22nd May 2007, 04:22am

Things change. And you never see it coming. People come and go.
I’ve no idea how to explain today.

As Si put it, it was a game of two halves.

So now I don’t have to explain it, because he’s done it for me.

It’s easy to forget things sometimes. Like the fact that things often turn out well.
Our logos turned up. So the van looks the way it deserves to look after the amount that it has done for us, what with running three computers, four speakers, an amp and a projector from it’s battery for the last five days.

This late afternoon we went to a party on a boat that was moored in Cannes, attempted to project on the pier and for the first time got moved on. So Andy moved the van and then we went back to the party. We screened a lot of films to a lot of people. We had our biggest crowd yet. Giving out free (warm continental) beer to anyone watching probably helped. At one point we accumilated a head count of thirty-odd people in the audience. Which was very satisfying. Then a middle aged French woman passed out whilst watching the films, vomited everywhere, an ambulance was called and then four policemen asked for my papers and searched me for trying to film it whilst laughing at the same time. I stand by it being quite funny.

After that the vibe and crowd kind of died down a bit. Which is fair enough.

So we took the coastal road out of Cannes and went to stand on the beach and contemplate things.

The sea is bloody odd. It’s huge. And alive. I am prone to forgetting that until I stand and look at it. It was past midnight by the point we reached it, and the sky out to sea was black. Utter darkness. Andy and Si stood and talked about all the things that this trip had brought to mind and I occasionally said something like “I agree” or some other thing equally as mundane. The ocean had my attention.

The sea swallows things. Like people. They vanish into it. Undercurrents and that.
The French Riveira allows for one to see the sea-bed through the water for as far as the eyes in question will allow. Even at night, it is possible to follow the sand trails out, though being night, they swiftly disperse into utter obscurity. The ocean really is endless. People underestimate it. Perhaps because we are not aquatic. Really though, seeing as people inhabit one third of the earth and the other two thirds are submerged, it would be silly to be surprised by the things that the sea is capable of throwing at you. And yet I still find it suprising whenever I look at it.

Cannes is filled with vast amounts of glitz, glam and now the van. The potential, art, money, film and style that the dudes and ladies in the streets and convoys project is all very impressive. But it doesn’t really come anywhere close to being on par with the truth in saying that none of it is any use to man or beast underwater. It is of use in one third of the planets ratio, and even then you have to be inclined to give a shit.
The other two thirds, they do things like stir the mind, house fish (who probably don’t like film that much anyway) and on occasion try to disapear passing swimmers.

I have been running through Okinawan drills for a couple of hours in some attempt to chill the mind and take a step back from it all. It has sort of worked.

There are a lot of good people out there who don’t deserve the things that happen to them. So hey, this is age old news but it still has relevence. These people spend a lot of time being resigned to life as it occurs, going unheard. Unheard is never good.

I’m happy that some of the films that we are putting out of the back of the van that is Cannes in a Van allow for people to take that step back from their day.
Even if it be for the duration of a short film.
They come, they sit, they watch. They listen to someones story and by all logic, the story came from somewhere.
Then they get up and wander off. In an enviroment as ludicrous as the biggest film festival in the world, that’s probably no bad thing.

Like Si said, “a game of two halves”.