Over the past ten days or so, in between your spring break beach visits and mixed drinks, you probably checked your Twitter and/or Facebook feeds. You were probably confused as to why some of your favorite actors, musicians, and artists had an inordinate amount of updates about Texas, barbeque, and the acronym “SXSW.”
The South by Southwest Festival takes place every March in Austin, Texas, consisting of three distinct parts–film, music, and interactive (technology). For those in the know but not attending, I assume the constant updates on the festival were more an annoyance than interesting and worthwhile tidbits of information. The recurring notion present in the countless recaps, diaries, and reviews you will find on the Internet is that SXSW is an overwhelming, surreal experience–ten days where normal everyday life is set aside while you shuttle from one experience to the next, discovering great and not-so-great work by great and not-so-great artists (and eating lots of meat). I attended SXSW for the first time this year, and I can tell you that this is mostly true. And it’s not so true.
Part of Texas lore is that Austin is a patch of blue in a sea of red, distinct from the culture of the rest of the state. Granted, there were what I assumed to be an inordinate number of hipsters and unkempt-looking people playing old instruments on the streets, but the city is still identifiably Texan. There’s an abundance of churches, beautiful green areas around the Capitol building, quaint stores selling things like cowboy boots and electric guitars, and an opportunity to purchase tacos or some form of barbeque on every block. Almost every restaurant has University of Texas Longhorns memorabilia exhibited on its walls–common for a college town, but only in Texas will the waitresses at those restaurants serve you in bikini tops, jean shorts, and cowboy boots.
I was signed up for just the film section of the proceedings. The way it works is that various theaters throughout Austin host up to five screenings a day, exhibiting feature-length and short narratives and documentaries. Unfortunately, you have to wait in line for each one to assure your spot in the theater, and the wait is sometimes longer than the movie itself. My process was to simply pick the ones that looked the most interesting, had names I recognized or were most convenient to get to. Sometimes through word of mouth and previews you can assure you see the best material, but other times you inadvertently stumble across brilliance. Mostly, it’s a coin flip as to whether you see something great or awful, and your SXSW experience can vary wildly because of it. Here’s some of the great ones I made it to:
- Short Term 12: The Jury and Audience Award winner, directed by newcomer Destin Cretton and starring two actors that you’ve seen before but can’t remember where: Brie Larson (of 21 Jump Street) and John Gallagher, Jr (of HBO’s The Newsroom). Short Term 12, about a youth group home and the people who run it, was far and away the best and most heartfelt movie I saw. It’s guaranteed to make more noise as it makes its rounds on the festival circuit.
- Don Jon’s Addiction: Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s directing/writing debut about a Jersey meathead/sex addict looking for love. It’s more clever and funny than you would expect, and the audience absolutely ate it up (most likely because JGL himself was in the building).
- Black Metal: A short narrative and soon-to-be feature about a Slayer-type musician whose songs inspire a gruesome murder. An unexpectedly humanizing take on the genre, and gorgeous to look at, too.
- Medora: Documentary chronicling a season of Medora, Indiana’s legendarily awful basketball team, but also a meditation on overcoming obstacles, poverty, and the challenges that small-town America faces. The best documentary that I got to see at SXSW.
- Burning Love: Yahoo web series and Bachelor spoof helmed by and starring Ken Marino and co-starring tons of famous comedians, like Michael Ian Black, Adam Scott, Kristen Bell, and Nick Kroll. Burning Love was more lightweight than most of SXSW, but damned if it wasn’t absolutely hilarious, especially if you’ve seen a few episodes of The Bachelor or The Bachelorette (uhh, not that I have).
An aspect unique to SXSW was that immediately following the screenings, the people you saw on screen would come to life as the directors, actors, and producers took the stage for an audience Q&A. It’s an odd sort of thrill, especially when you recognize them from their other (more famous) work. Some of the more notable people I saw included Dave Grohl, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Shaquille O’Neal, Freda Kelley (the Beatles’ secretary), Martin Starr, Catherine Keener, and hermaphrodite porn star Buck Angel.
The experience itself of seeing around five movies a day wasn’t as hectic as I anticipated; if you like movies, it’s only a chore to sit through the bad ones, like the James Franco-starring Maladies. I’m guessing that most of the fatigue that runs through many SXSW recaps comes from the music side of things. The day the interactive portion ended and music started up, the streets of Austin went from kind of busy to Bourbon Street-like. It seemed like every bar turned into a venue, and weaving through the sea of drunken pedestrians, it was possible to hear at least four different performances simultaneously. I’m a little regretful that I was in the area and didn’t get to see some of my favorite artists perform like Kendrick Lamar, Justin Timberlake, Vampire Weekend, Earl Sweatshirt, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and especially Prince as the festival closer, but I can’t even imagine what five days of non-stop concerts would be like–I was overwhelmed just being in the vicinity of the happenings.
So maybe my SXSW experience wasn’t the norm. I sat in a bunch of theaters for five days and watched a lot of good movies, some average and some bad. It wasn’t overwhelming or surreal, and I didn’t have too many celebrity encounters, unless you count watching ’90s west coast rapper Kurupt eating a plate of chicken fingers. I didn’t go to any corporate sponsored parties or meet any quirky locals. I kind of wish I had, but I had a pleasant enough time simply enjoying the movies. This particular SXSW recap probably isn’t as exciting as most others, but it might be more accurate. However, there is one thing that every SXSW diary nails: the food. Goddamn, was that food delicious.
