FFCC member Reuben Pereira attended the opening night festivities of the 2014 Miami International Film Festival, which kicked off on Friday, March 7. The following is an excerpt from his post, which originally appeared at FilmFrontier.

I have a confession to make: I’m a Miami International Film Festival virgin. Well, a virgin as far as covering the festival as a press member. Even though I’ve been reviewing movies professionally in South Florida for over six years now, South Florida’s premiere film festival had never been a priority.

After attending last year’s successful 30th anniversary festival, at which I caught Pablo Larrain’s sharp political thriller No, Thomas Vinterberg’s searing The Hunt, as well as an enlightening Critics Panel at the Miami Beach Cinematheque, I decided that it was about time I put on my big boy shoes and showed up to the party. Since this is my first year covering the fest, I’ve opted to pace myself and only cover eight films. I’ll be posting my diary entries on each film over the course of the next seven days.

No film festival coverage is complete without the opening night festivities and thus it was MIFF’s opening night premiere of Michael Radford’s Elsa & Fred where I decided to kick things off. I didn’t make it to the Olympia in time for the red carpet arrivals, but I didn’t need to because one look-around the theater was all I needed to gauge the glitzy festive temperature of the evening. Photographers and television anchors lined the aisles, desperate to get a shot of the stars – among them Elsa & Fred leading players Shirley McClaine and Christopher Plummer, filmmaker Jonathan Demme, actor Jared Gilman, as well as Anne Hathaway, whose last minute appearance caused photographers to lose their temporary sanity. Audiences, on the other hand, seemed to be relishing the evening. Dolled up in Miami-chic, they laughed, socialized and caught up with their weekly gossip as they emptied their cocktail and wine glasses, waiting for the lights to dim down.

Continue reading at Film Frontier