Writing about a film festival that has only just begun takes some imagination. A festival programme is a very different entity from the festival itself, and sometimes what sounds like an exciting line-up on paper can fail to live up to its promise in reality. On the other hand, sometimes a festival that doesn’t grab you on the page becomes an unforgettable experience as it unfolds, due to the presentation of unexpected gems and, also, the warmth, atmosphere and dialogue created by the audience.

There are parallels to this in the filmmaking process itself: countless unpredictable factors, from financial limitations to the weather, come to define a completed film. I’ve worked as a filmmaker as well as a film critic, so I’ve learned the hard way that a director’s “vision” is not just an ability to visualise the film he wants to make. It’s also the ability to see how this can be achieved in reality, and how the more uncooperative elements of life can be harnessed to this end.

In the past few months I’ve directed three short films and, coming to Festival de Lima, I’ve been trying to rewire my brain to think like a film critic again. Watching films as a filmmaker, my thoughts tend to be self-centred: “I would have done that differently” or “I wish I’d thought of that first”. But there is also something to be gained as a viewer and critic by this kind of hands-on experience. It reminds you of the tremendous physical struggle that realising a film requires and the ways that chance and misfortune, time and money, relationships and egos can all invigorate and interfere with the best laid plans. It’s this knowledge that led American filmmaker John Cassavetes to exclaim, “Anyone who can make a film, I already love.”

We may be unlikely to hear a film critic say the same thing anytime soon, but just this once, can we perhaps paraphrase Cassavetes’ statement for the endeavour that is the Festival de Lima and say, “Anyone who can make a film festival, we already love”?