Chinese Xinjiang, Uyghur minority, Islam, forced marriage: sensitive enough keywords to ring the bell of contentious debates or trigger internet chats censorship. But I stop you right here: Nikah is not a political movie. Nikah is a contemporary coming-of-age tale set in a repressive backdrop. This is where fiction can sometimes surpass documentary, as it is not bound by considerations of witness accounts or ruled by “cinéma vérité” dogma. The camera serves a narrative here, not an agenda.
Nikah is screening at CAAMFest
Dilber is a 27-year-old Uyghur woman. It is now high time for her to get married. These two sentences are obviously charged with meaning. But Dilber is also a modern young adult whose life revolves around her mobile phone and social media, a window to the world, like most of young Chinese women of her age. So, when her friend Gulnur, living in Paris, proposes a long-distance...
Nikah is screening at CAAMFest
Dilber is a 27-year-old Uyghur woman. It is now high time for her to get married. These two sentences are obviously charged with meaning. But Dilber is also a modern young adult whose life revolves around her mobile phone and social media, a window to the world, like most of young Chinese women of her age. So, when her friend Gulnur, living in Paris, proposes a long-distance...
- 5/19/2024
- by Jean Claude
- AsianMoviePulse
Cannes Directors’ Fortnight is launching a new People’s Choice audience award at its upcoming edition, running alongside the main festival from May 15-26.
The parallel section said the award, which comes with a €7,500 cash prize, was in keeping with the spirit of the event, which has always been open to members of the public alongside cinema professionals since its launch in 1969.
It will be the first audience award to be introduced in Cannes, across the Official Selection and the parallel sections of Directors’ Fortnight, Critics’ Week and Acid.
“Every year, in addition to professionals and other accredited guests, the Fortnight opens its doors to thousands of cinephiles from around the world, in order to share its selection in a welcoming setting, giving filmmakers the opportunity to meet the first audience for their films, and the audiences a chance to take part in Q&As with film teams,” Directors’ Fortnight said in a statement.
The parallel section said the award, which comes with a €7,500 cash prize, was in keeping with the spirit of the event, which has always been open to members of the public alongside cinema professionals since its launch in 1969.
It will be the first audience award to be introduced in Cannes, across the Official Selection and the parallel sections of Directors’ Fortnight, Critics’ Week and Acid.
“Every year, in addition to professionals and other accredited guests, the Fortnight opens its doors to thousands of cinephiles from around the world, in order to share its selection in a welcoming setting, giving filmmakers the opportunity to meet the first audience for their films, and the audiences a chance to take part in Q&As with film teams,” Directors’ Fortnight said in a statement.
- 3/27/2024
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
Modern Chinese documentary echoes with radicality, with Wang Bing's “West of the Tracks” (2002) and Liu Jiayin's “Oxhide” (2005) serving as flag bearers. Zhang Mengqi is definitively part of this lineage, with “47km 2020” being the 10th instalment of a colossal documental project titled “Self-Portrait”.
Self Portrait: 47 km 2020 is screening at MoMi, as part of the First Look 2024 program
Let us begin by decoding the enigmatic title. “Self Portrait” implies an exploration of identity, yet it diverges from the self-centered, self-indulgent introspection typical of Western cinema of individuals. Instead, the author seeks to achieve it by scrutinizing her origins and intimately exploring her familial and rural environmental influences. A passive form of self-portrayal in a way. “47km”? At 47 kilometers from Suizhou, Hebei, lies her native village. An anonymous name for an everywhere village. Interesting to note that Diaoyutai village has undergone several name changes over time and now stands as only 42Km,...
Self Portrait: 47 km 2020 is screening at MoMi, as part of the First Look 2024 program
Let us begin by decoding the enigmatic title. “Self Portrait” implies an exploration of identity, yet it diverges from the self-centered, self-indulgent introspection typical of Western cinema of individuals. Instead, the author seeks to achieve it by scrutinizing her origins and intimately exploring her familial and rural environmental influences. A passive form of self-portrayal in a way. “47km”? At 47 kilometers from Suizhou, Hebei, lies her native village. An anonymous name for an everywhere village. Interesting to note that Diaoyutai village has undergone several name changes over time and now stands as only 42Km,...
- 3/26/2024
- by Jean Claude
- AsianMoviePulse
The East Asia Film Festival Ireland (Eaffi) and the Irish Film Institute (Ifi) are delighted to announce the programme for the eighth edition of the festival, which will take place this year from Thursday, March 7th to Sunday, March 10th, bringing works from prominent and
emerging writers and directors from diverse cultural and social backgrounds across East Asian cinema to audiences in Ireland. These films reflect on individual and communal experiences, and observe and explore life and relationships in an eclectic mix of fiction, documentary, and classic titles. At the programme's centre is a season of rare screenings by auteur filmmaker Edward Yang (1947–2007) – four masterworks from one of the most iconic figures, alongside Hou Hsiao-Hsien, of the Taiwanese New Wave film movement of the early 1980s.
Each of the four special screenings will be introduced by Taiwanese film producer Chuti Chang. They will be:
A Confucian Confusion , which charts the...
emerging writers and directors from diverse cultural and social backgrounds across East Asian cinema to audiences in Ireland. These films reflect on individual and communal experiences, and observe and explore life and relationships in an eclectic mix of fiction, documentary, and classic titles. At the programme's centre is a season of rare screenings by auteur filmmaker Edward Yang (1947–2007) – four masterworks from one of the most iconic figures, alongside Hou Hsiao-Hsien, of the Taiwanese New Wave film movement of the early 1980s.
Each of the four special screenings will be introduced by Taiwanese film producer Chuti Chang. They will be:
A Confucian Confusion , which charts the...
- 2/11/2024
- by Adriana Rosati
- AsianMoviePulse
Here. Stay here. See what the news is going to be tomorrow. Graves grow no green that you can use. Remember, green’s your color. You are Spring. —Gwendolyn Brooks, “To the Young Who Want to Die”Cynicism has no place in Bas Devos’s Here (2023), a meshwork of small utopias in which the most urgent problem, on the surface of things, is the prospect of some vegetables going to waste. Set in Brussels, the nominal center of the European Union, this hopeful film takes shelter from present political crises and follows two placid characters, a first-generation Romanian migrant and a second-generation Chinese Belgian academic, whose narratives of minor events entwine in two chance encounters. They take cover from the rain with each other. They cross paths on wooded trails.If the deictic of the title—that lovely, laconic “here”—signals a stance of presence, then it is a stance...
- 2/5/2024
- MUBI
Tamara Tatishvili is going full steam into her first edition of the International Film Festival Rotterdam, which runs Jan. 25 – Feb. 4, following her appointment as the head of the festival’s funding arm, the Hubert Bals Fund. She started full-time in early January.
“I will use the festival to connect to professionals outside of IFFR, hosting informal think tank meetings with industry professionals, producers and sales agents within a close environment to see what their observations and ideas are, and how this could feed into the future thinking strategies of Hubert Bals Fund,” she tells Variety.
She went on to emphasize the importance of festivals from a funder’s point of view. “Festivals are key platforms to connect the stories funds help create to audiences. Audience engagement is a key topic. Funders and producers believe films need to be made to reach audiences. It’s how you create impact and how...
“I will use the festival to connect to professionals outside of IFFR, hosting informal think tank meetings with industry professionals, producers and sales agents within a close environment to see what their observations and ideas are, and how this could feed into the future thinking strategies of Hubert Bals Fund,” she tells Variety.
She went on to emphasize the importance of festivals from a funder’s point of view. “Festivals are key platforms to connect the stories funds help create to audiences. Audience engagement is a key topic. Funders and producers believe films need to be made to reach audiences. It’s how you create impact and how...
- 1/25/2024
- by Rafa Sales Ross
- Variety Film + TV
“I don’t find the definition of Chinese filmmakers by generation to be a useful tool,” said Marco Mueller, introducing dark satire “The Movie Emperor” as the opening film of the first edition of his Festival of Young Cinema (Asia-Europe) in Macau on Friday. “Much more interesting is the concept of exchange between new and old and between East and West.”
“The new forces of Chinese cinema are present and participating. More than 100 young filmmakers will have the opportunity to meet and interact with names including Amir Naderi, Aleksei German Jr and Yonfan,” Mueller continued. While Macau is these days best known for its high-tech casinos, the former Portuguese colony has long been a venue for international cultural exchange and retains ambitions to restore some of that diversity.
Along with screenings of 27 films and 17 works in progress, masterclasses and on-stage dialogs are a key educational tool on offer at the...
“The new forces of Chinese cinema are present and participating. More than 100 young filmmakers will have the opportunity to meet and interact with names including Amir Naderi, Aleksei German Jr and Yonfan,” Mueller continued. While Macau is these days best known for its high-tech casinos, the former Portuguese colony has long been a venue for international cultural exchange and retains ambitions to restore some of that diversity.
Along with screenings of 27 films and 17 works in progress, masterclasses and on-stage dialogs are a key educational tool on offer at the...
- 1/5/2024
- by Patrick Frater
- Variety Film + TV
Ning Hao’s The Movie Emperor will screen as the opening film of Macau’s Asia-Europe Young Cinema Film Festival, which is holding its inaugural edition from January 5-11. Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s 12th Fail, recently a hit in India, will screen as the closing film.
The event has two major sections – a programme of masterclasses and screenings aimed at young directors, film students and local audiences, and a Works-in-Progress (WiP) Lab, which will be attended by international sales agents, distributors and festival programmers.
The masterclasses will be held by leading international filmmakers including several from the Chinese-speaking world – Ning Hao, Li Dongmei, Johnnie To, Yon Fan and Lee Hong-chi – along with Japanese filmmakers Ryosuke Hamaguchi and Shinya Tsukamoto, Russia’s Aleksey German Jr, Italy’s Gabriel Menetti, India’s Anurag Kashyap, Lav Diaz from the Philippines and Iranian filmmaker Amir Naderi.
China Film Directors Association is actively involved in...
The event has two major sections – a programme of masterclasses and screenings aimed at young directors, film students and local audiences, and a Works-in-Progress (WiP) Lab, which will be attended by international sales agents, distributors and festival programmers.
The masterclasses will be held by leading international filmmakers including several from the Chinese-speaking world – Ning Hao, Li Dongmei, Johnnie To, Yon Fan and Lee Hong-chi – along with Japanese filmmakers Ryosuke Hamaguchi and Shinya Tsukamoto, Russia’s Aleksey German Jr, Italy’s Gabriel Menetti, India’s Anurag Kashyap, Lav Diaz from the Philippines and Iranian filmmaker Amir Naderi.
China Film Directors Association is actively involved in...
- 1/4/2024
- by Liz Shackleton
- Deadline Film + TV
No reasonably intelligent person imagines an artist’s statement about the horrors in Gaza would, in fact, end those horrors, but there are always limits to what one can take and hopes for what one could do. It might even be said that, as observers of the world and human behavior, filmmakers are especially inclined to recoil. When I interviewed Pedro Costa last month he spoke, unprompted, of a situation that’s only grown worse: “It’s very clear that we cannot stand images anymore. I can’t. I can’t. The images of the world for me [Exhales] I can’t. I turn my eyes, and I’m sure you do the same. It’s unbearable.” When I spoke with Anthony Dod Mantle a couple of weeks later it, again, emerged––vis-a-vis The Zone of Interest, whose own cinematographer alluded to it the next day. It’s difficult being a person in the world,...
- 12/29/2023
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
Each winter, we invite Notebook contributors to take part in our unique twist on the year-end poll. Rather than tally their favorite new releases from the year, they’re asked to creatively pair a new release with an older film they watched for the first time that year: a “fantasy double feature.” We’re delighted by the range of responses this year; this year’s doubles offer up inspired combinations of moving-image art that might otherwise slip through the cracks.We invite you to plunge into this collective viewing scrapbook, which captures our writers at their most imaginative, adventurous, and thoughtful—maybe it'll motivate you to test some of these out (or come up with your own) over the holidays.We hope you enjoy the read, and find our sixteenth year appropriately sweet!{{notebook_form}}Paul AttardNEW: Skinamarink + Old: Room Film 1973Homebound horror films shrouded in darkness, ones that transform...
- 12/23/2023
- MUBI
As various critics groups and awards bodies dole out their top films of the year, it can be hard to parse which ones are actually worth paying attention to. Following our top 50 films of 2023, one such list has arrived today with Film Comment’s annual end-of-year survey. Revealed at a special live talk last night, Todd Haynes’s May December, Kelly Reichardt’s Showing Up, and Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon grabbed the top three spots, while Eduardo Williams’s The Human Surge 3, Lisandro Alonso’s Eureka, and Víctor Erice’s Close Your Eyes topped the best undistributed films.
“It speaks to the ongoing vitality of cinema as an art form, as well as the discernment of our critics in the year of ‘Barbenheimer,’ that this year’s top films represent some of the most boundary-pushing, complex movies of recent times—three new classics from contemporary masters,...
“It speaks to the ongoing vitality of cinema as an art form, as well as the discernment of our critics in the year of ‘Barbenheimer,’ that this year’s top films represent some of the most boundary-pushing, complex movies of recent times—three new classics from contemporary masters,...
- 12/15/2023
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Chinese director Wang Bing returned this summer to the Cannes International Film Festival, where, in 2018, his nearly 500-minute documentary Dead Souls premiered. Youth (Spring) (2023) compromises half of those minutes, in which Wang partially abandons the conventions of observational documentary and his tendency to blend into the landscape, emerging more present than ever. However, he remains true to the idea that the created intimacy – the reciprocal bonds among the members of a small community of workers in Zhili and that which develops between them and their audience – can only be achieved through the extended moments on screen.
Workers in the tailoring workshops come from the neighboring regions of the industrialised textile city, and they are largely young, some even underage. Those who accept the working conditions are housed in the proximity of the workspaces, although the communal quarters are poorly maintained. Despite the popularity gained by...
Workers in the tailoring workshops come from the neighboring regions of the industrialised textile city, and they are largely young, some even underage. Those who accept the working conditions are housed in the proximity of the workspaces, although the communal quarters are poorly maintained. Despite the popularity gained by...
- 12/13/2023
- by Dalesia Cozorici
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Andrew Haigh wins best screenplay for ’All Of Us Strangers’
A wide open awards season saw the Los Angeles Film Critics Association (Lafca) award The Zone Of Interest best film and Jonathan Glazer best director, while Sandra Huller, Emma Stone, Rachel McAdams, and Da’Vine Joy Randolph dominated the gender-neutral acting categories.
The Lafca best film picks are a strong bellwether of Oscar best picture nominations, with only five winners since 2000 missing out on a nod. Last year’s winner for example, Everything Everywhere All At Once, went on to win best picture at the Academy Awards.
Anatomy Of A Fall...
A wide open awards season saw the Los Angeles Film Critics Association (Lafca) award The Zone Of Interest best film and Jonathan Glazer best director, while Sandra Huller, Emma Stone, Rachel McAdams, and Da’Vine Joy Randolph dominated the gender-neutral acting categories.
The Lafca best film picks are a strong bellwether of Oscar best picture nominations, with only five winners since 2000 missing out on a nod. Last year’s winner for example, Everything Everywhere All At Once, went on to win best picture at the Academy Awards.
Anatomy Of A Fall...
- 12/10/2023
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
Returning to Cannes with his first film in five years, Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s About Dry Grasses earned a Best Actress prize for Merve Dizdar. The film follows the young art teacher Samet “who is finishing his fourth year of compulsory service in a remote village in Anatolia. After a turn of events he can hardly make sense of, he loses his hopes of escaping the grim life he seems to be stuck in. Will his encounter with Nuray, herself a teacher, help him overcome his angst?” After this month’s Oscar-qualifying run, Janus-Sideshow will begin unrolling About Dry Grasses on February 23, 2024, ahead of which there’s a U.S. trailer.
Rory O’Connor was impressed with the film at Cannes, writing, “It’s a hallmark of Ceylan’s artistry that those exchanges are as strongly staged as they are dramatic. Here as in another of the director’s Anatolia-set dramas,...
Rory O’Connor was impressed with the film at Cannes, writing, “It’s a hallmark of Ceylan’s artistry that those exchanges are as strongly staged as they are dramatic. Here as in another of the director’s Anatolia-set dramas,...
- 11/28/2023
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
Taiwanese family drama ‘Old Fox’ won the most awards on the night.
China-set drama Stonewalling, directed by husband-and-wife team Huang Ji and Ryuji Otsuka, won best narrative feature at the 60th Golden Horse Awards in Taiwan on Saturday (November 25).
Taiwanese family drama Old Fox won the most awards on the night, including best director for Hsiao Ya-chuan, best supporting actor for veteran Akio Chen, makeup and costume design, and best film score.
Scroll down for full list of winners
Mainland Chinese director Huang and Japan’s Otsuka were in attendance at Taipei’s National Dr Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall to...
China-set drama Stonewalling, directed by husband-and-wife team Huang Ji and Ryuji Otsuka, won best narrative feature at the 60th Golden Horse Awards in Taiwan on Saturday (November 25).
Taiwanese family drama Old Fox won the most awards on the night, including best director for Hsiao Ya-chuan, best supporting actor for veteran Akio Chen, makeup and costume design, and best film score.
Scroll down for full list of winners
Mainland Chinese director Huang and Japan’s Otsuka were in attendance at Taipei’s National Dr Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall to...
- 11/26/2023
- by Silvia Wong
- ScreenDaily
China-set drama Stonewalling, co-directed by husband-and-wife team Ryuji Otsuka and Huang Ji, won best narrative feature at Taiwan’s Golden Horse Awards, which is celebrating its 60th edition this year.
The film, which premiered in Venice and won best film at Hong Kong film festival’s Young Cinema Competition, follows a young woman in mainland China grappling with issues around career, relationships, health and fertility. It also won best editing, which was shared by Otsuka and Taiwan’s Liao Ching-sung, with the latter winning his first Golden Horse award after 12 nominations stretching back four decades.
The awards were evenly spread among the nominated films. Taiwan’s Wu Kang-ren won best leading actor for his role as a deaf-mute in Malaysian drama Abang Adik. Best actress went to 12-year-old Audrey Lin for her role in Trouble Girl, making her the youngest ever best actress winner at the Golden Horse awards.
Best...
The film, which premiered in Venice and won best film at Hong Kong film festival’s Young Cinema Competition, follows a young woman in mainland China grappling with issues around career, relationships, health and fertility. It also won best editing, which was shared by Otsuka and Taiwan’s Liao Ching-sung, with the latter winning his first Golden Horse award after 12 nominations stretching back four decades.
The awards were evenly spread among the nominated films. Taiwan’s Wu Kang-ren won best leading actor for his role as a deaf-mute in Malaysian drama Abang Adik. Best actress went to 12-year-old Audrey Lin for her role in Trouble Girl, making her the youngest ever best actress winner at the Golden Horse awards.
Best...
- 11/25/2023
- by Liz Shackleton
- Deadline Film + TV
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For regular updates, sign up for our weekly email newsletter and follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSCapital.The Palestinian Film Institute and several prominent filmmakers—including Sky Hopinka, Miko Revereza, Maryam Tafakory, Charlie Shackleton, and Basma al-Sharif—have withdrawn from the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam in response to the festival’s messaging about the war in Gaza. On the festival’s opening night, a group of activists took to the stage holding a banner that read “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”; on November 10, IDFA published a statement apologizing to patrons who may have been offended by this “hurtful slogan.” On November 11, the Pfi and the advocacy group Workers for Palestine Netherlands announced their withdrawal from IDFA: “As the world’s largest documentary film festival, IDFA holds the responsibility to respond to the plight of journalists and documentarians on the ground in Gaza,...
- 11/16/2023
- MUBI
Chinese director Wang Bing found joy in latest film “Youth (Spring),” focusing on young textile workers. But as he continues to work on his trilogy, things might get a bit darker.
“Their age is one of the factors here: they are so young and it’s just a happy time in your life. You are experiencing so many things, for example romantic relationships. Their actions are not entirely controlled by rationality, which made for vivid footage,” he tells Variety ahead of traveling to IDFA, where he is this year’s Guest of Honor.
“But here’s the thing – this trilogy is not finished yet. I will finish the second and third part by 2024 and they are not the same [as the first]. Maybe when it is completed, it will feel completely different?”
Despite winning multiple awards over the years, including Locarno’s Golden Leopard for “Mrs. Fang,” making films hasn’t necessarily gotten easier,...
“Their age is one of the factors here: they are so young and it’s just a happy time in your life. You are experiencing so many things, for example romantic relationships. Their actions are not entirely controlled by rationality, which made for vivid footage,” he tells Variety ahead of traveling to IDFA, where he is this year’s Guest of Honor.
“But here’s the thing – this trilogy is not finished yet. I will finish the second and third part by 2024 and they are not the same [as the first]. Maybe when it is completed, it will feel completely different?”
Despite winning multiple awards over the years, including Locarno’s Golden Leopard for “Mrs. Fang,” making films hasn’t necessarily gotten easier,...
- 11/13/2023
- by Marta Balaga
- Variety Film + TV
The Workshop Around the Corner: Bing Threads Through Textile Manufacturing
Having filmed from 2014 to 2019 in the city of Zhili, Youth (Spring), one of the latest projects from director Wang Bing, is potentially the first part of a forthcoming ten hour series. Those familiar with his style will recognize his practical methods of capturing life unfolding, even if this often means forging through elements both banal and potentially mundane, with this latest three-and-a-half-hour exercise being no exception. However, it’s also something of a refreshing departure for Bing considering the subject matter isn’t involving a laser focus on death and degradation.…...
Having filmed from 2014 to 2019 in the city of Zhili, Youth (Spring), one of the latest projects from director Wang Bing, is potentially the first part of a forthcoming ten hour series. Those familiar with his style will recognize his practical methods of capturing life unfolding, even if this often means forging through elements both banal and potentially mundane, with this latest three-and-a-half-hour exercise being no exception. However, it’s also something of a refreshing departure for Bing considering the subject matter isn’t involving a laser focus on death and degradation.…...
- 11/11/2023
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Selected as this year’s Guest of Honor at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), Chinese director Wang Bing sat down with the festival’s artistic director Orwa Nyrabia for an in-depth talk on his career on Friday at the imposing Tuschinski Theatre in the Dutch capital.
Bing commented on not wanting his films to be “political” while reflecting on the entirety of his career, from his nine-hour-long debut “West of the Tracks” to the recent Cannes competition title “Youth (Spring)” — “I’m not particularly interested in politics (…) I don’t want my films to become a political tool. The movies I watched in my childhood were full of politics, ideology and an agenda. I don’t want people to find these elements in the movies I make.”
When prodded by Nyrabia on the subject, the director stated: “I live in a politically sensitive society. All the people involved...
Bing commented on not wanting his films to be “political” while reflecting on the entirety of his career, from his nine-hour-long debut “West of the Tracks” to the recent Cannes competition title “Youth (Spring)” — “I’m not particularly interested in politics (…) I don’t want my films to become a political tool. The movies I watched in my childhood were full of politics, ideology and an agenda. I don’t want people to find these elements in the movies I make.”
When prodded by Nyrabia on the subject, the director stated: “I live in a politically sensitive society. All the people involved...
- 11/11/2023
- by Rafa Sales Ross
- Variety Film + TV
Producer Pierre-Olivier Bardet has become a hero to filmmakers who rock the boat – feature and documentary revolutionaries who work in ways that he says are “completely unique,” as he puts it: Albert Serra, Frederick Wiseman, Wang Bing and Alexandr Sokurov.
And it’s hard to imagine anyone else who would have agreed to produce an English version of Mozart’s “The Magic Flute,” directed by Kenneth Branagh (after Francis Ford Coppola and several luminaries declined the project), set in World War I.
But for Bardet, the fascination of working with those who reject the usual conventions of filmmaking is what drives him – which is a key reason he was honored at this year’s Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival for his contribution to cinema by the Czech producers association.
Bardet’s new film with Serra, focused on the rituals of bullfighting in Spain, is likely to push boundaries still further,...
And it’s hard to imagine anyone else who would have agreed to produce an English version of Mozart’s “The Magic Flute,” directed by Kenneth Branagh (after Francis Ford Coppola and several luminaries declined the project), set in World War I.
But for Bardet, the fascination of working with those who reject the usual conventions of filmmaking is what drives him – which is a key reason he was honored at this year’s Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival for his contribution to cinema by the Czech producers association.
Bardet’s new film with Serra, focused on the rituals of bullfighting in Spain, is likely to push boundaries still further,...
- 10/28/2023
- by Will Tizard
- Variety Film + TV
Veteran French editor Dominique Auvray says there’s an essential intuitive element to her work. The woman who created the sound for “Paris, Texas” and cut such films as “No Fear, No Die,” “L’Amour Fou,” and “Hu-Man” says her career has been built around one key ability: Tuning in to your eyes and ears.
Speaking at the Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival this week, the longtime collaborator with seminal French director and author Marguerite Duras said, “I think the first thing when you are an editor, you have to look and to listen. And to listen at the same time to your heart and your head. And to listen to the director. And to listen to what the images say, you know.”
Auvray says she approached her work on the definitive Duras films “Le Camion,” “Woman of the Ganges” and “Le Navire Night” this way, and is still listening...
Speaking at the Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival this week, the longtime collaborator with seminal French director and author Marguerite Duras said, “I think the first thing when you are an editor, you have to look and to listen. And to listen at the same time to your heart and your head. And to listen to the director. And to listen to what the images say, you know.”
Auvray says she approached her work on the definitive Duras films “Le Camion,” “Woman of the Ganges” and “Le Navire Night” this way, and is still listening...
- 10/28/2023
- by Will Tizard
- Variety Film + TV
Launching an ambitious program of compelling global and Czech work, the 27th edition of the Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival opened on Tuesday, kicking off six days of more than 350 film screenings by veteran and new filmmakers.
Fest head and founder Marek Hovorka, who launched the event in his hometown in 1997, introduced what is now Central and Eastern Europe’s main event for docs, defining the fest mission as “a celebration of films, image, sound, gestures and diversity.”
The films selected this year are “all very original,” he told the opening gala audience, and show filmmakers “perceive the world very differently.”
The fest, raising its curtain in the location that remains its home, the communist-era Dko “house of culture,” as the pre-1989 regime dubbed such multi-purpose spaces, attracts for its launch hundreds of guests seated at white-decked tables, sipping local wine.
Opening night moderators embraced an ironic take on AI,...
Fest head and founder Marek Hovorka, who launched the event in his hometown in 1997, introduced what is now Central and Eastern Europe’s main event for docs, defining the fest mission as “a celebration of films, image, sound, gestures and diversity.”
The films selected this year are “all very original,” he told the opening gala audience, and show filmmakers “perceive the world very differently.”
The fest, raising its curtain in the location that remains its home, the communist-era Dko “house of culture,” as the pre-1989 regime dubbed such multi-purpose spaces, attracts for its launch hundreds of guests seated at white-decked tables, sipping local wine.
Opening night moderators embraced an ironic take on AI,...
- 10/25/2023
- by Will Tizard
- Variety Film + TV
José Luis Cienfuegos is in his first year as festival director, joining after stints in Gijon and Seville.
José Luis Cienfuegos is ready to launch his first edition as director at one of Spain’s oldest film events, Valladolid International Film Week (October 21-28) also known as the Seminici.
Previously in charge of the Gijón and Seville film festivals, Cienfuegos’ Valladolid is embracing new voices and has enhanced industry activities as it continue the work of finding new audiences for independent cinema while debating film heritage in the 21st century.
He talks to Screen about this year’s programme and...
José Luis Cienfuegos is ready to launch his first edition as director at one of Spain’s oldest film events, Valladolid International Film Week (October 21-28) also known as the Seminici.
Previously in charge of the Gijón and Seville film festivals, Cienfuegos’ Valladolid is embracing new voices and has enhanced industry activities as it continue the work of finding new audiences for independent cinema while debating film heritage in the 21st century.
He talks to Screen about this year’s programme and...
- 10/20/2023
- by Elisabet Cabeza
- ScreenDaily
The Portuguese doc fesitival has a reputation for showcasing formally bold films with attitude.
As it celebrates its 21st edition this year, Doclisboa is one of the most radical and innovative of the autumn documentary festivals. It opens today (October 19), taking place in the Portuguese capital of Lisbon until October 29.
Festival director Miguel Ribeiro prides himself on programming films with attitude and this year’s international competition includes shorts screening in the same section as features. Six are world premieres.
Whether they are dealing with politics, art or music, the titles screening in Lisbon tend to be opinionated and formally...
As it celebrates its 21st edition this year, Doclisboa is one of the most radical and innovative of the autumn documentary festivals. It opens today (October 19), taking place in the Portuguese capital of Lisbon until October 29.
Festival director Miguel Ribeiro prides himself on programming films with attitude and this year’s international competition includes shorts screening in the same section as features. Six are world premieres.
Whether they are dealing with politics, art or music, the titles screening in Lisbon tend to be opinionated and formally...
- 10/19/2023
- by Geoffrey Macnab
- ScreenDaily
This year’s edition of the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) will open with the world premiere of “A Picture to Remember” by Olga Chernykh. The film, which received the support of the IDFA Bertha Fund in 2022, is a deeply personal account of the ongoing war in Ukraine and its violent history, seen through the prism of three generations of women.
The full program for the festival’s 36th edition was announced earlier today by IDFA’s artistic director Orwa Nyrabia, who stated the festival’s opening film is “both personal and political,” adding that “the director does not shy away from trying to build a cinematic world with fragile elements. The courage and originality of the film’s approach opens up to a much larger worldview.”
Before announcing this year’s full lineup, Nyrabia took a moment to acknowledge the current Israel-Hamas war: “To us, respecting the human...
The full program for the festival’s 36th edition was announced earlier today by IDFA’s artistic director Orwa Nyrabia, who stated the festival’s opening film is “both personal and political,” adding that “the director does not shy away from trying to build a cinematic world with fragile elements. The courage and originality of the film’s approach opens up to a much larger worldview.”
Before announcing this year’s full lineup, Nyrabia took a moment to acknowledge the current Israel-Hamas war: “To us, respecting the human...
- 10/18/2023
- by Rafa Sales Ross
- Variety Film + TV
Fix up and look sharp, NYC filmgoers: Wang Bing‘s latest, “Youth (Spring),” begins its US theatrical rollout at Metograph next month. And the new documentary is just the first in a trilogy of new films Wang Bing has worked on since 2014. So if “Youth (Spring)” ends up a year-end favorite, get ready for two more films featuring the same people in due time.
Read More: ‘Youth (Spring)’ Review: The Kids Are Underpaid & Flirty [Cannes]
Premiering at Cannes earlier this year alongside Wang Bing’s other new film, “Man In Black,” “Youth (Spring)” charts the social and economic evolutions in 21st-century China through the lives of young migrant textile workers in Zhili, a factory town outside Shanghai.
Continue reading ‘Youth (Spring)’ Trailer: The First Doc In Wang Bing’s New Trilogy Arrives At Metrograph On November 10 at The Playlist.
Read More: ‘Youth (Spring)’ Review: The Kids Are Underpaid & Flirty [Cannes]
Premiering at Cannes earlier this year alongside Wang Bing’s other new film, “Man In Black,” “Youth (Spring)” charts the social and economic evolutions in 21st-century China through the lives of young migrant textile workers in Zhili, a factory town outside Shanghai.
Continue reading ‘Youth (Spring)’ Trailer: The First Doc In Wang Bing’s New Trilogy Arrives At Metrograph On November 10 at The Playlist.
- 10/13/2023
- by Ned Booth
- The Playlist
Ji.hlava Intl. Documentary Film Festival has unveiled the program for its 27th edition, which will take place in the Czech city of Jihlava between Oct. 24-29. The festival will showcase 357 films in both competitive and non-competitive sections, with 115 world premieres, 22 international premieres and 17 European premieres.
This year’s program touches on themes of artificial intelligence and new technologies, the changing planetary climate, migration, transformation of the democratic system and society, as well as the search for new paths to freedom and happiness.
Festival director Marek Hovorka says of the concept of this year’s edition: “The world in which we live is rapidly changing, and this year’s Ji.hlava brings images of these transformations. The films in the program are thematically and formally very diverse, allowing us to recognize and contemplate the world’s transformation.”
Works related to the theme of this year’s Ji.hlava include Sophie Compton...
This year’s program touches on themes of artificial intelligence and new technologies, the changing planetary climate, migration, transformation of the democratic system and society, as well as the search for new paths to freedom and happiness.
Festival director Marek Hovorka says of the concept of this year’s edition: “The world in which we live is rapidly changing, and this year’s Ji.hlava brings images of these transformations. The films in the program are thematically and formally very diverse, allowing us to recognize and contemplate the world’s transformation.”
Works related to the theme of this year’s Ji.hlava include Sophie Compton...
- 10/13/2023
- by Rafa Sales Ross
- Variety Film + TV
Wang Bing might not have released any new films in the last half-decade, but that is only because he’s been hard at work shooting his new trilogy. Captured between 2014 and 2019, the director’s new project documents the social and economic transformation of 21st-century China through the eyes of young migrant workers laboring in textile factories in the town of Zhili, outside Shanghai. Youth (Spring), one of two new films from the director to premiere at Cannes alongside Man in Black, will now get a theatrical release from Icarus Films starting on November 10 at Metrograph and the first trailer has arrived.
Ethan Vestby said in his review, “Wang Bing’s Youth (Spring) is the first of a supposed trilogy shot from 2014 to 2019 chronicling Millennial and Gen Z (consciously always listing the age when onscreen text introduces a new character) China. And judging by the three-and-a-half-hour runtime, it seems like many...
Ethan Vestby said in his review, “Wang Bing’s Youth (Spring) is the first of a supposed trilogy shot from 2014 to 2019 chronicling Millennial and Gen Z (consciously always listing the age when onscreen text introduces a new character) China. And judging by the three-and-a-half-hour runtime, it seems like many...
- 10/6/2023
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Japan heads the nominations, followed by China.
Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Evil Does Not Exist heads the nominations for the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, with nods in four categories including best film, best director, best screenplay and best cinematography.
The Japanese feature premiered at Venice where it picked up both the jury and Fipresci prize, and centres on a father and daughter in a rural village, whose peaceful lives are disrupted by proposals to build a camping site in their area.
Hamaguchi’s latest film, following Oscar-winner Drive My Car, was just ahead of China’s Snow Leopard by the late Tibetan director Pema Tseden,...
Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Evil Does Not Exist heads the nominations for the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, with nods in four categories including best film, best director, best screenplay and best cinematography.
The Japanese feature premiered at Venice where it picked up both the jury and Fipresci prize, and centres on a father and daughter in a rural village, whose peaceful lives are disrupted by proposals to build a camping site in their area.
Hamaguchi’s latest film, following Oscar-winner Drive My Car, was just ahead of China’s Snow Leopard by the late Tibetan director Pema Tseden,...
- 10/3/2023
- by Michael Rosser
- ScreenDaily
The programme for Doclisboa’23 is now known; the festival will take place between 19 and 29 October at the usual venues: Culturgest, Cinema São Jorge, Cinemateca Portuguesa – Museu do Cinema and Cinema Ideal. In all, the 21st edition of Doclisboa is showing 250 films from 42 countries, including 35 world premieres and 39 Portuguese films. The films reveal the pulse of the world and those who inhabit it.
Doclisboa travels to the inside of the human brain through the lens of Werner Herzog (Theater of Thought), and to the pressing issues of work in The Liberated Broom, Listen to the Story I Was Told, by Coline Grando; delves into memories of past wars and to the current war in Ukraine; film archives; music; and dance.
The press conference was held this morning at Culturgest and was hosted by Miguel Ribeiro (Director of Doclisboa), Mark Deputter (Chairman of the Board – Culturgest), Marco Guerra (Head of the Cultural...
Doclisboa travels to the inside of the human brain through the lens of Werner Herzog (Theater of Thought), and to the pressing issues of work in The Liberated Broom, Listen to the Story I Was Told, by Coline Grando; delves into memories of past wars and to the current war in Ukraine; film archives; music; and dance.
The press conference was held this morning at Culturgest and was hosted by Miguel Ribeiro (Director of Doclisboa), Mark Deputter (Chairman of the Board – Culturgest), Marco Guerra (Head of the Cultural...
- 9/30/2023
- by Rouven Linnarz
- AsianMoviePulse
The Portuguese festival showcases documentaries from around the world.
The 21st edition of DocLisboa will open with Wang Bing’s Man In Black, and will close with Baan from Portuguese director Leonor Teles.
Man In Black premiered at Cannes and Baan made its debut at Locarno earlier this year.
The festival will take place in Lisbon from October 19-29.
Wang Bing, via videoconference, and Telles both participated in the festival press conference on September 28 at which festival director Miguel Ribeiro revealed this year’s programme in full.
Bing explained his film profiles 86-year-old Wang Xilin, one of China’s most important contemporary classical composers,...
The 21st edition of DocLisboa will open with Wang Bing’s Man In Black, and will close with Baan from Portuguese director Leonor Teles.
Man In Black premiered at Cannes and Baan made its debut at Locarno earlier this year.
The festival will take place in Lisbon from October 19-29.
Wang Bing, via videoconference, and Telles both participated in the festival press conference on September 28 at which festival director Miguel Ribeiro revealed this year’s programme in full.
Bing explained his film profiles 86-year-old Wang Xilin, one of China’s most important contemporary classical composers,...
- 9/29/2023
- by Geoffrey Macnab
- ScreenDaily
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSMe and You and Everyone We Know.The Writers Guild of America reached a tentative agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, and have voted to end the strike as of 12:01 a.m. Pt this morning. A summary of the agreement is available here. Before the details were released, the WGA negotiating committee had this to say in a statement: "We can say, with great pride, that this deal is exceptional – with meaningful gains and protections for writers in every sector of the membership." The WGA has also encouraged their members to support SAG-AFTRA's ongoing picket line.A new novel from Miranda July is due out in May of next year: All Fours follows an artist in the throes of a midlife crisis and a messy divorce. While driving...
- 9/27/2023
- MUBI
Wang Bing, an essential Chinese filmmaker and a regular presence in Doclisboa’s programme, returns to the festival with Man in Black, the opening film of the 21st edition, scheduled for 19 October, 9pm, at Cinema São Jorge. Leonor Teles’ first feature-length fiction film, Baan is the closing film of Doclisboa’ 23 – and will have its Portuguese premiere on 29 October 29, 9pm, at Culturgest.
In Man In Black, Wang Bing – author of works such as Fathers and Sons (Doclisboa 2014) and Dead Souls (Doclisboa 2018) – portrays the body and soul of Wang Xilin, a Chinese composer and dissident. Using excerpts from Xilin’s symphonies, the filmmaker registers the horrors recalled by the octogenarian composer, stories of dehumanization in a country and a regime in permanent upheaval. Wang Xilin will be in Lisbon for the opening session of the 21st edition of the festival.
On 29 October, it’s Leonor Teles’ turn. Baan (“house” in Thai), the...
In Man In Black, Wang Bing – author of works such as Fathers and Sons (Doclisboa 2014) and Dead Souls (Doclisboa 2018) – portrays the body and soul of Wang Xilin, a Chinese composer and dissident. Using excerpts from Xilin’s symphonies, the filmmaker registers the horrors recalled by the octogenarian composer, stories of dehumanization in a country and a regime in permanent upheaval. Wang Xilin will be in Lisbon for the opening session of the 21st edition of the festival.
On 29 October, it’s Leonor Teles’ turn. Baan (“house” in Thai), the...
- 9/21/2023
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
Programme includes ‘top 10’ films selected by director Wang Bing and selection of Peter Greenaway films.
The International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) has revealed the first 50 titles for this year’s edition, running Nov 8 to Nov 19.
As part of a previously announced Wang Bing retrospective, the director has been invited to programme his “top 10”. The films he has selected are all Chinese and all date from 1999 or later.
They are: Before the Flood (2005) directed by Yifan Li, Yu YanBing’ai (2007) by Yan Feng; Born in Beijing (2011) by Li Ma; Last Train Home (2009) by Lixin Fan; The Next Life (2011) by Jian Fan...
The International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) has revealed the first 50 titles for this year’s edition, running Nov 8 to Nov 19.
As part of a previously announced Wang Bing retrospective, the director has been invited to programme his “top 10”. The films he has selected are all Chinese and all date from 1999 or later.
They are: Before the Flood (2005) directed by Yifan Li, Yu YanBing’ai (2007) by Yan Feng; Born in Beijing (2011) by Li Ma; Last Train Home (2009) by Lixin Fan; The Next Life (2011) by Jian Fan...
- 9/20/2023
- by Geoffrey Macnab
- ScreenDaily
Documentary festival IDFA, which runs Nov. 8 to 19 in Amsterdam, has revealed its first 50 titles, including the top 10 Chinese films selected by Chinese filmmaker Wang Bing, IDFA’s Guest of Honor.
The festival has also revealed the films playing in two of the three Focus programs: Fabrications, which probes the difference between reality and realism, and 16 Worlds on 16, an homage to 16mm film.
Wang’s selection will take the viewer “on a contemplative journey into contemporary Chinese cinema,” according to the festival. “The films and their politics are subtle in their film language, representing a wave of filmmaking rarely shown internationally.”
The selection (see below), which covers films produced since 1999, includes Lixin Fan’s 2009 film “Last Train Home,” which was supported by IDFA’s Bertha Fund. The film documents the millions of migrant factory workers that travel home for Spring Festival each year.
Fabrications explores the relationship of trust between documentary film and audiences,...
The festival has also revealed the films playing in two of the three Focus programs: Fabrications, which probes the difference between reality and realism, and 16 Worlds on 16, an homage to 16mm film.
Wang’s selection will take the viewer “on a contemplative journey into contemporary Chinese cinema,” according to the festival. “The films and their politics are subtle in their film language, representing a wave of filmmaking rarely shown internationally.”
The selection (see below), which covers films produced since 1999, includes Lixin Fan’s 2009 film “Last Train Home,” which was supported by IDFA’s Bertha Fund. The film documents the millions of migrant factory workers that travel home for Spring Festival each year.
Fabrications explores the relationship of trust between documentary film and audiences,...
- 9/19/2023
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
Acclaimed director Wang Bing, this year’s guest of honor at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, will be using his IDFA platform to highlight nonfiction cinema of his native China.
The festival, which runs from Nov. 8-19, announced the 10 films Bing has selected to be screened at IDFA – one of the perquisites of being named guest of honor. Among the documentaries he’s choosing to highlight are Old Men (1999), directed by Lina Yang; Wheat Harvest (2008), directed by Tong Xu, and IDFA Bertha Fund-supported Last Train Home (2009) by Lixin Fan, “documenting the millions of migrant factory workers that travel home for Spring Festival each year.” (Scroll to see Bing’s full top 10 list).
Director Wang Bing attends the Cannes Film Festival May 19, 2023.
The documentaries chosen by Bing “and their politics are subtle in their film language,” IDFA noted in a release, “representing a wave of filmmaking rarely shown internationally.
The festival, which runs from Nov. 8-19, announced the 10 films Bing has selected to be screened at IDFA – one of the perquisites of being named guest of honor. Among the documentaries he’s choosing to highlight are Old Men (1999), directed by Lina Yang; Wheat Harvest (2008), directed by Tong Xu, and IDFA Bertha Fund-supported Last Train Home (2009) by Lixin Fan, “documenting the millions of migrant factory workers that travel home for Spring Festival each year.” (Scroll to see Bing’s full top 10 list).
Director Wang Bing attends the Cannes Film Festival May 19, 2023.
The documentaries chosen by Bing “and their politics are subtle in their film language,” IDFA noted in a release, “representing a wave of filmmaking rarely shown internationally.
- 9/19/2023
- by Matthew Carey
- Deadline Film + TV
Everyone is invited to the 67th BFI London Film Festival in partnership with American Express!
The BFI London Film Festival, founded in 1957, now at its 67th edition, is a renowned annual event that celebrates international and British cinema. It offers a diverse array of films, premieres, and engaging discussions, attracting filmmakers, industry professionals, and movie enthusiasts. This festival is a vital platform for promoting cinematic excellence and storytelling. Once again, this year's selection of Asian titles is rich and articulated.
Find all the Asian films and the Festival's trailer, here:
Cobweb
In this electric meta-comedy, The Good, the Bad, the Weird director Kim Jee-Woon captures the turbulence of South Korea's film industry in the 1970s.
Evil Does Not Exist
Drive My Car director Ryusuke Hamaguchi's new drama sees a community fighting to preserve its principles and the integrity of their natural world.
Self-Portrait: 47 Km 2020
The eleventh instalment in Zhang Mengqi...
The BFI London Film Festival, founded in 1957, now at its 67th edition, is a renowned annual event that celebrates international and British cinema. It offers a diverse array of films, premieres, and engaging discussions, attracting filmmakers, industry professionals, and movie enthusiasts. This festival is a vital platform for promoting cinematic excellence and storytelling. Once again, this year's selection of Asian titles is rich and articulated.
Find all the Asian films and the Festival's trailer, here:
Cobweb
In this electric meta-comedy, The Good, the Bad, the Weird director Kim Jee-Woon captures the turbulence of South Korea's film industry in the 1970s.
Evil Does Not Exist
Drive My Car director Ryusuke Hamaguchi's new drama sees a community fighting to preserve its principles and the integrity of their natural world.
Self-Portrait: 47 Km 2020
The eleventh instalment in Zhang Mengqi...
- 9/16/2023
- by Adriana Rosati
- AsianMoviePulse
Speaking about his underseen 1970 film British Sounds, Jean-Luc Godard said it was important that the bourgeois heard oppressive factory noise the working class must endure every day. This made me think of a job I had right after graduating university nearly a decade ago. Not wanting to leave Montreal for personal reasons, but limited in work opportunities due to my lack of French, I––in desperation––took work at a warehouse assembling light fixtures. Lasting from the middle of 2014 to the early months of 2015, my overwhelming memories of that time (beyond its general misery) are the sounds. In particular the radio which was on all day, as fellow workers and I weren’t allowed to listen to anything with headphones or earbuds. Working an eight-hour shift and finding out that Top 40 radio does, in fact, just play practically the same 9 or 10 songs over and over––thus hearing Taylor Swift’s...
- 9/14/2023
- by Ethan Vestby
- The Film Stage
by Cláudio Alves
Over a decade ago, Wang Bing’s first film explored the decline of an industrial district, state factories dying away as privately-owned businesses took over the Chinese economy. Since Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks, the director has applied the same ‘fly on the wall’ technique to various other projects, each growing in size until his filmography resembles a collection of non-fiction epics. The 2002 picture clocked at over nine hours, edited down from 200 hours of footage. For his most recent endeavor, Wang recorded 2,600 hours of material, deciding to present it as a trilogy named after one of the most exploited demographic in the nation’s industry – Youth. The three-and-a-half-hour Youth (Spring) represents the first chapter in the director’s new opus, introducing new tonalities to his work…...
Over a decade ago, Wang Bing’s first film explored the decline of an industrial district, state factories dying away as privately-owned businesses took over the Chinese economy. Since Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks, the director has applied the same ‘fly on the wall’ technique to various other projects, each growing in size until his filmography resembles a collection of non-fiction epics. The 2002 picture clocked at over nine hours, edited down from 200 hours of footage. For his most recent endeavor, Wang recorded 2,600 hours of material, deciding to present it as a trilogy named after one of the most exploited demographic in the nation’s industry – Youth. The three-and-a-half-hour Youth (Spring) represents the first chapter in the director’s new opus, introducing new tonalities to his work…...
- 9/13/2023
- by Cláudio Alves
- FilmExperience
Wang Bing made his directorial debut with an astonishing odyssey through the dilapidated structures of the danwei, or state-owned factory, that were the norm for work in China until opening and reform gradually gave rise to more private enterprise. The 551-minute 2002 film, Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks, telegraphed its intentionality both through its politics, starkly depicting the lives of factory workers and the strain put on Shenyang’s industrial Tiexi district, as joblessness loomed. The film’s intuitive, necessarily lo-fi aesthetic allowed the artifacting visuals of its Dv shooting format to become a conduit through which to further imagine the fate of the eroding spaces of the danwei.
The monumental achievement of West of the Tracks galvanized the field of Chinese independent documentary in the early 2000s to such a degree that a new generation of filmmakers seemed to form almost instantly and take specific cues from Wang’s DIY ethos.
The monumental achievement of West of the Tracks galvanized the field of Chinese independent documentary in the early 2000s to such a degree that a new generation of filmmakers seemed to form almost instantly and take specific cues from Wang’s DIY ethos.
- 9/13/2023
- by Sam C. Mac
- Slant Magazine
The Busan International Film Festival put aside many of its recent internal and local political problems to Tuesday unveil a large selection ranging from bleeding edge art titles to international festival favorites.
“The difficult times are not behind us, but hard work has made this year’s festival better than ever,” said programmer and interim festival chief Nam Dong-chul, speaking at an online press conference.
International guests expected to attend the festival include Luc Besson, Chinese superstar Fan Bingbing, Japanese directors Hamaguchi Ryusuke and Kore-Eda Hirokazu, Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf, and Korean Americans Justin Chon (“Gook”) and Lee Isaac Chung (“Minari”).
Hong Kong-based superstar Chow Yun-fat has been named as Busan’s Asian Filmmaker of the Year and will be in person to receive the award. The Korean Cinema Award will presented to the late Yun Jung-hee, the actress who starred in “The General’s Mustache” and Lee Chang-dong’s 2010 drama “Poetry.
“The difficult times are not behind us, but hard work has made this year’s festival better than ever,” said programmer and interim festival chief Nam Dong-chul, speaking at an online press conference.
International guests expected to attend the festival include Luc Besson, Chinese superstar Fan Bingbing, Japanese directors Hamaguchi Ryusuke and Kore-Eda Hirokazu, Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf, and Korean Americans Justin Chon (“Gook”) and Lee Isaac Chung (“Minari”).
Hong Kong-based superstar Chow Yun-fat has been named as Busan’s Asian Filmmaker of the Year and will be in person to receive the award. The Korean Cinema Award will presented to the late Yun Jung-hee, the actress who starred in “The General’s Mustache” and Lee Chang-dong’s 2010 drama “Poetry.
- 9/5/2023
- by Patrick Frater
- Variety Film + TV
Chinese documentarian Wang Bing and UK filmmaker and artist Peter Greenaway will be honored at the 36th International Documentary Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), running from November 8 to 19.
Wang has been invited as the edition’s Guest of Honor, while Greenaway will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award.
As part of its celebration of Wang, IDFA will screen his ground-breaking 2002 work Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks as well as his more recent films Man in Black and Youth (Spring), which both premiered to acclaim in Cannes this year. The latter title, which revolves around Chinese garment workers, was recently acquired by Icarus for North America.
The Wang program also includes Alone (2012), ’Til Madness Do Us Part (2013), and Mrs. Fang (2017).
The director will give a masterclass and has also been invited to compile the festival’s annual Top 10, which will...
Wang has been invited as the edition’s Guest of Honor, while Greenaway will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award.
As part of its celebration of Wang, IDFA will screen his ground-breaking 2002 work Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks as well as his more recent films Man in Black and Youth (Spring), which both premiered to acclaim in Cannes this year. The latter title, which revolves around Chinese garment workers, was recently acquired by Icarus for North America.
The Wang program also includes Alone (2012), ’Til Madness Do Us Part (2013), and Mrs. Fang (2017).
The director will give a masterclass and has also been invited to compile the festival’s annual Top 10, which will...
- 8/30/2023
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
Netherlands festival sets three focus programmes.
International Documentary Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) will showcase the careers of Chinese filmmaker Wang Bing, and the UK’s Peter Greenaway at the 2023 edition in November.
Wang Bing is the 2023 IDFA guest of honour and the festival will screen a curated selection of his work, including 2002’s Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks, and this year’s Cannes titles Man In Black and Youth (Spring).
In a masterclass session, Wang Bing will also discuss 10 contemporary films by Chinese filmmakers, as a way of investigating the social and political history of the country, and the language of cinema.
International Documentary Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) will showcase the careers of Chinese filmmaker Wang Bing, and the UK’s Peter Greenaway at the 2023 edition in November.
Wang Bing is the 2023 IDFA guest of honour and the festival will screen a curated selection of his work, including 2002’s Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks, and this year’s Cannes titles Man In Black and Youth (Spring).
In a masterclass session, Wang Bing will also discuss 10 contemporary films by Chinese filmmakers, as a way of investigating the social and political history of the country, and the language of cinema.
- 8/30/2023
- by Ben Dalton
- ScreenDaily
Chinese filmmaker Wang Bing is this year’s Guest of Honor at IDFA, which holds its 36th edition from Nov. 8 to 19 in Amsterdam. IDFA is also honoring filmmaker and artist Peter Greenaway with a Lifetime Achievement Award, a selective retrospective and an extensive on-stage talk.
IDFA will highlight Wang’s “innovative prowess” – in the festival’s words – through a curated selection of his work. His masterpiece “Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks” (2002) heralded a new era for Chinese documentary film, “granting viewers an organic view of contemporary China free from any exotic gaze.”
IDFA is also screening Wang’s “Man in Black” and “Youth (Spring),” two films that premiered earlier this year in Cannes, and which “demonstrate the filmmaker’s vision and capacity for innovation,” IDFA said.
Other film screenings will be “Alone” (2012), “’Til Madness Do Us Part” (2013), and “Mrs. Fang” (2017).
Wang will also give an indepth Master Talk.
IDFA will highlight Wang’s “innovative prowess” – in the festival’s words – through a curated selection of his work. His masterpiece “Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks” (2002) heralded a new era for Chinese documentary film, “granting viewers an organic view of contemporary China free from any exotic gaze.”
IDFA is also screening Wang’s “Man in Black” and “Youth (Spring),” two films that premiered earlier this year in Cannes, and which “demonstrate the filmmaker’s vision and capacity for innovation,” IDFA said.
Other film screenings will be “Alone” (2012), “’Til Madness Do Us Part” (2013), and “Mrs. Fang” (2017).
Wang will also give an indepth Master Talk.
- 8/30/2023
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
After a one-year hiatus, the much-missed El Gouna Film Festival (Oct. 13 – 20) is back and poised to make an increased impact. Joining beloved festival director Intishal Al-Timimi this time around is esteemed Egyptian producer-director Marianne Khoury in the artistic director position.
Khoury’s long-time championship of female filmmakers and themes finds an echo in the impressive first wave of programming just announced. Of the 19 features, 10 boast a distaff helmer or co-director.
The kudo-laden titles include “Anatomy of a Fall” from Justine Triet, “On the Adamant” from Nicolas Philibert, “Scrapper” by Charlotte Regan, “Stepne” from Maryna Vroda and “The Strange Path” from Guto Parente, which claimed every prize in Tribeca’s international competition.
Among the other buzzed-about auteur titles are Todd Haynes’ “May December” and Wang Bing’s epic documentary “Youth.” Emerging talents Tibor Bánóczki and Sarolta Szabó offer dystopian hybrid-animation “White Plastic Sky,” while a robust documentary selection includes Tatiana Huezo...
Khoury’s long-time championship of female filmmakers and themes finds an echo in the impressive first wave of programming just announced. Of the 19 features, 10 boast a distaff helmer or co-director.
The kudo-laden titles include “Anatomy of a Fall” from Justine Triet, “On the Adamant” from Nicolas Philibert, “Scrapper” by Charlotte Regan, “Stepne” from Maryna Vroda and “The Strange Path” from Guto Parente, which claimed every prize in Tribeca’s international competition.
Among the other buzzed-about auteur titles are Todd Haynes’ “May December” and Wang Bing’s epic documentary “Youth.” Emerging talents Tibor Bánóczki and Sarolta Szabó offer dystopian hybrid-animation “White Plastic Sky,” while a robust documentary selection includes Tatiana Huezo...
- 8/24/2023
- by Alissa Simon
- Variety Film + TV
Nearly 150 documentaries set to screen at festival in South Korea.
South Korea’s Dmz International Documentary Film Festival (Dmz Docs) has overhauled its programme structure ahead of its 15th edition, which will open with Maite Alberdi’s The Eternal Memory.
A total of 147 documentaries, comprising 83 features and 64 shorts, from 54 countries will be screened at the festival from September 14-21 at cinemas in and around Goyang city, near the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea, in Gyeonggi Province.
The programme, which previously included the Global Vision and Dmz Open Cinema sections, have been reorganised into three competition strands: International, Frontier and Korean.
South Korea’s Dmz International Documentary Film Festival (Dmz Docs) has overhauled its programme structure ahead of its 15th edition, which will open with Maite Alberdi’s The Eternal Memory.
A total of 147 documentaries, comprising 83 features and 64 shorts, from 54 countries will be screened at the festival from September 14-21 at cinemas in and around Goyang city, near the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea, in Gyeonggi Province.
The programme, which previously included the Global Vision and Dmz Open Cinema sections, have been reorganised into three competition strands: International, Frontier and Korean.
- 8/24/2023
- by Michael Rosser
- ScreenDaily
Following the first three section announcements, the final film section of the 61st New York Film Festival has been unveiled with Currents. Complementing the Main Slate, tracing a more complete picture of contemporary cinema with an emphasis on new and innovative forms and voices, the section presents a diverse offering of productions by filmmakers and artists working at the vanguard of the medium.
Highlights include Currents Opening Night selection Eduardo Williams’ The Human Surge 3, Thien An Pham’s Cannes winner Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell, Joanna Arnow’s The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed, a special program featuring Jean-Luc Godard, Wang Bing, and Pedro Costa––with Trailer of a Film That Will Never Exist: Phony Wars, Man in Black, and The Daughters of Fire (As Filhas do Fogo), respectively––and much more.
“The filmmakers in this year’s Currents lineup range from well-known veterans to prodigious newcomers,...
Highlights include Currents Opening Night selection Eduardo Williams’ The Human Surge 3, Thien An Pham’s Cannes winner Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell, Joanna Arnow’s The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed, a special program featuring Jean-Luc Godard, Wang Bing, and Pedro Costa––with Trailer of a Film That Will Never Exist: Phony Wars, Man in Black, and The Daughters of Fire (As Filhas do Fogo), respectively––and much more.
“The filmmakers in this year’s Currents lineup range from well-known veterans to prodigious newcomers,...
- 8/23/2023
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
Egypt’s El Gouna Film Festival (Gff) has unveiled a first wave of international titles due to play at its upcoming comeback sixth edition, unfolding from October 13 to 20 after a one-year hiatus.
The selection features a number of high-profile festival titles including Justine Triet’s Cannes 2023 Palme d’Or winner Anatomy Of A Fall, Berlinale 2023 Golden Bear winning documentary On the Adamant by Nicolas Philibert and Guto Parente’s Tribeca Film Festival break-out The Strange Path.
The line-up also showcases a host of buzzy first and second films including UK director Charlotte Regan’s Sundance 2023 Grand Jury Prize winner Scrapper and French filmmaker Delphine Deloget’s Cannes Un Certain Regard social drama All To Play For, starring Virginie Efira.
Respected Egyptian distributor and producer Marianne Khoury is overseeing the selection for the first time, following her appointment as artistic director earlier this year, working alongside long-time festival director Intishal Al Timimi.
The selection features a number of high-profile festival titles including Justine Triet’s Cannes 2023 Palme d’Or winner Anatomy Of A Fall, Berlinale 2023 Golden Bear winning documentary On the Adamant by Nicolas Philibert and Guto Parente’s Tribeca Film Festival break-out The Strange Path.
The line-up also showcases a host of buzzy first and second films including UK director Charlotte Regan’s Sundance 2023 Grand Jury Prize winner Scrapper and French filmmaker Delphine Deloget’s Cannes Un Certain Regard social drama All To Play For, starring Virginie Efira.
Respected Egyptian distributor and producer Marianne Khoury is overseeing the selection for the first time, following her appointment as artistic director earlier this year, working alongside long-time festival director Intishal Al Timimi.
- 8/23/2023
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
Icarus Films has taken North American rights to Youth (Spring), the newest feature from Venice prizer winner Wang Bing, which earlier this year became one of the first documentaries admitted to Cannes’ main competition in decades. A release date has not yet been disclosed.
Soon to screen at both the New York Film Festival and TIFF, the doc shot over the course of five years is set in Zhili, China, 120 miles from Shanghai. In this city dedicated to textile manufacturing, young workers come from rural regions crossed by the Yangtze River. They are in their early 20s, sharing dormitories and snacking in the corridors. They work tirelessly to be able one day to raise a child, buy a house, or set up their own workshop. Friendships and romantic affairs are made and unmade according to the seasons, financial difficulties, and family pressures.
The film from House on Fire, Gladys Glover Films,...
Soon to screen at both the New York Film Festival and TIFF, the doc shot over the course of five years is set in Zhili, China, 120 miles from Shanghai. In this city dedicated to textile manufacturing, young workers come from rural regions crossed by the Yangtze River. They are in their early 20s, sharing dormitories and snacking in the corridors. They work tirelessly to be able one day to raise a child, buy a house, or set up their own workshop. Friendships and romantic affairs are made and unmade according to the seasons, financial difficulties, and family pressures.
The film from House on Fire, Gladys Glover Films,...
- 8/17/2023
- by Matt Grobar
- Deadline Film + TV
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