October 9th, 2014.
It was only yesterday that the Red Carpet in front of the Odeon Leicester was graced by Rain, Benedict Cumberbatch and Keira Knightley for the BFI London Film Festival opening gala for "The Imitation Game". Just one day later, at the same location, a different Red Carpet was graced by Rain, More Rain, and Ansel Elgort.
Here's how it went down.
This is not the Odeon Leicester Square. This is across the square at the Odeon West End, where the premiere of "Bjork : Biophilia" was to have taken place. Except then Bjork cancelled and the idea of going to the premiere of the movie without the main star showing up seemed rather silly. On which note...
This is the Odeon Leicester Square, and we have been informed that lead actor Adam Sandler will not be attending, and lead actress Jennifer Garner has cancelled her attendance. In the absence of evidence of a serious reason, I will assume their non-attendance was because Ms Garner took one look outside her hotel bar and said "that rain will ruin my hair for sure" while Mr Sandler was busy elsewhere lighting cigars with $100 bills.
Fortunately for the organisers, the event for "Men Women & Children" did not become an empty wasteland in the wake of the two main stars canceling. Actually, it became clear that the majority of the young and female crowd probably had no idea who Adam Sandler was and they were here to see Ansel Elgort, a name so bizarre you know it must be true. Apparently he's the male lead of the recent Teen Cancer Sufferers Romance movie "The Fault in Our Stars"
This is the girlfriend of the guy signing autographs to her left (Chris? Charles? David?). She seems like she'd rather be anywhere else. Her combination black dress / yellow raincoat seems to want to be in two different places at once.
She: "I'm just saying... you're spending all your time posing with other girls and I'm RIGHT HERE"
He : "Babe, that's because none of the guys here want to pose with me! I can't help that"
This is not Ansel Elgort. This is director Jason Reitman, who has directed a couple of films, including the Ellen Paige/Michael Cera teen pregnancy movie Juno (2007), The George Clooney / Anna Kendrick movie Up In The Air (2009) and the Charlize Theron black-comedy (?) Young Adult (2011). The girl in the dress is also in this movie... more on her later.
"Hey, don't sweat it. I've got a phone just like that. Just not in pink. Mine's baby-blue/lilac". Gird your ears, for that high-pitched screaming you're possibly hearing is for the arrival of Ansel Elgort.
The Girl in the Spectacularly Crocheted Dress (which is not a David Fincher sequel) is Kaitlyn Dever, possibly best known for roles in "Bad Teacher" with Cameron Diaz, and as "Palmer's Daughter" in the movie "J.Edgar". But mostly I think it's possibly because of the dress.
Meanwhile, the possibly now-single David-or-Chris-or-Charles is continuing his foray into selfies-with-pink-phones territory to my left.
Ansel. So Hot Right Now. Ansel
(Yeah... I made a 'Zoolander' joke, from a movie that's almost from last Century)
"So I was like, OMG that's Ansel Elgort!!!! So for the first day I did nothing but take selfies and update my twitter and facebook and instagram."
"Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's probably eight point six trillion drops of rain and I should probably take out my contacts..." Apparently this is one of the film's producers. I'm not sure which one, but fortunately for me imdb.com exists and there are five producers only one of whom has a female name. But I don't subscribe to gender stereotypes, so I'm guessing she's Jason Blumenfeld.
"Prepare my carriage. It has begun". Sounds scary.
Director Jason Reitman has been nominated for four Academy Awards, but when it rains he still gets wet, and when the crowd is this average age they'll still all be shouting for Ansel Elgort and presumably wondering who the Old Guy is.
"If this dress gets any more waterlogged it's going to weigh more than I do, and you'll have to roll me along this red carpet". The weather does seem to have turned. Welcome, as yesterday, to London in Autumn.
"There's nothing wrong with your camera, ladies. It's just that my suit really is that sparkly" Ansel Elgort has hit our part of the crowd, and I am being easily outmuscled by girls less than half my age and bodyweight.
"Along with about 400 girls, there's also a guy over there who wants to hug you. I'll leave it up to you. He seems nice"
Ansel Elgort was also in the movie Divergent (2014). Because... of course he was. The Nikon I used for this shot appears to have underexposed by about 9 stops to commemorate this, and I don't actually mind.
"What was it like working with Ansel Elgort, and do you know where Adam Sandler is?"
"Divergent was totally groundbreaking, GRANDAD". Yeah, and so were all the other movies it copied.
"What was it like working with Ansel Elgort? Well... I kept trying to take selfies with him. It was weird."
Good news for fans of rain. We've got more of it.
My eye is fixed on the infinite calm of the girl at the bottom, who is probably getting a high score on Fruit Ninja and is letting nothing and no-one interfere with her Flow
Sometimes I do wonder whether it's better to be single and doing this in this kind of weather... or being single and at home watching TV. Right now, I'd rather be Adam Sandler, lighting cigars with hundred dollar bills....
"Guys? I'm honoured that you came, but right now you should probably find higher ground"
So... that was the glitz and glamour of a London Premiere, apparently. Still... I did kind of enjoy it. Rain might be uncomfortable (and probably not recommended for the longevity of camera equipment), but it adds a nice uniquenes and random element to photography. Wouldn't want to do it every day, but this was decent. I'm off doing other things tomorrow, but I'll be out soon enough as London Film Festival continues, but in the meantime it's "another premiere for the Archive of Movie Premieres".
Until Next Time!
ps. if you ever want to know when I post one of these journals, feel free to follow me on twitter @berndt2_photo or facebook at premieresdotco.