This weekend, I joined my friends right down the road from my apartment, for the Louisiana International Film Festival.
It was the second annual, and honestly, I didn’t give it a second thought until I was at my weekly poetry open mic night, when someone there was giving away free tickets. Why not check it out? I thought.
So I grabbed a few tickets, found out some of my friends got tickets as well, and we planned a Saturday night out.
When we arrived at the theatre, I was pleasantly surprised to see a red carpet, searchlights, lots of press, and lots of people—cool!
We decided to see Cannibal, and I use the term “we” loosely, because it was one person’s choice, and I’m not going to name names, but he is obviously a sick, sick man.
Cannibal is a Spanish film that revolves around the reclusive Carlos, who seems fairly normal except that, you guessed it, he kills and eats people—storing the perfect cuts of meat wrapped in his freezer, and eating it for dinner (with a glass of red, naturally).
After a fresh kill, a beautiful woman shows up at his door looking for her sister (little does she know, he had her for dinner). While he wants to perform his usual ritual, there’s something different about her…
I won’t spoil it for you. Surprisingly, I thought it was okay—there were some creative scenes that I appreciated.
After the movie, we braved a Louisiana monsoon to get to the after party down the street, where it was a complete celebration of our state: food, beer, art, and music.
It was a perfect snippet of the entire reason the film festival was there; to show locals that we can benefit from being second to Hollywood in filmmaking.
Aside from the film festival, it was a night revolved around meeting new people—something I’m really trying to do more of lately. And it turned out to be really fun, even after a particularly rough day.
It’s weird how, when one (or two or three) people let you down, you can turn the corner and find a whole other group that’s willing you pick you right back up, without question.
The Bitter Lemon 