Really sweet thank you video from True/False and Boxcar Films:

I’m stuck in an airport hotel in St Louis. Lots of flights have been canceled because of bad weather in NYC but I’m still feeling the happy glow from True/False and a wifi connection is a wifi connection so all is not lost.

Saturday and Sunday were jam-packed with great screenings and super-fun parties. More on the films to come but here is the final installment of photos.

True/False is on the telly!

Buskers before the final screening of The Yes Men Fix The World in the beautiful and newly renovated Missouri Theatre – they did a banjo version of Paradise City. Yup.

The Rowdy Bunch: Nate Truesdell, Josh Weinstein, Todd Sklar, Jamie Jay Johnson, Danielle DiGiacomo, Natalie Difford and me

Men with great hair: Jamie Jay Johnson and Josh Weinstein

Bryan Stamp (Participant Media), Brian Brooks (indieWIRE) and David Wilson (True/False)

Jamie, me and Nicholas Abrahams (his film The Posters Came From The Walls is really good and very funny – it looks at Depeche Mode fandom all over the world in hilarious sequences that add up to something entirely pleasing)

The most excellent Ionic Furjanic got us all dancing at a party on the final night

The March March parade up Broadway makes everyone smile. I was talking to someone about it afterwards and she said how nice it was to see grown-ups jumping up and down and grinning inanely and what an incredible sense of community an anarchic parade like this creates. Amen! Here’s the evidence.

This fine lady was giving out buttons that said I AM LOVED in lots of different languages

Esther Robinson (a Swami here this year), with Sky Sitney (Silverdocs)

Stephanie Skaff, AJ Schnack, Mark Rosenberg (Rooftop Films) and David Wilson (True/False – whoo hoo!!!) – apologies to all for my over-enthusiastic flash

Natalie Difford (Chicken & Egg), Brent Hoff (Wholphin), and me

The legendary Exene Cervenka busks before Sounds Like Teen Spirit (I was too awestruck to get close enough to take a proper picture)

Me, Jess Search (BRITDOC) and Jamie Jay Johnson after Jamie’s packed screening of Sounds Like Teen Spirit. I’m utterly biased but I enjoyed the screening immensely and I think everyone else did too. Hooray!

I arrived in Columbia, Missouri yesterday and was immediately swallowed up into the documentary joys of True/False (not to mention the excellent cheeseburgers at Booches). I’m about to join the March March parade up Broadway and then see Ondi Timoner’s We Live in Public followed by Jamie Jay Johnson’s Sounds Like Teen Spirit. My kind of Friday night! Here are some photos from the last 24 hours.

True/False cupcakes in the Ragtag

Me in a Jamie Jay Johnson (Director of Sounds Like Teen Spirit) and Nicholas Abrahams (Co-Director of The Posters Came From The Walls) sandwich

Brian Brooks (indieWIRE), AJ Schnack (All These Wonderful Things blog), Rachel Rosen (LA Film Festival) and Karina Longworth (Spout blog)

Jamie Jay Johnson, Jess Search (BRITDOC) and Heather Croall (Sheffield Doc/Fest) – so great to see these lovely people here in the middle of America.

Havana Marking (Director of Afghan Star) and Pamela Cohn (Still in Motion blog)

Todd Griffin (composer, musician, member of The Quavers) and Matt Dentler (Cinetic)

These were the bumpers that preceded all the films at True/False. Parkour, or freerunning, is incredible to watch, the films are beautifully-made (directed by Nathan Truesdell), and the audience applauded each and every time which is not the usual response to a pre-film bumper! The last two are especially impressive so make sure you watch those.

It seems that those of us who were in Columbia over the weekend can’t help but spread the love. Danielle DiGiacomo wrote a lovely review of the fest on the IndiePix blog. I love the idea of David and Paul as “bold and foolish lambs” convincing the rest of us to leap with them.

Here are some more pics – all taken by Shooting People’s Jesse Epstein who had a great short film called 34×25x36 at True/False. 34×25x36 is also screening at SXSW so you can catch it there if you’re going to be in Austin.

David Wilson talking to John Pierson and Anna Boinowksi (director of Forbidden Lies)

Paul Sturtz with Chris Bell (director of Bigger Stronger Faster*)

The wonderful Mucca Pazza at the Parade

True/False is larger than life

Mucca Pazza at the Lover’s Leap party

The awesome Scott Beibin from Evil Twin with his veggie powered van filled with Steaz

Blogger Joel Heller tries his hand at the saw.

John Flansburgh from They Might Be Giants stands behind Jesse at the Volunteer’s Party, the last hurrah of the fest.

Nobody wanted the party to end

I knew I was going to like True/False before I arrived in Columbia, Missouri for the first time this year. Everyone who has gone in the past has raved about how friendly and fun it is and how David Wilson and Paul Sturtz, the festival founders, always program a really interesting slate of films. I was not disappointed. In fact I was quite bowled over.

The films were excellent, the parties were fun and everybody was so friendly it was almost disconcerting (for a Brit living in New York it’s a bit of a shock to the system). The local community gets very involved in the festival which means that there are enthusiastic volunteers everywhere and screenings are packed with locals rather than industry folk. And they really do come out to support the films. Every screening I went to was full or nearly full and most people stayed to participate in energetic Q&As after the screenings. I never saw the old Ragtag cinema but the new building is a great focal point for the fest and the Uprise Bakery kept me in caffeine and ginger peach muffins throughout.

I saw some wonderful films and will write more about these later but I, like many others, was blown away by Anna Broinowski’s Forbidden Lies and am really curious to know why it essentially vanished after screening at HotDocs last year. Forbidden Lies is the story of a woman with just a touch of The Usual Suspect’s Keyser Soze about her. In the spirit of True/False, we had been having some interesting debates about the nature of truth in documentary storytelling during the long ride from Kansas City Airport and continuing over coffee and beers in the Ragtag, and this film is a mascot for probing the slash between truth and fiction. Broinowski did a great Q&A with Brent Hoff from Wholphin that included the following classic lines:

The marriage between a con artist and a filmmaker is a match made in heaven.

To make documentary portrait you need to gain someone’s trust and then betray them. But in this case I was the one who was betrayed.

Norma (the film’s subject) was a joy to work with. One of the most fascinating things to watch is someone lying on film.

Other highlights for me were the wonderful closing night film James Marsh’s Man on Wire, Antoine Cattin’s and Pavel Kostamarov’s beautifully shot The Mother, and Andrey Paounov’s funny and disturbing The Mosquito Problem (and Other Stories).

David and Paul wrote in the festival guide:

“We started out this year debating whether we could have a fest at all. The Missouri Theatre was closing for renovations, Ragtag was getting ready to move. It all seemed a little overwhelming. But we decided to take the leap, jumping into the unknown with the hope that a net would appear.”

They jumped and the net did appear which is lucky for all of us who could be there to revel in the love that True/False inspired – for great films and good people and Mucca Pazza, best marching band EVER.

Mucca Pazza at the March into March parade up Broadway on Friday

At the parade

Mucca Pazza played again at the Lovers Leap Party later that night – I took this with my iPhone but I think it’s rather lovely

Trombones are the way forward!

Anna Broinowksi and Brent Hoff during the Q&A after a screening of Forbidden Lies

IndiePix’s Danielle DiGiacomo and her sister Alana at the Reality Bites event

Buskers played before every screening which is a really great idea. This is Andy Smetanka, who is also an animator, playing the saw.

Filmmaker Josh Weinstein (pretending to be on the phone) and Rivkah Beth Medow who co-directed Sons of a Gun

Paul and David got a standing ovation before the final screening of Man on Wire. Aw, bless.

The fest ended on Sunday night with a super-fun They Might Be Giants show. And then it was over. Sigh.

I’m going to be attending the True/False Film Fest for the very first time next weekend. I can’t wait to discover why everybody loves this fest so much although I do know David and Paul, the fest founders, and they’re both thoroughly lovely people which must have a lot to do with it.

I’m really looking forward to finally getting a chance to see Hold Me Tight Let Me Go and Please Vote for Me, both of which I hear are very good. Kim Longinotto is one of my favorite documentary filmmakers so I’m especially excited to see Hold Me Tight. And Stranded is also screening which I missed countless times at Sundance due to illness and exceptionally poor time management!

The full schedule is up on their website. I’ll report back on the joys of Columbia, Missouri next week.