"moo moo mooo moo mooo, moo moo, moo moo&quot

We have noted that Hannah McGill (EIFF artistic director, left) looks significantly less well this year than she has done previously on her frequent appearances at the front of auditoria to welcome people and gush about the films and people concerned therewith. There must be a fair amount of draining late-night schmoozing in her job, a thought which led a moment's worry about exactly where the money from tickets goes during the festival - I'd hate to think that a portion of my ticket money is being spent on buying drinks for the after-screening parties. At least she has refrained from making clothing errors on the scale of those made by the unknown gentleman to whom she was speaking outside the Cineworld. Well done to the wearer for discovering something even worse than a white linen suit for indicating festival-avoidability.

Whilst last week's shortfilms were relatively good both sets today were a little bit duff... one of the programmes at least cites random weirdness as one of its tenets so I wasn't expecting too much well-made deeply-thought-out stuff but when the best of the bunch was one featuring a load of timelapsed bus stops it's perhaps time to tell the the programmer that they might perhaps consider lowering the ticket price a bit. Of the other set of shorts there was one about a couple with Down syndrome for the serious stuff and a short animation on which someone played the Blue Danube on a Cow Organ for stupidness. Reminded me to try and find the web-based version of Manic Miner again. Another which unfortunately stuck in the mind was a meh film about the chicken-keeping hobby of a child who is possibly the most irritating posho brat ever captured in a short film. Named Kirran Lochhead Strang ("There's only one other person in the whole world called Kirran, with two Rs. The other is a very minor celebrity. I'm not sure what they do but they're very minor.") he should, if you ever encounter him, be thoroughly ignored. If you absolutely have to speak to him then tell him to lose the mullet, learn the principle by which an oar or paddle is able to propel a boat and shut up. Then ignore him.

First proper full-length film of the day was El Niño Pez (preceded by a little animated short whose name I didn't catch but which I shall attempt to remember to fill in when next on proper computer with proper web access - slightly creepy-looking models which work well with the slight creepiness stop-motion can exude), the story of a kid (Inés Efron from XXY) and her relationship with her maid. Slightly ropey story and a couple of sore-thumb unnecessary digital effects but well-lit and well-shot. I would rush to recommend watching it but if it swings past a local cinema there are worse things you could do than watch it. Cheaper on DVD, though.

Second proper full-length film was another Standard Life Audience Award-eligible Cineworld screening: Fragments does much as it promises and shows the brief moment of interconnectedness of a few lives . Better than Traffic but not as good as Identity. A couple of weird accents in it... not sure what Guy Pearce or Kate Beckinsale were doing but they've both done more convincing US accents in the past. There are definitely better roles for Dakota Fanning elsewhere, too. It's unfortunate that her character was unlikeable in a spouting-junior-God-stuff sort of way but it all lacked a little subtlety. There's a little reveal at the end but the build-up is uneven. Only two stars on the award rating system for this one, at last a change from the previous three fours. If there's nothing else in the DVD shop one evening in the future it's not actually bad but isn't as stand-out ace as many other things seen this week.