice as I hadn't heard of nearly anything or anyone else in the festival. It slowly sank in that this was an 'underground' event, and that this was part of what being part of that centerless, leaderless out-of-control community was all about; of course none of us had heard of each other. We're UNDERGROUND, dammit!

Will I be accused of sour grapes here for picking on a festival we weren't accepted by? Certainly. In fact, I'll be the first to accuse myself of that charge, because I AM steamed that we didn't make it into a local film festival that had accepted my work in the past. But I guess I'm more out of touch with the scene and the shit weasels that have commodified it than I imagined. Apparently I thought there would be a support group for people like me, who work in New York with very low-budgets to create projects that are a million miles away from what Hollywood produces on a clockwork basis. Slick production values? Who needs 'em! Actors you've heard of? Please, we've got a story to tell, here! Concepts that are larger than a single-sentence T.V. Guide blurb? Hell yeah! We sure do fucking hope so! From now on, we'll be screaming it from the rooftops to anyone who'll listen (and even those of them that don't); Proudly Rejected by The New York Underground Film Festival! It's a new badge of honor for us, and one that we'll wear with ferocious dignity.

And if anyone reading this did happen to get their project into this year's NYUFF; congratulations, and best of luck to you. It is an honor to have been selected (as I know from past experience), and it's a real jolt to be screened in this town to an enthusiastic audience. There is no disrespect intended to any of the deserving selections, but a hell of a lot of you look to me more like you haven't gotten a distributor yet, as opposed to being 'underground' (as NYUFF claims itself to be). This is simply a call-to-arms to the idiots who are running the festival who should be taken to task for misleading advertising; wake up, assholes! This isn't an underground festival, it's a Sundance wannabe' with a bad-boy attitude and a snooty disposition selling false goods to an unsuspecting public. So fuck you, too, NYUFF. I'm sure Tylenol and Pabst Blue Ribbon are happy to have you raising their 'underground' credibility as official sponsors; might I recommend you take full advantage of the narcotizing effects of both, overdose and drop dead?

-Scooter McCrae

My guess is after seeing my last e-mail, poor Daniel must've had his memory jogged about that 2004 letter.

And I haven't gotten another e-mail from him since.

Oh well. He seems like a nice guy and I meant what I said to him. Better luck to you this year, NYUFF!

(By the way, that's a photo of one of my lovley kitties, Oedipussy (or sometimes just Ms. Kitty). I'm told this is the kind of thing people normally put in their blogs, so I'm just trying to follow the rules for once.)