The story so far:

In July 2005, I wrote a blog entry about an exchange I had with someone who wanted actress/singer Raven-Symone’s e-mail address. There was no reason I would have that information, of course; this was a kid who thought that because I reviewed movies meant I had some connection to the people in them.

However, the blog entry only exacerbated the problem: Now when you Googled “Raven-Symone” and “e-mail,” my Web site came up. This caused more people to write in and ask for Raven-Symone’s address, apparently failing to read (or at least to understand) the article where I mentioned the subject.

This caused me to write ANOTHER blog entry, about how the first blog entry had failed. Well, that only made the problem EVEN WORSE, of course. Now when you Googled “Raven-Symone” and “e-mail,” TWO blog entries came up, thus making it even more apparent (to stupid people) that I MUST be in possession of the prized information.

Continue reading…

World War II ended 61 years ago, but the entertainment industry keeps forgetting. It thinks it only ended about 20 or 30 years ago.

I say this because I keep seeing characters in movies and TV shows who are supposed to be World War II veterans, but who simply AREN’T OLD ENOUGH for that to be true. I cite two very recent examples:

- In the new movie “Inside Man,” Christopher Plummer plays a man who got tangled up with the Nazis back in the day and made some money from them. He is now the CEO of a large bank. But even if he was only 20 years old at the time, and even if he didn’t get involved with the Nazis until near the end — say, 1944 — that would still make him 82 now. And there’s no way an 82-year-old man would still be the acting CEO of a bank. (Remember, 82 is the YOUNGEST he could be. Something like 90 would be more plausible.) Even if he were the founder of the bank, the board of directors would have gotten him to retire a loooong time ago. (And Christopher Plummer looks about 70.)

- In the first episode of the new Fox series “The Loop,” Philip Baker Hall, playing the head of an airline, says that when he was 23, he was shooting Japs in the jungle (or words to that effect). Even if he joined the military at the tail end of the war in 1945, that still makes him 84 now — again, way too old to still be running the day-to-day operations of an airline. (Also again: Hall looks about 65.)

My theory on these discrepancies is that the people who write TV and movies grew up at a time when these types of characters — bosses, CEOs, businessmen, etc. — really WERE World War II veterans. The war was only 30 or 40 years in the past when these writers were young, so the veterans were still a major part of everyday American commerce. That’s not true of today’s society — but since we’re used to hearing about World War II as an event within many people’s memory, we forget how long ago it really was.

Think about this: The very youngest a World War II veteran could be now — if he joined in 1945 as a 16-year-old by lying about his age — is 77. The youngest! Most would be in their 80s, if they’re alive at all. Estimates say of the 16 million who served, only 4 million are alive now, and they’re dying at a rate of about 1,000 a day. In 20 years, only a handful of 100-year-old veterans will be left. In 30 years, not a single World War II veteran, or anyone else who was an adult during that time, will still be alive. It kind of freaks me out to think about that.

Luckily, the war won’t ever be forgotten, thanks to the 4,982,019,378,229,179 movies that have been made about it.

In today’s Oregonian there’s a story about a family who were found alive and well after being missing for two weeks, stuck in their well-stocked mobile home on a snowy road in rural Oregon.

But that’s not what I wanted to tell you about. What I want to tell you about are the family’s two children, ages 10 and 8. Their names: Sabastyan and Gabrayell. First the stupidly misspelled names, then the ill-fated camping trip. Parents, why do you hate your children so much?

Thursday night, just hours after posting my review of Amanda Bynes’ gut-punchingly bad new comedy “She’s the Man,” I received this e-mail from one Robert Mackey:

What the hell are you supposed to be, a film critic or Don Rickles? [Do I have to choose?!]

Your review of “She’s the Man” was very discouraging to read. [If you mean I discouraged you from seeing it, then good.] I am sure you will be happy to know that you will be one of the five most hateful critics of the movie, as will be chronicled in the March 19 Weekly Column at Amanda Bynes NOW! com, America’s leading Amanda Bynes fansite. [The fact that yours is the "leading" Amanda Bynes fansite, thus implying that there are MULTIPLE Amanda Bynes fansites, disturbs me.]

The link to this page will be up so Amanda fans — who visit my site on the order of about 7500 a day — can get into your grill as well.

Happy eating, you jerk. [I don't get the reference. What will I be "eating"? Crow? My hat? My crow hat? Something else?]

In other words: “I run an Amanda Bynes fansite. I haven’t even seen this movie yet — this is Thursday night, and it doesn’t open until Friday — but I can tell it’s a great film because it has Amanda Bynes in it. I’m going to tell all my readers to e-mail you and tell you what a jerk you are for not liking the movie. Once you’ve gotten enough passionate, illiterate letters from 14-year-old girls, maybe then you’ll rethink your position and write a positive review of the movie.”

This sort of nonsense is common enough, of course. But it turns out this goes deeper than I thought. Friends, I urge you to visit the site this man runs — Amanda Bynes NOW! — and see firsthand what kind of madness we’re dealing with.

Robert Mackey (who goes by the name Robair on his site) writes a weekly column devoted to all things Amanda Bynes. I direct you to his column of March 3, in which he finally gets to meet his idol IN PERSON at a public appearance in Philadelphia. He took a photo of the happy event, and it’s on the page I just linked. Go look.

Did you notice what I noticed? THIS MAN IS AT LEAST 40 YEARS OLD. Yet he has run Amanda Bynes NOW! since 2001, when Amanda herself was only 15. And still he has the gall to criticize a magazine’s “Aquamarine” feature for including “a creepy makeup pictorial featuring the three non-legal stars of the tweeny-bop mermaid film.” Sure, Amanda Bynes is legal NOW. But she wasn’t legal when you started your site, you creepy, creepy man!

Hilariously, he writes reviews of current teen-oriented magazines based on the sole criterion of how well they cover Amanda Bynes and her new movie “She’s the Man.” If a magazine has the nerve to not put Amanda on the cover, it gets marked down. If it has the chutzpah to put some OTHER teen queen (like Lindsay Lohan) on the cover instead, that’s just salt in the wound. Surely any magazine worth the paper it’s printed on knows it should be all Amanda all the time this month, what with her new movie coming out. Don’t they realize this is the first new Amanda Bynes live-action film in 154 weeks?! (I learned that statistic from AmandaBynesNOW.com.)

Robair demonstrates a catty bitterness toward all teen-girl-oriented movies that don’t have Amanda Bynes in them, as well as toward all young actresses who aren’t Amanda. (On this week’s Entertainment Weekly: “Their failure to do an Amanda Bynes piece, much less have her on the cover, easily cost the film $5M in opening weekend box office. Two Reese Witherspoon covers and two ‘V for Vendetta’ cover blurbs in the last month? W for Weak.”) Again, read through some of the columns and news updates and be alarmed at the unbalanced mind that created them.

True to his word, Robert included me in his list of “most hateful critics” (i.e., critics who didn’t like “She’s the Man”). You may read it here, near the bottom of the page. Critics who disliked “She’s the Man” are rated low, and if they gave “V for Vendetta” a higher grade than Amanda’s film, they are rated even lower. (Why? Because “V for Vendetta” came out the same day as “She’s the Man” and is thus the film’s primary competition at the box office.) In fact, that’s all he has to say in my entry:

#7. ERIC D. SNIDER, ERICDSNIDER.COM (F vs. B) Do the alphabet. All we have to say.

In other words: “He gave ‘She’s the Man’ an F and ‘V for Vendetta’ a B. WHAT ELSE DO YOU NEED TO KNOW?!?”

I’m a little hurt that I only ranked seventh. I mean, I REALLY didn’t like this movie. Could there possibly be six people in the world who hated it more than I did? Doubtful. First place went to Pam Grady of Reel.com. Of her, Robert writes, with Corky St. Clair-esque invective:

The only reviewer with the balls to give this movie not one star. Not even a half of one, despite liking [supporting actors] Channing Tatum and Emily Perkins. From Pam’s review, we can tell a number of things. One, she called the movie “a piece of crap”, and “horrible”. Two, she totally hated Amanda Bynes, is probably jealous, and pretty much dragged her name in the dirt. Three, she’s a b****. And four, her mother quite obviously drank drain cleaner during her pregnancy.

Um, excuse me? Pam Grady was the ONLY critic to give the film zero stars? I believe I gave the movie an F, and if that doesn’t translate to zero stars, what does?

He doesn’t provide links to any of the most hateful reviews. He does provide the critics’ e-mail addresses, though, and urges his readers — 7,500 a day, remember — to write to them and express their displeasure. Why not include links to the reviews, too? Because those 7,500 Amanda Bynes fans don’t need to actually read the reviews. All they need to know is that Robair, administrator of “the world’s greatest Amanda Bynes fansite,” has dubbed the critics worthy of scorn.

If any Amanda Bynes fans do Robair’s bidding and send me e-mails, I will of course post them here. In the meantime, enjoy AmandaBynesNOW.com, and go out and see her movie this weekend. I’m told it’s really funny.

I used to make fun of PETA somewhat regularly in “Snide Remarks,” a fact which evidently came to the attention of someone named Rebecca (becs_x_b@hotmail.com), who submitted this scathing rebuke. It basically boils down to “blah blah blah, I disagree with you; therefore, you are a bad writer, blah blah blah.”

Dear “D. Snider” if thats what you call yourself. [Um, no, I don't.]
After thoroughly reading your aritcles on PETA I concluded that you are an idiot. [Really? Most people figure it out a lot sooner.]You also seem incapable of writing a humour column, and would recommend that you don’t call it that because really you are a disgrace to the world of writers. In my small amount of years upon this planet I have achieved a greater intellectual standard than you could ever hope to achieve throughout your hopefully short life. I really should eat that hat of yours [You should, or I should? Who's eating the hat here?] not just because you are wrong but because I hope it sticks in your throat and chokes you to death. Your “writing” [Like it or not, it WAS writing, so the sarcastic quotation marks don't make any sense] makes you sound like an old fat man who has no actual clue as to what is really happening and uses information he scrounges off the internet to write his “articles”. [Which is odd, because all the information in my PETA columns comes directly from the PETA Web site.] Feel free to email me if you ever do come up with a decent argument against PETA. They do so much good for animal welfare worldwide and deserve to be congratulated not insulted. However I do not agree with some of their principles, for instance I am not a vegetarian but you would not find a piece of battery chicken on my plate. [Battery chicken? Is that a chicken made from batteries? Or is it battery-powered chicken?] If you feel happy eating a chicken that could easily have been scalded alive then you are more inhumane then i thought possible. I suppose with these views you also find hunting acceptable. [And I suppose with your spelling and grammar errors, you are retarded. See?! Sometimes supposing things isn't logical!] If this is true I quite agree with you! I would be perfectly happy to ride out and hound you until you can run no more before skinning you alive. [You want me to choke to death on a hat and/or to be pursued and skinned alive. and I'm the inhumane one?] If this was legal I would not hesitate to do the honours.
Please do email me I would be happy to hear with any disagreements you have with my opinion.
Oh and please take some lessons in writing, because it really is atrocious

Four minutes later, she sent this addendum:

I also suggest you use your articles as bog roll because that is all they are useful for

It took her four minutes to come up with that. “Bog roll” is British slang for toilet paper, by the way. How I would use my Internet-only columns as toilet paper, she did not explain. Instead, I shall continue to use toilet paper made from the skins of baby seals.

By the way, if you want to read my PETA columns, you can find them here:

I PETA the Fool
PETA’s Dragon
Milking It
Pet Peeves

Day 6: Wednesday, March 15

This was it, folks. My last day at SXSW (or South By, as the kids abbreviate it in conversation). The films continue through Saturday, but Erik and Scott were leaving today, and thus my hotel gravy train was ending. (Note: The hotel contained no actual gravy. Or Internet access, for that matter, unless you paid $10 a day.)

After checking out of the hotel, I ran into Will and we went to the Alamo Drafthouse for an 11 a.m. showing of “The Great Ecstasy of Robert Carmichael.” The people who made “The Lost” should be grateful for this movie: Because of it, “The Lost” is no longer the worst thing I saw at SXSW.

“The Great Ecstasy” has a large cast of characters in a series of plot-less fly-on-the-wall scenes. It seems to be going in no particular direction, with no point whatsoever, but only for 80 minutes. In the last 10 minutes, it suddenly becomes shockingly violent and exploitative, moving from the realm of the merely boring to the genuinely deplorable. I suspect filmmaker Thomas Clay would say that if he provoked a strong response, then he considers himself to have succeeded. But I say it’s easy to do something shocking or taboo. What’s hard is to do it in a way that is thematically, artistically and cinematically justified — in a way that doesn’t seem to be doing it just for the sake of doing it, in other words.

Will and I both hated this movie, and we raged about our hatred for it as we walked back to Congress Avenue to a cafe called the Hideout, which had caught my attention earlier with its promise of free wi-fi and gigantic cookies. (It delivered on both promises in splendid fashion.) Will eventually left me to my writing as he went to stand in line at the Paramount for the 4 p.m. “surprise” screening of “A Scanner Darkly.” If there was ever an official announcement of the title, like a press release or an e-mail, I didn’t see it. Yet somehow everyone knew about it, and we anticipated that the lines to see it would be lengthy.

We were right. Everyone with a SXSW pass congregated in that line, but before any of us were let in, the 400 people on the “guest list” (i.e., Austin film industry types, their friends and families, and people tangentially connected with the film) were admitted. Thanks to Will staking out a spot early, we were at the front of the pass-holder line — and still, by the time we got inside, the theater’s main level was two-thirds full, with only the back rows and the balcony still open.

Nearly all of our crew was there. Erik had flown back to Chicago and Laura was goodness-knows-where, but Scott, Oz, Will and I snagged a row, and our new best friends Greg, Amber and Kristina joined us, as did a girl I didn’t know. We made her sit on the end, next to Oz.

The movie is the latest from Richard Linklater, whose previous films include such diverse fare as “Dazed and Confused,” “Waking Life,” “School of Rock” and “The Newton Boys.” “A Scanner Darkly,” based on a Philip K. Dick novel, is animated the same way “Waking Life” was: Scenes were shot in the usual fashion, and then artists colored over the frames. There’s no particular reason for this except that it looks cool, and therein lies the rub. Without the rotoscoping (as it’s called), the film would be completely undistinguished. The story, a futuristic thing about surveillance and identity, is nothing special, and neither is the acting (though it’s always fun to see Robert Downey Jr. play a crazy person).

My friend Michael arrived from Houston not long after “A Scanner Darkly” ended. After checking in at the Motel 6 where we’re staying tonight, we searched downtown for a place to park so we could eat dinner. We found a spot, and at the very moment we saw it, a homeless man pointed it out to us. I was unfamiliar with this scenario, but Michael was experienced. Apparently you have to tip the homeless man for his unnecessary service or else run the risk of having your car vandalized. Michael forked over a dollar and thanked the gentleman for his keen work in gesturing at a huge empty parking space, and I counted myself grateful to live in Portland, where our gigantic homeless population has not yet become so industrious.

Michael and I ate at 6th Street’s Iron Cactus, a decent restaurant that was ridiculously busy and probably understaffed. The music part of SXSW was now in full swing, and the streets, pubs, tattoo parlors and restrooms of Austin were thronged with people. At 31, I was older than almost all of them. Every time we walked past a bar from which loud live music was emanating, Michael worried whether he should have brought earplugs. No, he’s not an old man; he’s just a wuss.

It had been my hope that we would see the 9:30 screening of “V for Vendetta,” but the more I examined the situation, the more I realized the idea was futile. I would have no problem getting in with my pass, but Michael would have to stand in the regular-people line, and those losers only get in if there are still seats left once the pass-holders are in. At 8:30, the pass-holder line was already lengthy, and the regular-people queue was stretching around the block, too. So we said goodbye to Scott (who was already in line), abandoned the “V for Vendetta” plan, and joined Greg, Kristina and the new girl at a watering hole several blocks away. Amber had ditched us for a party to which she was invited but we were not. (Is Amber a snob???????? You decide.)

At around 11, Michael, Greg, Kristina and I, now joined by a different new girl — Greg has lived in Austin long enough to have acquaintances everywhere he goes, and I’ve started making a conscious effort not to bother learning their names — went to the ATX Magazine party, being held in a gravel parking lot on the southeast edge of downtown. Bands were doing their sound checks when we arrived, and about 30 people were milling around waiting for something to happen.

After a few minutes, the event’s organizer approached a group of would-be revelers and said we all had to go out the gate, have our IDs checked, and then be re-admitted before they could begin the festivities (and by “festivities,” as with most SXSW-related things, I mean the serving of complimentary alcohol). For some reason, he was looking directly at me when he made this announcement, like somehow hit was my fault the party hadn’t started yet, or my fault that they had left the gates open and let people wander in before they were ready for them. Accepting my apparent position as ringleader, I led us out of the gate, where our IDs were checked and we walked back in.

Unfortunately, we five were the only people to do this. So 10 minutes later, the organizer made the announcement AGAIN, and about 20 people — us included — exited, got carded, and re-entered. That still wasn’t everyone, but at this point the organizer gave up and returned his attention to getting the kegs tapped, a process with which I confess utter unfamiliarity. (It’s a big barrel of beer. Can’t you just drill a hole in it and let it pour out?)

It was a tragically lame party, probably the lamest party in America after Ralph Nader’s Green Party. The gravel parking lot didn’t exactly exude elegance, there were no restrooms, and the only beverage available was beer. Don’t drink beer? Too bad. They didn’t even have water. The weather turned drizzly, too, which I guess wasn’t ATX Magazine’s fault, but they didn’t really do anything to stop it, either.

I realized it was time to say goodbye to SXSW. Michael and I are heading to Houston tomorrow, where I’ll spend a couple post-film-festival days before returning to Portland. With heavy heart I bade farewell to my new best friends, and Michael and I found our way back to his car, pleased to see his payment of $1 had been enough to prevent the bum/extortionist from keying it.

Sundance is legendary for its parties, but my experience has shown that reputation to be undeserved. There are raging parties, no doubt — but they are exclusive and secretive. The official, Sundance-sponsored ones are always worthless, poorly attended and mostly ignored by the regular festival-goers. At SXSW, the official parties were great — in fact, the only bad one I went to was an off-the-record one — and everyone from filmmakers to actors to film critics to regular pass-holders attends.

This turned out to be an important distinction between Sundance and SXSW. At Sundance, if the movies are mediocre, you really feel it. At SXSW, the films were occasionally sub-par, yet I didn’t notice. Why? Because I was having fun anyway. Eating at the Drafthouse, going to SXSW parties, watching “Washington” back in the hotel room, getting caught up in one another’s personal dramas, making fun of Harry Knowles — these six days were outrageously entertaining whether the movies were any good or not. And several of them were very good, of course.

My thanks to Matt Dentler, the suave “conference and festival producer” who is the de facto face of the fest. He introduces almost every screening, using some kind of time-space portal to travel all over Austin, and has been good to the HBS.com crew. Elizabeth Derczo is the festival’s publicist, and she was instrumental in getting me credentialed and making sure members of the press had what they needed. My friends and colleagues Scott and Erik were lovely to let me occupy space in their hotel room, and it was good to see them again so soon after Sundance. Nice to see Oz again, too, and to meet Will and Laura in person for the first time. The Internet makes it possible for us to be friends, but I’m glad we have occasional chances to hang out in real life, too, if only to see what one another smell like.

I don’t think I could live in Austin. It’s too sprawled out for my tastes, and I’m not sure how much fun it is without the festival. I know I don’t want to be here in July, when it’s 110 degrees and there are armies of scorpions patrolling the streets. But I’ll definitely be back next March for SXSW, even if I have to sleep in the street and disturb all of downtown with my snoring.

Day 5: Tuesday, March 14

None of us went to bed until 4 a.m., so we slept in until 11. Then there was a lot of lingering and loitering and farting (mostly Oz), and finally Oz and I headed to the convention center so that he could pick up his credentials and so that I could finally get some serious writing done. And by “serious writing,” I mean blog entries with juvenile shmeckler-related jokes.

There was a massage therapist on hand in the press lounge again, a cool young gal named Jennifer. I forced myself to get some work done and then allowed myself the treat of a complimentary 15-minute massage. It was heavenly. Jennifer said she’s moving to Portland soon, and that’s where I live, so we’re totally best friends now. Later, after I left the press lounge, I realized I should have tipped her, and I cursed my stupidity.

My first film of the day wasn’t until 4:30, and it was “Patriot Act,” by comedian Jeffrey Ross. He joined Drew Carey’s USO tour to Iraq in 2003 — just after the fall of Baghdad and before Saddam was found — and videotaped the trip with his camcorder. Afterward, he thought the footage might make for an entertaining and/or informative movie.

Turns out he was right. There’s a few minutes of footage of him and the other comics performing for crowds of enthusiastic soldiers, the way Bob Hope used to do. But like the Ray Romano film, this one focuses on the behind-the-scenes experiences, not on the gigs themselves. Ross and his buddies are funny, awestruck, frightened and humbled as they meet soldiers, hear harrowing stories, and crack jokes about the war-torn areas they visit. Humor is how people deal with tragedy, after all, and it’s genuinely touching to see how delighted the troops are to have some entertainment.

I was very impressed with the film. Ross is a scathingly funny comedian, known as one of the most hilarious contributors at the Friars Club celebrity roasts. (“Drew Carey is to comedy what Mariah Carey is to comedy,” he once said. He is also fond of making references to Bea Arthur’s penis.) But the film shows him and his compatriots as regular Americans who, whatever their attitude toward Bush’s Iraq policies, are grateful for the dedicated men and women in the military who are doing the tough jobs over there.

Ross was on hand to introduce the film and to take questions afterward. He was in fine form. I’ve never seen his act live, but apparently one of his skills is making quick-witted, off-hand references to audience members, particularly those coming in late or leaving early. During his intro, he interrupted himself several times to acknowledge people just coming in, often noticing them before we did. “Are you a natural two-tone?” he said to a woman with multi-colored hair. “Good, my pot dealer, Joe-Joe, is here,” he said of a guy who looked the part. “You got some good s*** for me? We’re seeing the Strokes tonight.” When a very heavyset woman with a butch haircut entered, he said she was his high school gym teacher.

He was funny in the Q-and-A, too, but given the serious undertones of the film (which is also uproariously funny, I should add), some of the Q’s led to more somber A’s. Still, I like what he said when someone asked him whether he’d seen the other Iraq documentaries playing at the festival, including one called “My Country, My Country”: “I thought that one was about Garth Brooks, so I didn’t go.” He explained that since he’s been over there (and has since returned on another USO tour), it’s difficult for him emotionally to watch movies about the crisis. “I couldn’t (even) watch Lauren Bacall make her Oscar speech,” he said.

I had to skip out of his Q-and-A a little early, though I managed to escape being commented on as I did so. (When one woman got up, Ross instantly said, “Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.” So simple, but so funny.) I had to get to the other Alamo Drafthouse, the one down the road a couple miles, and that meant taking a taxi. I had hoped to share the cab with Scott, but I couldn’t find him at our designated meeting place, and he doesn’t have a cell phone (yes, he’s the one; you probably read about him), so I had to shell out the $10 myself.

The movie I was seeing was “The Lost,” and it was an atrocious piece of crap, without question the worst thing I’ve seen at the festival so far. It’s a horror film, sort of, about a young sociopath in the style of “American Psycho’s” Patrick Bateman who kills a couple women and then, four years later, flips out again. But in the meantime, there’s a whole lot of nothing. The film keeps introducing characters and spending scenes with them for no reason, and the lead psycho’s psyche is given only a cursory glance. (He hates his mother, obviously, and has to help her run a Bates-esque motel.) Also, with his cowboy boots, big belt buckle, sleeveless T-shirt, and slick black hair, he looks like k.d. lang, which you’ll probably agree is never a good thing for a lead actor.

I didn’t want to pay another 10 bucks for a cab, so I walked back downtown after the film, a distance of probably a mile and a half. I was good and exhausted by the time I reached the Paramount, where there was no one checking passes at the door, which means anyone could have walked in. Good to know: As the week goes on, security gets more lax. Maybe next time I’ll sneak some friends in.

The film: “The King,” starring Gael Garcia Bernal as a young man who shows up in Corpus Christi, Texas (though the film was actually filmed in Austin), to find the father he never knew. The father in question is a holy-roller minister played by William Hurt, and the tryst he had with the young man’s mother was before he became a Christian, so he wants nothing to do with the fruit of that relationship. Behind his back, the kid starts dating the minister’s teenage daughter — and yes, I mean the teenage daughter who is the guy’s half-sister. It gets even yuckier from there, but it’s an intriguing film. There comes a point where everyone has so many lies and secrets floating around that it’s only a matter of time before they’re all going to be revealed and the stuff’s gonna hit the fan. And hit the fan the stuff does!

It was nearly 11:30 when “The King” ended, and the SXSW closing party was already in full swing. Why have the closing party on Tuesday when the film festival runs through Saturday? I dunno. Beat the rush, I guess. No, it’s because the conference part of the festival (with a trade show, panel discussions, etc.) ended today, and the music part of the festival begins tomorrow. The party is a way to bid farewell to one group while welcoming the other.

For some reason, this party was held outside of a meat-packing plant on the east side of town, I guess because maybe the paper mill and the oil refinery were booked. Scott, Erik, Oz and our new best friends Greg, Amber and Kristina were already there when I arrived, and we had a joyful reunion. For some reason Oz has taken it upon himself to find a girlfriend for Erik, who is a decent enough fellow that he ought to have no trouble finding a girlfriend without the help of a flatulent Australian. But Oz got married recently, and getting married is like becoming a zombie: You stumble around in a daze, you’re sort of the same person you were before but not really, your looks go downhill, and all you ever do is try to get people to join you. Married people look at single people the way zombies do at the living: fresh meat waiting to be converted.

The band Sleater-Kinney was playing, very loudly, at the party. I text-messaged this fact to a friend who I thought would be impressed, and he responded, “kewl.”

I told Greg I’d been to the Jeffrey Ross movie, and he was jealous, because he loves the guy. Alas, Greg had been busy helping to run a panel that Charlize Theron (who produced a documentary) was involved with, so he was stuck looking at her porcelain beauty all afternoon.

A few minutes after learning of Greg’s fondness for Ross, whom should I see across the way but Ross himself! Greg was conversing with someone, so Amber and I scurried over to Ross to say hello and get a picture with my digital camera. I then showed that picture to Greg, who became enraged with jealousy, which was exactly my plan. Luckily, Ross was still around, and we were able to get a picture of Greg with him, too. All the celebrities here — the stars at night really ARE big and bright deep in the heart of Texas — and the one I get my picture with is Jeffrey Ross. But hey, you take what you can get. And sometimes what you get is a schlubby-looking Jew.

Speaking of schlubby-looking Jews, Scott got us all invited to an after-party with the “Darkon” guys back at their hotel, and if there’s anyone who knows how to party, it’s people who dress up like Renaissance Faire soldiers and roll 12-sided dice. With the SXSW party ending at 1 a.m. (it had begun at 9, right after the awards ceremony), we still had an hour before our customary bedtime, so we figured we’d go. Unfortunately, we got the location wrong, and by the time we found out the correct locale, we were back in our hotel room and it was 2:30. Scott still went, though, and returned at some unholy hour, just in time to throw things at me to make me stop snoring.

SXSW, like most major film festivals, has a jury to choose awards for best documentary and best narrative films, and there are audience-voted awards in the same areas. They hand out ballots at screenings of eligible films, and you can rate the film on a scale of 1 to 5. I never vote, though, because I feel like since I got in free, I shouldn’t be allowed to have the same input as people who paid for their tickets. Also, not voting takes less effort than voting, as my generation proved in the last presidential election.

For documentaries, “Maxed Out” won a Special Jury Prize (whatever that means), and “Jam,” about 1970s roller derby competitors, took the main prize. “Darkon,” predictably, won the audience award.

Among fiction films, the jury gave an award for Outstanding Ensemble Cast to “Americanese” (which I hope to see tomorrow), and another one for Outstanding Visual Achievement to “Inner Circle Line” (which I know nothing about). The main jury prize went to “Live Free or Die,” which astounds me, considering how average it was. The audience chose “Americanese.” Luckily, “Crash” didn’t win anything.

Day 4: Monday, March 13

In all my years at Sundance, I’ve never seen more than five movies in one day. Four is typical, and five is occasional. But six? Madness.

But today was it. Today I accomplished the elusive six-movie day.

It actually wasn’t that hard. Screenings were at 11 a.m., 1:30, 3:45, 6:15, 9:15 and midnight. There was enough time between them to get from one venue to the next, and occasionally enough time to eat food. And I didn’t have to force it, either: All six movies were ones I was actually interested in seeing.

Which isn’t to say they were all good. First was “Live Free or Die” at the Alamo Drafthouse, which is fast becoming my favorite place in the world. (Our new best friend Greg mentioned that Entertainment Weekly named it the best movie theater experience in America. I recall the feature where they listed their top 10, but I had forgotten that an Austin landmark was at the top.) The movie started late due to a press screening for “The Notorious Bettie Page” (which I’ve already seen) being held at 9:30. Why they didn’t foresee a 9:30 press screening interfering with an 11:00 public screening, I don’t know. Maybe they thought “Bettie Page” was only 60 minutes long.

Anyway, while we were outside (in beautiful weather, the first nice, pleasant day we’ve had in Austin), a festival volunteer came by to inform us that it would be an extra 20 minutes or so before we were allowed in. He said if we wanted to, we might mosey over to a nearby coffeehouse and grab a snack. That suggestion led to this conversation between a man and his female friend, in line behind me:

WOMAN: I want a cupcake, but I don’t want to walk three blocks to Starbucks.
MAN: Lady, if you won’t walk three blocks for a cupcake, you don’t deserve to eat.

Truer words were never spoken.

“Live Free or Die,” as it turns out, is a lukewarm comedy set in New Hampshire, where a cowardly wannabe nicknamed Rugged (played by Aaron Stanford) tries to maintain a reputation as a hardcore gangster criminal without actually committing any significant crimes. Paul Schneider is funny as Rugged’s dumb sidekick/goon, but the film never rises above average.

I exited the Drafthouse and got right back in line for “Darkon.” I wasn’t alone. Apparently the buzz had spread beyond the confines of that “Darkon”-sponsored party, because the line was already stretched around the corner. Erik joined me in line — no one has any compunction about letting one or two or 12 of their friends join them, regardless of where they are in line — and we got to see the much-discussed “Darkon.”

These live-action role-playing guys (and girls, though they are much less plentiful) are about the way you’d expect them to be. In the documentary interviews, several of them state plainly that the fantasy game is appealing because it gives them a chance to be something they never are in real life: powerful and successful and not living in their parents’ basement.

How does it work? It’s a cross between “Dungeons & Dragons” and those guys who re-enact Civil War battles in meticulous detail. The players make their own armor and weapons (soft, round-edged representations of swords, cudgels and maces), and there are color codes to determine what kind of injury you suffer if you are hit during a battle. There are a lot of off-battlefield negotiations between rulers, too. When the documentary was being shot, the imperialistic kingdom of Mordom was being challenged by the smaller, more peaceful Laconia, because the Laconians didn’t like how Mordom was always throwing its weight around, the big jerks.

The best line in “Darkon” comes when a man whose character is that of a dark elf is trying to buy potions from someone. He buys a couple — agony, paralysis, etc. — and then says, very seriously, with great intensity, “One thing I do need, and will pay greatly for, is a supernatural death poison.” Don’t we all, dark elf. Don’t we all.

“Darkon” turns out to be pretty fun, though by no means revolutionary or particularly insightful. The filmmakers don’t exactly make fun of the subjects, but they don’t exactly take them as seriously as they take themselves, either. I suppose you could either laugh at or laugh with the participants, depending on your opinion of fantasy role-playing games. I laughed at. But then, this is coming from someone who watches 350 movies a year, so maybe I’m not one to talk about moderation.

Erik headed up to the Dobie for something next, while I went to the Paramount to join Will, Scott and Laura for “95 Miles to Go,” a documentary that follows Ray Romano on a stand-up tour through Florida and Georgia. He hates to fly, so after his initial trip to Miami, he drove a minivan to all his destinations, accompanied by long-time friend and opening act Tom Caltabiano and an “Everybody Loves Raymond” intern named Roger. Roger’s in charge of filming their every move, and while the film has maybe 15 minutes of total footage of Ray’s shows, it’s mostly about everything else: the driving, Ray’s petty neuroses, and his pleasantly bickersome relationship with Tom. It’s a very funny movie, again serving no greater purpose or offering insight into anything, but providing many hearty laughs.

Ray and Tom were on hand for Q-and-A afterward, so we stuck around. They continued to be very funny, and they were soon joined by “surprise” guest Brad Garrett, Ray’s “Everybody Loves Raymond” co-star. He harassed Ray, made fun of his ego, and provided general merriment. It was a most enjoyable Q-and-A.

They don’t let you bring outside food into the Paramount, though they are more than happy to sell you candy bars for $2. Not the movie-theater-sized candy bars, either, but the regular ones you can get in a vending machine for 65 cents. You expect to pay a dollar for those at film festival venues, but TWO dollars? No sir. Because I don’t like The Man telling me what I can and can’t bring into theaters, I was more than happy to hide Scott’s leftover stromboli in my backpack, which the people at the door were going to make him discard. After the Ray Romano thing, he stood in line for the next film and ate his stromboli while I dashed across the street to a restaurant called Hickory Street, where our new best friends Amber, Greg and Kristina were dining. I ate Greg’s french fries and bought a cookie and called that dinner. I’m thinking of writing a book called “The Film Festival Diet,” if only because I’m reasonably sure it’s no less healthy than Atkins.

The next movie, for which we were joined by our new best friends, was “The Oh in Ohio,” starring Parker Posey as a woman who, despite all the efforts of her husband Paul Rudd, can’t seem to achieve the, um, ultimate, er, destination in their marital collaborations. (The “O” in Ohio is the Big O. Not Oprah, the other one.) The movie’s pretty dirty (“sexy” is the word the festival programmers used), and while it’s funny for a while, it takes an odd detour in its last act. This detour involves Danny DeVito, so I guess I don’t need to tell you that “sexy” is not the word people should be using to describe it.

It was then time for me and Scott to join Amber and Kristina in piling into Greg’s bird-crap-covered car and driving to the other Alamo Drafthouse. This one’s new, has two screens, and is on the south side of town. We were to see “Bickford Shmeckler’s Cool Ideas,” and maybe it was “The Oh in Ohio” influencing us, but we thought “Shmeckler” sounded like an obscene job description. (“What do you do?” “Oh, I’m a shmeckler. I’m in charge of all the shmeckling.”)

The movie is an up-and-down comedy about a brainy college student (Patrick Fugit) whose notebook of Stephen Hawking-style brilliance goes missing. I like certain elements of the film — it was shot in a very nice-looking high-definition digital video, for example, and Fugit is almost always a fun actor to watch — but it’s not as amusing or entertaining as it wants to be, nor are Bickford Shmeckler’s cool ideas actually all that cool.

That’s five, if you’re counting, and one to go. We drove back downtown to the original Alamo Drafthouse, and actually had an hour to kill before we needed to get in line. (We killed it by sitting in the sports bar next door and drinking Coke. Don’t let anyone tell you Austin isn’t a party town.) The midnight movie was “Population 436,” a washed-over “Twilight Zone” story about a weird little town where the population is always exactly 436. We realize within the first couple minutes that every time someone is born, someone else dies, so the question I have is why the filmmaker decided to drag it out for so long. How do you make a film like this and not realize how unoriginal the idea is? Have we forgotten Shirley Jackson’s classic short story “The Lottery”? Or any of the various TV episodes and movies about strange burgs with ancient superstitions that involve human sacrifice? I mean come on.

When Scott and I got back to the hotel, we found our HBS.com pall Chris “Oz” Parry had arrived from Vancouver. That’s four people sharing this hotel room, if you’re counting, and fortunately none to go. We called for another roll-away bed to be sent up, and we wondered how many times we could do that before they started asking questions.

We also showed Oz a DVD of our favorite short film, an animated music video called “Washington.” It’s a slow-grooved hip-hoppy song about the Father of Our Country, with his achievements exaggerated to Paul Bunyan proportions. “He ate opponents’ brains / he invented cocaine” is one couplet; “He has a wig for his wig and a brain for his heart” is another. We’ve watched it two or three times every night since getting it.

After the nightly “Washington” screenings, Erik wanted to sleep, Oz and I wanted to write, and Scott wanted to watch a screener of something. What we settled on was ordering room service. It was the first time I had ever had room service, actually. Every time I’ve stayed at a hotel, it’s always been the cheap kind that doesn’t have room service, or the expensive kind where I’m spending so much on the room that I can’t afford to spend $15 for chicken fingers. But it was 3 a.m., we were starving, and so I forked over $9 for a club sandwich. The sandwich wasn’t worth $9, of course — the only way a club sandwich would be worth $9 is if it came with fries and four dollars. But what could I do? You watch six movies in one day, you deserve a treat.

Day 3: Sunday, March 12

We were all late in arising this morning. Erik and Scott both reported that my snoring was better, which assuaged my guilt, though I confess my guilt is easily assuaged. (One good anagram of “assuaged” is “sausaged.”) My first order of business was to drop by the press office, which I hadn’t yet had occasion to visit.

Like the press lounges at Sundance and CineVegas, the SXSW one has computers for us to use, tables for lounging, and a few complimentary beverages. They don’t have much in the way of press kits, though, which are often invaluable for writing reviews because they include cast lists and plot summaries (handy for when you see 30 movies in one week and your memory needs a nudge weeks later). All the films have publicists on hand, but what most of them do instead of providing real press kits is to just print up glossy full-color one-sheets — advertisements, basically, which they strew around the press office in a reckless manner. I’m all for SXSW being cooler and less rigid than other fests, but sometimes it’s better to be a grownup, you know?

One thing the press lounge had that was unique to my experience was free massages. There was a guy there, a professional (I gathered), with a chair set up and everything. I saw him but didn’t pay attention to him nor realize what his purpose was until I heard someone approach him and say, “Are the massages complimentary?” (Even though everyone at film festivals wants free stuff, no one ever uses the word “free.” They say “complimentary” or “open,” as in, “Does the party have an open bar?” Which it does, by the way.) The massages were indeed complimentary, and you just have to plop down in the chair and let the guy go to town on your back, neck and shoulders.

Alas, he was soon occupied with the guy who said “complimentary,” and I had to leave. But I hope to enjoy a complimentary rubbing before the week is through.

I bought a slice of pizza again as I walked over to the Paramount for a 1:30 screening of a film called “Gretchen.” Erik joined me and fell asleep halfway through it; I stayed awake and loved it. I know I just compared something to “Napoleon Dynamite” yesterday, but it’s even more applicable here. In fact, about 15 minutes in, I thought: I’m watching this year’s “Napoleon Dynamite.” It has the same quirky vibe, the same small-town characters, quiet tone and semi-absurdist view of high school. The festival’s printed film guide, I later noticed, compares the title character to a cross between Dawn Wiener from “Welcome to the Dollhouse” and Deb from “Napoleon Dynamite,” and that’s exactly right. I look forward to seeing this one again.

Erik and I walked back to the convention center and festival headquarters, stopping on the way to eat at a restaurant we couldn’t find, which means we didn’t eat there after all. I had noticed a Jimmy John’s sandwich shop in my travels, and I have fond memories of that chain as a good cheap place to eat. But when Erik and I looked for it, it was nowhere to be found, gone like the city of Brigadoon. So we just went to headquarters, where I wrote for a while.

Scott was there, and he and I wound up at the Registrants Lounge, which is a completely useless place for all festival-goers to hang out. It’s outdoors under a tent, so it’s hot and humid, and the complimentary beverages consist of beer and water. Scott ran into a couple publicists and a filmmaker he loves and kindly invited me to join him as he chatted with them, but I was feeling hungry and anti-social, so I went in search of a place to eat. (One time I used the term “anti-social” in that context and I got an e-mail from someone pointing out that the way we use “anti-social” colloquially is highly inaccurate. He said what I mean to say is “non-social” or “unsocial.” So to make “anti-social” more apropos, I killed him.)

6th Street is crawling with eating establishments, so I chose one at random called BD Riley’s Irish Pub. The only available seating was at the bar, where I deposited myself and asked the bartender for a menu. The bartender, who looked just like Mike Novick on “24,” produced it cheerfully and asked what I’d like to drink. I ordered a Diet Coke, which he brought me and thereupon ceased to acknowledge my existence.

It was truly strange. He brought new drinks to the guys next to me, took the food order of two girls next to them, and refused to even make eye contact with me. The only thing I can figure is that since I wasn’t having big-boy drinks, he wasn’t going to waste his time with me. Finally I left $2 on the bar to cover the Diet Coke and left in search of an eatery that actually wanted my business. BD Riley’s Irish Pub: the first Austin restaurant to get on Snider’s List.

Next I tried the Jackalope, a pub that has menus on the tables yet requires you to walk to the kitchen to order food, and possibly to make it yourself. Maybe it’s only certain days it’s like that, but I wasn’t having any of it. I was going to sit somewhere, have someone ask me what I wanted, and then allow that person to bring it to me. None of these stipulations were negotiable.

At last I found what I was looking for in a 6th Street pub called, fittingly, Paradise. A cheerful girl told me to sit wherever I wanted, and then she brought me a menu and took my order. The food was decent, it was reasonably priced, and I was able to read my book (“Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” by Jonathan Safron Foer) in comfort. Thus Paradise earned a spot on Snider’s List (the other one).

(Side note: You know what I keep seeing on menus in Austin? Fried pickles. Someone told me I really need to try them. I disagree with that position.)

I saw two movies at the Paramount next. First was “The Cassidy Kids,” an uneven blend of comedy and intrigue about the reunion of five people who, as children, solved a local murder. That event was the inspiration for a (fictional) kids’ sitcom that ran from 1982-86, but even now certain questions about the original mystery remain unanswered. The film stars Kadeem Hardison, who you may remember as Dwayne Wayne on “A Different World,” or possibly as the guy who asks for change outside of Hardee’s. It’s a great idea — the reunion of people who watched fictionalized versions of themselves on TV for four seasons — but the mystery element is ridiculously handled.

Will had joined us at some point, and next we watched “Even Money,” an Afterschool Special sort of melodrama that explains why Gambling Is Bad. Reason #1: It makes you lose money. Reason #2: It apparently makes you overact, too, though it’s possible you’re only susceptible to that if you’re Kim Basinger, who plays a casino-addicted wife. Kelsey Grammer wears a fake nose and plays a hard-boiled homicide detective. You should probably see the movie just for that, actually, and for no other reason.

The director, Mark Rydell, was sitting just across the aisle from us, which made it very awkward when we laughed at the unintentionally funny parts of his movie. It also makes it awkward when, as everyone’s leaving the theater, we’re walking past him saying, “HOLY CRAP WAS THAT BAD!!”

It was then time for, yes, another party. Three nights, three parties. This one was at Maggie Mae’s again, but on the ground floor. Apparently the upper level was reserved for some magical special party for special people only, and scum like SXSW passholders weren’t allowed. But on the plus side, we ran into our new best friends Amber and Greg, as well as their friend (and our third new best friend) Kristina. This time we took some pictures, in case you didn’t believe us that we have new best friends.

Rumors were spreading that Wednesday’s to-be-announced slot would be a screening of “A Scanner Darkly,” Richard Linklater’s new film based on a Philip K. Dick story. This makes the third time at SXSW that I have had to mention a celebrity with the last name Dick. The rumor couldn’t be confirmed, but it seemed reasonable, especially considering Linklater is a Texan.

This party was sponsored by the movie “Darkon,” which I have not seen but which Scott says is fantastic. The subject matter didn’t interest me: It’s a documentary about a group that engages in live-action role-playing games. In other words, rather than just sitting around playing “Dungeons & Dragons,” they actually put on homemade costumes and pretend to fight with homemade weapons.

I should choose my words carefully here, I think, but let me just say that I think role-playing games are stupid and the people who play them are losers. Wait, wait, that totally came out wrong. What I mean is, I hate those people. No. Shoot. I’m sorry. I don’t have a point. But I wasn’t planning to see the movie until I went to this party, which made the film seem fun and which was heavily attended by people who had already seen it and were raving about it. Does it count as “buzz” if the only place I’ve heard it is at a party sponsored by the film being buzzed about? Or is that more like propaganda? Eh, whatever. I decided I’ll see “Darkon” tomorrow. It’s playing during the slot where I was going to see “Summercamp,” a documentary about kids’ summer camps, but forget that. Those kids can all go to hell.

Day 2: Saturday, March 11

I snore. I’m registered in the National Snorer Database, and when I move into a new house, I have to inform the people in my neighborhood. Knowing this, I brought ear plugs to share with my roommates Scott and Erik, but they both declined last night when I offered them. They both said they were so tired, they’d be asleep before I was anyway.

This proved to be true, but they weren’t counting on being woken up by my snoring as soon as I fell asleep. I’ve never heard myself, obviously, but those who have describe it as a frightful experience. Erik compared it to the film “Grizzly Man,” in which a man is eaten by a bear. Previous roommates have likened it to a herd of giraffes galloping and snorting as they stampede across the Serengeti. (Never sleep with English majors.)

Whichever wild creatures you choose to compare it to, the point is, being in the vicinity is not conducive to a good night’s sleep. I was deeply sorry for having disturbed Scott and Erik, though in my defense, I did offer them earplugs. I imagine tonight they will take me up on the offer.

First order of business for me and Erik was to see an 11 a.m. film at the Alamo Drafthouse. This is one of those places where you can order food and booze to watch during the movie, where every row of seats has a long, narrow table in front of it to accommodate dining while watching. Being no great fan of popcorn or other typical movie fare, I salute whoever came up with this business model, the one where you can eat a turkey club sandwich and fries while you watch “Big Momma’s House 2.”

Salt Lake City has a place like this called Brewvies that I used to attend regularly, but the Drafthouse has them beat. Where at Brewvies one must go to the lobby to order one’s food and then return to pick it up when it’s ready, the Drafthouse sends a waitstaff around to the seats to collect your order, then to bring it to you, then to collect payment before the movie is over. They operate quietly and with minimal interruption to the film, which is nice, and you get to enjoy food and drink without ever getting up. It is probably the single greatest achievement in the food service industry since the invention of the chicken finger.

So the food was great; the movie, not so much. It was “Bondage,” a serio-comic tale of juvenile delinquency about a troublemaking Orange County teen trying to survive in juvenile hall. The kid is played by Michael Angarano, best known as Jack’s son on “Will & Grace,” and he’s an engaging character. Everyone else is flat and under-written, though, and the film meanders. We didn’t stay for the Q-and-A, but I suspect from the film’s opening title card — “This s*** really happened” — that the filmmaker was hoping the film’s basis in fact would sustain it.

Next I had to find the Dobie Theatre to catch another screening. Erik gave me directions, and I proceeded on foot, mostly uphill, about 16 blocks up Guadalupe Street. The Dobie is a three-screen arthouse theater in a sad little mall near the University of Texas campus, and I found it easily enough, though I was sweating like the proverbial whore in church when I arrived, what with the heat and humidity that are so powerful it is impossible not to complain about them constantly.

The movie: “Motorcycle,” a low-budget little comedy shot on grainy black-and-white film that tells the story of a motorcycle and the lives of three people who own it, one after another. The characters all have a “Napoleon Dynamite”-style low energy and slight dorkiness about them, and the film’s set in an unidentified medium-sized city with no distinguishing features. It’s not quite funny enough to sustain itself and its intentionally low-key demeanor, but it’s passable.

I had originally planned to catch a film at the Arbor Theatre next, but an examination of the map revealed that it is a 20-minute CAR ride uptown, and neither trusting the city buses nor wanting to hire a taxi, I decided to cancel all my Arbor-related screenings. (One way Sundance has SXSW beat is with its shuttle buses to take you from one venue to another. The attendance at “Motorcycle” was embarrassingly low, and I reckon it’s because the only people who want to bother with the Dobie are the locals, who have cars and can drive to the venues. All the out-of-towners are staying downtown.)

I found a city bus that would take me back to Congress Avenue and was soon at the Paramount, where a film called “Maxed Out” was to commence at 4 p.m. I found Scott and Will in line, along with David Poland of MovieCityNews.com and Tim Ryan of RottenTomatoes.com. (SXSW doesn’t do press screenings, but passholders do get let into the public screenings before everyone else.) There is a noticeable dearth of newspaper critics here. Except for Joe Leydon from Variety, I’ve seen only online guys — though without separate press screenings, and with everyone’s badges looking about the same, it could be that I’ve seen print journalists and just haven’t realized it. Like vampires, they walk among us.

The Paramount is a huge theater, seating something like 1,200 people, and so I was surprised to see it so full. Last night’s Robert Altman premiere, sure. But a documentary no one had ever heard of? Weird.

Let me be the eighth or ninth out of what will eventually be hundreds of writers to point out that “Maxed Out” does for credit card companies what “Super Size Me” did for fast food. (The filmmakers’ names are even similar. “Super Size Me” was made by Morgan Spurlock, while “Maxed Out” comes from James Scurlock.) “Maxed Out” uses humor, pathos and outrage to show how “obscenely profitable” the credit card business is (to use one expert’s terminology), how wicked screwed-up the FICO scores and credit-report system is (how do they determine your credit score? It’s a big fat secret!), and how the government has only made things worse for consumers. The revision of bankruptcy laws last year that makes it harder for middle-class people trapped under a mountain of debt to file for bankruptcy, even when there’s no other viable option for them? That bill was written by MBNA — the second-largest provider of credit in the country, not to mention George W. Bush’s greatest campaign contributor.

There are some flaws in the film, such as using extreme worst-case scenarios to engage our emotions (people so distraught over impossible debt that they commit suicide) and a complete failure to even bring up the subject of personal responsibility. But as to its major themes, of greedy credit card companies that will issue credit to anyone; that especially pursue people they KNOW are likely to go over their limits and fail to make payments; that sit there before congressional committees and say, with straight faces, that they have systems in place to make sure only good candidates are offered credit — well, anyone who’s ever tangled with a credit card company will come out of “Maxed Out” with boiling blood and a vow to get out from under their infernal thumbs once and for all.

I was to be back at the Paramount again an hour later, so after “Maxed Out” I ventured across the street to one of the 8,482 pizza-by-the-slice restaurants that populate downtown Austin for a little dinner. Upon my return to the theater, I watched a documentary that will make some people mad just by its very existence: “Al Franken: God Spoke.” It’s a rather unfocused account of the launch of Franken’s Air America Radio network, along with his campaigning for Kerry in the 2004 election. It’s entertaining in places, but it needs to have its scope narrowed.

Here’s my problem with political pundits in general: Everything they accuse the other side of usually applies to them, too. Franken makes fun of how he has so rankled Bill O’Reilly that O’Reilly now mentions Franken almost every day. (This was during the launch of Air America.) Yet Franken is easily just as obsessed with O’Reilly as O’Reilly is with him. Name-calling, baiting, a condescending tone — both sides dish it out. Yet somehow each side thinks it’s only the other side that does it. Grr.

It was amusing to watch the film with what was obviously a very liberal audience. Whenever someone in the film would make a point they agreed with, they would applaud, and people applauding a movie always makes me laugh. (If the filmmaker is in attendance, it makes sense to applaud at the end. But failing that, there’s no reason. And there’s NEVER any cause for clapping DURING a movie. I mean, what are you saying? “Yes, movie! I liked that! Show me more things like that!” The movie’s not being improvised, folks. It was shot and edited a long time ago.)

But scenes of Franken’s run-ins with Ann Coulter were especially enlightening. Everyone’s laughing at Franken’s quips and verbal jousting, and much of it is very funny. Then he counters the right’s claim that he and other lefties “hate America” by pointing out that he has done several USO tours. When it’s Coulter’s turn to talk, she says, “I did win the bet on whether it would take more or less than five minutes for Al to mention his USO tours,” the point being that he mentioned it immediately, which apparently was predictable.

That’s funny! She made a funny jab! And the only audible laughter at it in the entire theater was mine. I think Ann Coulter is infuriating, narrow-minded and an outrageous history revisionist — but come on, a funny line is a funny line, I don’t care who says it. If Hitler were to show up and tell the “Aristocrats” joke, I’d laugh, I’m sorry.

Next I dashed over to the convention center to get in line for an Andy Dick movie. (That’s how you know film festivals are a bizarro world: People dash places just to get in line for Andy Dick movies.) I heard several people expressing anticipation for the film; to each his own, I thought. I’ve always thought Andy Dick was amusing in small doses, but an entire film? With him as the writer, director and star? It makes one nervous.

Scott joined me in the audience, and we both had the same reaction: This movie is funny for 20 minutes, and then it goes on for another 65. It’s called “Danny Roane: First Time Director,” and it’s about a former sitcom star who sets out to make a film chronicling his battle with alcoholism. The movie we’re watching is supposedly the behind-the-scenes documentary about the making of the film, which of course is a disaster. It’s interesting how we get to watch two directors screw up their movies at the same time: Fictional Danny Roane ruins his by relapsing into alcoholism, and real Andy Dick ruins his with weak writing and an over-reliance on poop and puke jokes.

Scott and I fled as soon as it was over and figured, since it was 11:30, we might as well go to another SXSW-sponsored party. They have them almost every night, and while Sundance’s official parties are usually lame, SXSW’s tend to be much more “off the hook,” as the kids say (unless the kids do not say that). We were both tired, but hey, SXSW comes but once a year. So party on!

We ran into Erik as we were entering Maggie Mae’s, a large tavern on 6th Street. The SXSW party (again open to all passholders) was on the second level, which is completely outdoors — the roof of the building, essentially. The weather was perfect for it, still warm even at midnight (and humid, but no one listens anymore when I complain about that).

And it was packed! We saw actress Clea DuVall with what someone alleged was her date, a very pretty woman about her same age. If Clea DuVall is a lesbian, and if that’s common knowledge, I’m not going to be the one to mention it. Erik saw David Cross enter the party and later saw him leave, but we never saw him in the meantime. Xander Berkeley — best known as tragic figure George Mason on the first few seasons of “24″ — was there, as he had been at last night’s party (which I forgot to mention last night). And so was Kevin Corrigan, who everyone recognized from TV’s “Grounded for Life” and who has been in several movies I’ve seen but who didn’t look the least bit familiar to me.

Speaking of “Grounded for Life,” Scott and I wound up talking to a couple of SXSW volunteers, pixie-faced Amber and her guy friend Greg, and we learned that Amber works for a WB affiliate. Greg said with the upcoming merger between WB and UPN, merchandise with the WB logo is being clearance-saled off the shelves, which led to Amber buying six “Grounded for Life” mugs for a dollar. I don’t know why I thought that was so funny, but I did.

Greg also did an impression of Christopher Walken helping someone parallel park, and told me what the cool kids call Austin: ATX. So I was glad I ran into him.

We also met Tally Abecassis, director of the cute Canadian documentary “Lifelike,” about taxidermists. I screened the film before the festival and had already posted a review, and Scott had interviewed her for HBS.com. She remembered him, and I mentioned I had written a review, and she said, “Oh? Is it …?” She wanted to know if it was positive or negative. I panicked momentarily as I scanned my mental hard drive: What if I hated this movie?! But no, I liked it, and told her so. Whew.

After staying far too long at the party, we returned to the hotel, stopping yet again for a slice of pizza from one of the many vendors on 6th Street, which looked like Mardi Gras tonight. While Erik and I slept, Scott watched two screeners. And I tried to sleep on my side so I wouldn’t snore as much.