Yes, I've been busy the past few days shooting my new short film LAST FRAGMENTS OF WINTER. If you follow me on Twitter, you might have seen me tweeting some production stills.
It's now my birthday, and I find it rather fitting that I'm spending it in my editing room.
In my previous epic post, which I spoke about the eating problems and depression I sunk into, I also made a casual mention of a new short film I'm preparing, and also a junk camera I bought as a key prop for the film.
The short film is called LAST FRAGMENTS OF WINTER, and I've started pre-production even though I was half-dead during the days I just came back from Europe. The film will be shot in both Japan and Malaysia, with me shooting the Japanese segment first before flying back to Malaysia on the night of my birthday to continue.
It all started when I arrived at Tokyo after my somewhat lengthy Eurotrip.
I was in a bus from the airport to Shinjuku. As I was arriving, I saw through the window, a young girl carrying a kickass looking camera and taking photos at the streets. The bus stopped, I got out, dragged my luggage with me and tried looking for the girl. She was still there, I started asking about the camera.
She spoke fluent English and told me she was using a Mamiya RZ67.
Ernest Chong Shun Yuan and Susan Lee Fong Zhi in INHALATION
It's been nearly 3 nights since I got back from Europe, yet I still feel a little jetlaggy, a little worse for wear. Despite recovering from a bad cold while I was in Clermont-Ferrand, I ended up with another bad case of diarrhea (happens every time I go to France, really, 3 times in the last year. Maybe me and French food just don't mix, maybe I had too much French fries, maybe I shouldn't eat train food, maybe I shouldn't have airport food etc.)
It's now 8.25am, February 14. I've just spent a night in Paris and am heading to the airport in less than an hour.
Yes, I'm aware that it's Valentine's Day, but since the day had never really meant much to me, aside from having some nice chocolates to eat (they were never meant for me, alas.
I rather just spend the day thousands of feet above the ground. It's been a long trip.
The stars will wheel forth from their daytime hiding places; and one of those lights, slightly brighter than the rest, will be my wingtip passing over
I've gotten sick the past three days (a usual occurrence whenever I'm abroad). I guess being on the road for more than two weeks had taken its toll.
Anyway, this is my last night in Clermont-Ferrand, the past week had been fun. Screenings of INHALATION occurred every night. Always to a full house. Twice, my screening had happened in the Cocteau hall, which has a capacity for 1200 people.
In other days, film is screened in smaller halls that still hold 600+ people.
For the past 3 days, ever since CINEMA TODAY's article of my short, EXHALATION, actress Tomoe Shinohara had remained one of the 3 most talked-about artistes on MSN, along with Nicholas Cage and Ai Hashimoto.
For a guy who had spent nearly a third of his life living abroad, it's still kinda strange to think that this was my first Chinese New Year spent out of Malaysia, the first time I didn't have the usual Steamboat CNY's Eve reunion dinner with family.
So my Chinese New Year's Eve was rather interesting. I started out seeing one of the Tiger Competition films by Iranian filmmaker Majid Barzegar called RAINY SEASONS. Then I ended up having lunch in a Chinese restaurant with Kiki, Hospitalite director Koji Fukada, and a pair of Koji's Japanese friends who live in Paris.
It's still 6:25pm here in Rotterdam, gonna head off for my 'reunion dinner' with a bunch of Korean folks.
Anyway, haven't been able to post anything on the blog despite a whirlwind of stuff happening.
But here you go, videos from the Q and A sessions of EXHALATION on the 29th and 30th of January. They are both pretty long videos (especially the second one, since Sherman Ong was there as well to talk about his short film).
Had been trying to upload the videos from my screening Q and A sessions in International Film Fest Rotterdam the past few days, but they're taking quite a while to compress.
So I'll just share an article with you about EXHALATION that was on Cinema Today yesterday (which was then syndicated on MSN and Yahoo). Click the link below!
I always have an obligatory McDonald's breakfast meal before a flight. The Mega McMuffin owns. So, when I arrived at Narita Airport, I had it again.
I then slept through more than 7 hours of my 11 hour flight to Amsterdam. Waking up only for the two meals, and watching I AM LOVE, starring Tilda Swinton (it was in competition at the Venice Film Festival 2009, the same year Kingyo was shown).
Nice film.
I then caught maybe half of MEGAMIND, but got interrupted when the plane arrived at Schiphol airport, Amsterdam.
A car picked up and took me to Rotterdam, it was a 1-hour journey.
When I reached the main film festival building, I picked up my bag, and ensured that the press desk was covered with promotional items for THE TIGER FACTORY and EXHALATION.
Chinling, one of the festival programmers, brought us to the Wuxia-themed WATER TIGER INN, where me, Matthieu (Bratislava Film Fest director, and many others) and Jessica Kam (PIANO IN THE FACTORY producer) could have a quick bite.
It was to my amusement that after serving us drinks, the waitress got into a heated encounter with a beggar who just walked into the place. And then they got into some martial arts stuff, and me and the customers were instantly turned into extras of a wuxia film!
It's funny, realizing that this will be the first time when I'm actually not returning to Malaysia for Chinese new year. Even all my years in Perth, and the past few years in Tokyo, I always managed to be at home for the reunion dinner and all.
For this year's, I'll still be in Rotterdam. Perhaps I'll be celebrating it with other filmmakers in some Chinese restaurant over there, if I'm not wrong, there's also gonna be a screening of The Tiger Factory on either Chinese new year eve, or the first day itself.
Perhaps I myself should try to catch a Chinese film or something cheerier as well at the film festival. I'm superstitious, I wouldn't want to watch dark depressing films of woe and death to start my Chinese New Year!
In exactly 12 hours I'll be flying off to Rotterdam. Aside from my own short film EXHALATION, I'm also there for Ming Jin's THE TIGER FACTORY, which is the feature film spin-off of my short, INHALATION (hah). Since he can't make it to the festival, it's all up to me to handle his Q and A sessions as well after each screening. Fun.
Less than two days left before I head off to Rotterdam International Film Festival, so pardon the onslaught of EXHALATION stuff here.
While preparing an EXHALATION press kit for the festival last week, I enlisted the help of Toronto J-Film Pow-Wow's Marc Saint-Cyr to conduct a short interview regarding the film.
I'll share an exchange from the Q and A regarding why I alternated between black-and-white and colour in the film.
MSC: How did you decide which sequences in the film would be in black-and-white or color?
EY: The black-and-white, was, in fact, a last-minute decision made during post-production. I remembered reading an interview with Andrei Tarkovsky where he pointed out that a black-and-white film immediately creates the impression that your attention is concentrated on what is most important. On the screen, color imposes itself on you.
In order to underline the melancholic undertone of the film, I decided to drain most scenes of their colors. I inserted colours in certain scenes when I needed to accentuate the emotional states of the protagonists. A feeling of brief warmth, or lingering sadness, or an abrupt break from monotony. In the end it was an experiment of sorts for storytelling.
(UPDATED: The Tarkovsky interview I was referring to is here.)
If you are one of the 3 people who had been following my filmmaking escapades so far, you'll know that I've made two short films, EXHALATION and INHALATION. Both are similarly titled and shared many common themes, but are ultimately two (vastly) different films.
Yesterday afternoon, Kong continued shooting the second scene of his 3-scene one-minute short film. (the first scene is of a girl in a shower encountering a slasher).
Today is Seijin No Hi (Coming Of Age Day), it is the day when young women who are turning 20 this year celebrate their coming of age by going to shrines for prayers.
I've synced all my other social network accounts (Youtube, Twitter, Flickr etc.) with my Facebook account so that friends of mine on Facebook will know whenever I've uploaded a photo, or a video, or posted a tweet.
Although I'm highly secretive with my own short films (as in, I don't upload them on Youtube for public viewing) because most of them had been circulating at the film fest circle, I don't mind sharing my own experiences with others, it's my way of keeping in touch with others, allowing others to keep track on my misadventures, and on the other hand, I can keep track on what the others were doing as well.
Many of my relatives, former schoolmates and classmates, and other people I've met throughout the course of my life are Facebook users too, and sadly, this might just be the only way for me to remain 'visible' for them (since I'm constantly flying about, it's really hard for some to keep track on where I am these days). Yes, I don't disagree that this has turned into a form of exhibitionism, and I can absolutely understand why people who crave privacy don't really like the use of Facebook.
I myself try to maintain some form of privacy too, despite having 1400+ friends, every time someone tries to add me and I cannot really recognize them, nor seem to have any mutual friends, I usually message them first and ask them to identify themselves. If there's none, I'll probably ignore the friend request.
Recently, people I've never spoken to for years have begun speaking to me via Facebook Chat, out of the blue. But the conversation is usually like this:
Yesterday, Kong began to shoot a new short film (it's for some event in Thailand called the Postcard Cinema where a couple of chosen Thai filmmakers have to make 60-second short films, or 'video postcards').
5 days have passed since 2011 started, I have yet to have my hatsumode (first shrine visit of the year). In the past two years, I did it on New Year's Day. Two years ago, I was at the Todai-ji of Nara. Last year, I went to Tsukui Kannon Zen Temple.
This year, a lady friend of mine who had yet to do her hatsumode as well said to do it at Meiji Shrine.
I have written about Meiji Shrine, which is filled with young women in kimono during Seijin No Hi (Coming Of Age Day), (... and that was the top-viewed blog post of last year), which is the number one destination in Japan for hatsumode. Been there a few times, but thought it's a great idea to finally go there for my hatsumode.
So I went.
The first three days of the new year would have been overcrowded, but today, it was decent.
After posting my epic Part 1 and Part 2 of the 2010 recap, (which you SHOULD read, if you haven't already, because it took me a lot of time to write that), I put on the exact same shirt I wore on the first day of 2010...
It is 5:39am, 31st of December, 2010 as I am writing this. Less than 18 hours left for the year. I guess I'll just take a bit of time to reflect on the past year and make some sense out of it.
My life is probably defined now, by my filmmaking career. Ever since I started actually directing in 2008, I had derived a lot of joy from creativity, to be surrounded by like-minded people, to indulge myself in films, to further my own craft. My last tweet was laced with some sort of irony-induced nostalgia.
It's quite a contrast, a year ago and today. A year ago, I had just finished the EXHALATION shoot and capped an unbelievable 2009. 2010 had been an incredible year as well (I am referring only to my own filmmaking career, anything outside that is a tragedy to describe), but as I am few hours away from the last day of 2010, I realize how quiet it is ending for me.
Solitude is fine, all the peace and stuff, yet to be occasionally being surrounded by like-minded people during film shoots is a warm feeling, maybe that's why I enjoy them.
Before I go for a more proper year-end blog entry, I'll just share with you all a very nice performance I had the pleasure of witnessing on Christmas day, of a lady named Yadako (you can follow her on Twitter).
At that time, I was trying to find an editing software for my laptop that could help me edit the videos that I shot that night.
In the past, I used the Adobe Premiere Pro for PC. Edited my first few short films (Chicken Rice Mystery, Fleeting Images, Love Suicides) with it, also edited telemovies like Cinta Tiga Segi with that too.
But once I switched to shooting stuff on HD, I had to use Final Cut Pro on Mac, which felt immensely more convenient. (Ming Jin's two films WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER and THE TIGER FACTORY, and my short films beginning from KINGYO, all done with Final Cut Pro)
I still use a PC laptop, and I don't have Adobe Premiere Pro anymore, so I scoured the net, trying to find a good free editing software that could help me. Downloaded a few (I won't name them), but none of them seemed to be able to edit Canon 7D videos.
The only good one I ended up using in the end was EDIUS, but it took a while for me to familiarize myself with the layout.
In the end I lost my patience and decided to just come to my editing lab at Waseda today to swiftly put together this video with Final Cut Pro. After almost an hour, I managed to slap this video together using the music from Nico Spahni's MUSIC FOR SEPT ELLES album.
The bowling alley was so psychedelic that I felt like I was in TRON: LEGACY.
This concludes my Dubai International Film Fest 2010 recap.
Before the closing ceremony, I was excited to meet the star of Lee Chang Dong's POETRY, Yun Jeong-Hee, seen here with her husband, the renowned pianist Paik Kun-Woo.
Here's Carey Mulligan, presenting Variety's International Movie Star of The Year award to Colin Firth, and also his acceptance speech, on the 13th of December, second day of the Dubai Film Fest.
So, I'm now at Dubai. Today, my film EXHALATION will finally have its world premiere at the Dubai Film Fest.
But this will chronicle my first day in the place.
Here are some pretty photos of me right before the opening ceremony on the 12th of December, courtesy of Indonesian documentary filmmaker Daniel Rudi Haryanto.
I'm now in Dubai, took numerous photos and videos. But before I give you all updates of my misadventures there, I'll do a recap of Cinemanila International Film Fest first.
3rd of December. I arrived in Manila during the afternoon, I was picked up at the airport. I intended the festival to be one where I could rest, since the Torino schedule was so hectic.
"Well, for tonight, I'll just relax, and maybe catch the SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD screening." I told Raymond, who was picking me up. His day job is actually as a TV writer.
"Oh, I'm afraid you can't do it. The awards ceremony is tonight." Raymond said.
"What? But today's only the second day of the festival!" I was flabbergasted.
"Yes, but they wanted to get the awards out of the way first." Raymond said.
So... that evening, we went to the award ceremony.
I flew to Torino on the 25th of November for the Torino Film Lab (which is part of the Torino Film Festival. 3 years ago, Ming Jin won a jury award in this festival for THE ELEPHANT AND THE SEA).
When I arrived, it was already dark. I had to take a bus to the city center. The journey lasted around 45 minutes.
Yup, I came back from Manila two days ago. For the past two weeks I was in Torino (Italy) and Manila for the film festivals and other stuff.
The screenwriting workshop I've been attending throughout the year concluded its session in Torino (the first two rounds were in Bratislava, back in March, and Brignogan, France, back in June).
Then I just headed off immediately to Cinemanila Film Fest to present INHALATION and THE TIGER FACTORY.
Many photos, videos to share, many stories to tell.
My computer died (again) just when I reached Torino, hence the lack of updates. Frustrating, but it had happened so often that I've grown numb.
I'm leaving for Dubai on the 11th. Not a lot of time to rest from my constant flying, haha.
When I had an appointment with someone yesterday evening, I decided to go to Yoyogi Park first. To my consternation, the sky was already turning dark at 4pm. Nonetheless, the golden ginkgo leaves were still there.
I met up with old high school friend Sebastian yesterday evening in Shinjuku (he and his family were on a family trip in Japan and dropped by in Tokyo for two nights). After we had dinner, he left and I walked off to catch the bus.
As I walked past the Shinjuku Station West Exit, our conversation swirled in my mind, people from high school, those who had just gotten married, those who had just gotten engaged, previous loves, our careers in film (Sebastian works in RHYTHM AND HUES and had just made a short film called Hashshashin's Revolt, it was a valiant attempt), and the like.
Perhaps time was indeed passing me by, I thought in slight melancholy. Ah, memory, a constant source of pain.
It was Sunday evening, Shinjuku was characteristically crowded. Yet I walked in solitude, past the crowds of people, past lovers whispering sweet nothings to each other, past tourists mesmerized by the bustling energy of Shinjuku, past a pair of pretty twin sisters singing at the street, past a happy family, past a couple of homeless guys-
Eh?
I stopped, and looked back at the pair of pretty twin sisters.
Since my epic food poisoning last week, I continued my semi-retreat into a writing session of my screenplay.
So the entire week just came and went.
I just came to a realization that Nov 17, 18 and 19 are birthdays of many people I know. In fact, I have 3 different family members and relatives celebrating their birthdays on these three successive days.
I felt that something was wrong two nights ago when I was suddenly afflicted with diarrhea. What could've caused it? The onigiri I bought in a convenience store for lunch? The bento from the nice elderly couple that I've had for dinner (a favourite of mine for the past two years)? The iced chocolate I drank two hours later during a meeting?
Not dwelling upon the issue, I quickly took the famed Po Chai pills. The discomfort lasted for two hours before everything subsided and I could sleep again.
When I woke up yesterday, I felt a little better, and assumed that I've recovered. I took a few gulps of water, then I was overwhelmed by a strong feeling of nausea.
Oh shit... was the words in my mind as I ran out of my room, hoping to reach the toilet in time.
Recently, during a Facebook chat session with some primary school friends (yes, we still keep in touch, someone was sweet enough to start a Facebook group for the class of 1996) and a certain incident started emerging from the deepest recesses of my memory.
Not much about the fair though, since the highlight of my day was clearly this:
Although I was quite amused by the folks at the Bodybuilding Club too. A group of muscular dudes were in the university campus, flexing their muscles, letting people touch them, while they hand out flyers.
Just received news that I won two awards at the inaugural Doi Saket International Film Festival (facebook page here). The festival actually ended on the same day as the Tokyo International Film Fest (Oct 31st), but the folks were so busy that they didn't announce the results publicly until few moments ago.
The Tokyo International Film Festival ended yesterday (... or two days ago, since it's 1:37am when I'm writing this).
I went to the awards ceremony and to my surprise, THE TIGER FACTORY received a Jury Special Mention for the Winds Of Asia category! Basically it happened when the jury members were presenting the Best Asian Film award to Korean filmmaker Shin Su-Won for her film PASSERBY #3, then jury member and film director Akira Ogata mentioned that the jury would like to specially mention THE TIGER FACTORY as well. So, I realized that a 'special mention' is literally, you know, a special mention.
When the 'award winners' were invited onto the stage for a photography session, not entirely sure whether someone who got a 'special mention' is considered an 'award winner', I headed off to the toilet. Then I came out and heard people calling out my name, so I went back into the hall and people were waiting for me!
So I took some photos with the winners and was whisked off to the press conference.
Me and Su-Won addressed the press and took questions.
The Tokyo International Film Fest website quoted some stuff I said. But slightly different in both the Japanese and English pages.
The TPG meetings from the 26th to 28th of Oct went by in a blur. I think it's much more fruitful than the one two years ago, I got to meet more people, got more input for the project, it was a very educational experience.
No photos though, just a photo of Ming Jin and I, with Dustin Nguyen. In between meetings.
26th of Oct. The 1st screening of INHALATION and THE TIGER FACTORY.
The day began with the TPG (Tokyo Project Gathering) reception. Just like two years ago, Ming Jin and I had a project called 'THE BOOK KEEPER' in the TPG. Some changes were made since then, for example, the opening reception was held on the TIFF Movie Cafe instead of the ballroom in the 49th floor of Roppongi Hills, and that meetings of TPG had been integrated into TIFFCOM (at the 40th floor) instead of being in a separate space at the 49th floor. I elaborated a lot more about the TPG in this blog two years ago.
Thai director Pen-ek Ratanaruang has a new project called Headshot.
Been quite behind with my updates because I've been so busy at the Tokyo Film Festival in the past few days. Both screenings of INHALATION + THE TIGER FACTORY had ended, so is the TPG (Tokyo Project Gathering) at TIFFCOM, so I have a bit more time now. (still have to head there later this afternoon to be interviewed)
On the 24th of June, the Taiwanese folks had a Taiwan Cinema Party in the Tokyo Film Fest.
Yesterday was the opening of the Tokyo International Film Festival 2010.
My recent Pusan Film Fest-winning short film INHALATION (which Ming Jin produced) and Ming Jin's THE TIGER FACTORY (which I produced) are screening under the WINDS OF ASIA section.
Before the green carpet event, we took photos with Vivian Hsu.
I told her that I saw the short film, JULIET'S CHOICE, which she starred in at the Pusan International Film Festival (it was also under the Asian Short Film Competition). JULIET'S CHOICE was initially conceived as part of an omnibus called Juliets, and Juliets is also screening at the Tokyo International Film Fest.
We walked down the green carpet. The TRON 2 folks were in front of us.
Yeah, it's not everyday that you get to share the same dance floor with an Oscar-winning actress.
But there I was, last night, at the Wide Angle party in Pusan International Film Fest. Just after the screening of INHALATION.
You'll spot Juliet Binoche, and my sista Kkobbi Kim (from "Breathless", who is probably the poster girl of this year's Pusan Film Fest cos she's in THREE films: MAGIC AND LOSS, ASHAMED and an anime), and also festival director Kim Dong Ho. This festival is Kim Dong Ho's swansong (he had been in charge for 15 years, since its founding).
Oh, Abbas Kiarostami appeared at the 0:34 mark too.
Before I launch into my barrage of photos from the Pusan Film Fest, I'm going to post up some photos I took in Hamburg during my time there on 1st-5th Oct.
I wanted to post photos of my graduation day on the 20th, or photos of me and mom hanging out at Kamakura on Mid-Autumn Festival two days ago, unfortunately I have to post about this instead.
This morning I received a call from mom. My uncle, dad's youngest brother, had just passed away a few hours before dawn. Cardiac arrest. He was 56. My parents are flying back to Malaysia tomorrow, a day earlier than planned. More about this later.
Dear readers, do not be deceived by the title of this blog post. I am definitely NOT encouraging the objectifying of beautiful booth women at the this year's edition of Tokyo Game Show. Like my 'Babes of Tokyo Game Show 2008' post from two years ago, I am now getting up my high horse to voice my personal conflicted feelings towards the beautiful booth women of the Tokyo Game Show.
Edited this together two nights ago. The music you here in the trailer is the main theme of the short film and is composed by my now-frequent collaborator Wong Woan Foong. Cello performed by Mark Shuping.
They started in 1996, then disbanded in 2000. I was crushed. In 2008, they came back again, I was skeptical. Yet the intensity of my love for SPEED, especially lead vocalist Hiroko Shimabukuro (the tall one), was so intense that I composed silly haiku for her.
(After such a long period of inactivity, I am now bombarding this blog with festival announcements, eek.)
This actually started at the beginning of September, but I didn't mention it due to some, er, distractions.
Anyway. a one-minute incarnation (or rather, the first scene) of my older short film, LOVE SUICIDES (2009), was one of the 25 finalists selected for FILMINUTE 2010, an international one-minute short film festival. I was a little surprised when I was informed last month by the people at the festival that the first scene of LOVE SUICIDES seemed like a 1-min film by itself!
So yeah, after that I decided to extract the scene and sent them as LOVE SUICIDES: PROLOGUE.
Watch it here on the Filminute website. (considering that it's only a minute long, I really don't that it'll waste that much of your time. Hah)
I mentioned in my previous post that my latest short, INHALATION, is finally making its premiere in competition at the Pusan International Film Festival on the 8th of October.
Actually on the same day (but slightly later, due to timezones), INHALATION will also be opening before THE TIGER FACTORY at the Vancouver International Film Festival. And later in the month of October, INHALATION will also be playing before THE TIGER FACTORY at the Tokyo International Film Festival.
It's not everyday that you get to plug your own SHORT FILM (!!) at the Cannes Film Festival. But I did just that with INHALATION, back in May, during the press conference of THE TIGER FACTORY, when I was asked about it by Jeremy Segay the moderator and programmer.
Marc Saint-Cyr had posted a review of THE WHITE FLOWER at J-Film Pow-Wow. Here's an excerpt:
Suitably, the still photography used throughout “The White Flower” is incredibly beautiful, possessing much richness, crisp clarity and great attention to framing and lighting in every shot. In fact, viewers are likely to be doubly grateful for the slideshow-like manner in which the shots progress, as it allows them to better savor each image while seeming to magnify and expand each of the contemplative, intimate moments that comprise the film’s episodic structure.
Leaving from Hong Kong to Guangzhou the day after the world premiere of THE WHITE FLOWER left me Twitter-less, Facebook-less, Youtube-less and Blogger-less, hence the lack of updates.
So, back to the screening of THE WHITE FLOWER. On the night of the 26th, I finally got to screen my experimental THE WHITE FLOWER to the public at the Broadway Cinematheque.
After hearing so much about the Avenue of Stars (it's modeled on the Hollywood Walk of Fame), I decided to pay a visit yesterday. I was greeted by the huge replica of the Hong Kong Film Awards statuette.
I arrived in Hong Kong yesterday afternoon (it's 2am when I'm writing this), the night before, Lesly the Cinematographer and Moon Lai the actress of THE TIGER FACTORY and NOW (the 1-min epic I shot last week) went to visit a horror film set.
This was actually posted on Twitch a while ago (my friends at Toronto J-Film Pow Wow covered it too), but I've been so busy with my own shoots back in Malaysia that I didn't get around to sharing it with you guys.
My experimental short, THE WHITE FLOWER, which I shot last year, is finally making its world premiere at the Hong Kong InDpanda Short Film Festival next week. To commemorate this, I cut together a trailer for the short.
It's an experimental film based on Yasunari Kawabata's short story of the same title, constructed mostly with still photos like Chris Marker's LA JETEE. It's my third Kawabata adaptation after LOVE SUICIDES and KINGYO.
Here's a synopsis.
A young Chinese woman living in Tokyo is haunted by remnants of a forbidden relationship and a dark family past. She ends up in a sanitarium and meets a doctor conflicted between his job and his personal feelings. After being discharged, she meets a wandering Thai filmmaker contemplating the relationship between art and love. Her encounters with them lead to unexpected revelations.
THE WHITE FLOWER is written, directed and edited by me. Produced by Maiko Itagaki. Cinematographer by Niklas Kullstrom (who just got married, congratulations, dude).
Starring Zhu Dan, Toru Inamura and Kong Pahurak (who also took the photo above).
Information of the film from the InDpanda website can be viewed here
6 days have passed since I wrapped the shoot of my one-minute epic, titled 'NOW'. Spent two days editing it. It was a tough slog, so many materials I've shot, yet I had to toss most of them away to fit into the 1 minute length. Nonetheless, it was worth the challenge.
Yes, you read that right. I was making an epic short film that is 1-minute in length. It's not the easiest thing to do, hence the pained expression etched upon my movie star-like face.
I've been back in Malaysia for nearly a week. Had been putting together a video shoot for the weekend, pondering the screenplay for my feature-length script, watching movies at home (watched HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON, the new KARATE KID, Fellini's LA DOLCE VITA and Herzog's THE WILD BLUE YONDER) and the cinema (well, I just got back from watching DESPICABLE ME)... and er, eating a lot of nice stuff.
I don't really 'miss' Malaysian food when I'm in Tokyo. There are Malaysian restaurants in Tokyo, but I'm happy enough with my usual bentos and ramen (... or McDonald's).
But now that I'm back here, I make the most out of enjoying the food here.
Tao Sha, the actress I used earlier, returned for a quick voice recording session. She was to recite a poem by Phyllis Lin Hui Yin.
The past two months went by in a blur, I can't even actually remember what had happened since I came back from Brest and Brignogan. A few days of being sick, then dealing with the Masters' Thesis presentation, and finally, quickly putting together a few projects to shake off my rust and ennui (that derived from the lack of filmmaking and creative endeavours).
A few weeks ago I was contacted by Huey Ching, also a Malaysian in Japan (and a composer), proposing a collaboration. An experimental festival for live performances and all sorts of music project's coming up soon in Tokyo, she intended to merge her own music performance with videos.
27th of July, two days ago, the first screening of KINGYO was held as part of the short film competition program in the Skip City International D-Cinema Festival 2010.
I was surprised by the amount of audiences, being a Tuesday morning and all. Mine was the last one to play, so I got to watch the other three short films, which were all really diverse in tone and genres: A fantasy black comedy, a cyberpunk samurai actioner, and a coming-of-age tale. Left the hall when KINGYO started playing, so not entirely sure of its reception.
The filmmakers and cast members were all invited onto the stage after the screening to introduce themselves and what they wanted to say about their films.
On Sunday (25th of July, just a day after the opening of the Skip City Film Fest mentioned in my previous post), I headed off to the Fuji TV headquarters in Odaiba for a screening of LOVE SUICIDES. It was part of the SF7 program. SF stands for 'Student Films', seven universities participated, hence the '7'.
Went to the opening ceremony of Skip City International D-Cinema Festival 2010. My short film, KINGYO, is in competition. 10 shorts were in competition, it's supposed to be a domestic competition for Japanese shorts only, KINGYO was a Japanese short, but its director ain't a Japanese, so that makes me the token foreigner among the nominees, awesome!
I was actually late, missed all of the opening speeches from the ceremony, but I arrived just in time to be introduced on-stage. When I walked into the place, the conversation between me and the staffer was like that:
Nine years ago, when I was just finishing high school, I went to Japan for a family trip. I remember being in a hotel that was known for the hot springs, but what I remember most then was the lobby, where a public service announcement poster of actress/ model Kazue Fukiishi from the fire department was pinned onto the wall.
I vaguely recognized her name (few years earlier I had seen her debut feature in the TOKIMEKI MEMORIAL, a film adapted from a dating simulation... er, yeah), but I was mostly mesmerized by her beauty. That large luminous eyes peering deep into my soul, telling me to be careful not to play with fire, the slight playful smile on her face hinted that she knew secrets of me and would be a willing co-conspirator.
Returning to my room, images of her lingered, and the question that haunted my mind then was... "what if I cannot see this poster again? What if, for the rest of my life, this poster would just be a fleeting image that would just fade off in my mind, along with her name?"
3PM is an exercise from the cinematography class I was taking last year. I remember finishing it around the end of June. Then summer came, and I was mired into some sort of depression, which is what I am pretty much going through now. (Quite odd, it's as if I'm stuck in a time loop like the protagonist of the film.)
I digress.
Anyway, all my rushes (raw footages) of this film had been destroyed when my hard disk died last year (just a few weeks after the film was done), making this a 'lost work' of mine. And I wouldn't exactly classify this as part of my oeuvre since it's really just a class project of sorts.
The film only existed in the form of some DVDs that I managed to burn for myself. There are some works that I've done which I would rather it doesn't see the light of the day, but I had a lot of fun shooting 3PM, with the help of a nice cast and crew. And I wouldn't want the film to disappear just like that, so I might as well upload it online for fun.
My friend, author Quentin S Crisp, has an important announcement to make.
Dear Readers,
My name is Quentin, but please call me Quentin S. Crisp. I have had the privilege of being interviewed on this blog in the past, and now I would like to address you directly. For some time I have been in correspondence and creative collaboration with Justin Isis, guest writer on this blog. A significant overlap in our aesthetic concerns led us to found the dadaoist blogzine, Chômu. Catching the westering rays of that dying blog (which will perhaps rise again), and taking its name therefrom, a new celestial body has appeared in the publishing firmament: Chômu Press.
Yesterday, I noticed an increase of traffic for last year's blog post about the Mitama Matsuri (or Mitama Festival) at the Yasukuni Shrine. I checked the date and realized that it's exactly been a year (plus a day) since I went to the festival. Last year I went with two of my friends, Zifeng and Yang Yang, it was a fun experience. We went there in the evening, and left after sunset.
It took me a while to decide whether I wanted to go again or not, with a newer camera, I could take much better photos than last year's. Too bad I would be going alone, but then, it's always been the case anyway.
This time, I arrived at the shrine at around 7:30pm. It was already night.
My old laptop died last month and I ended up being forced to get a new one. Well, it was about time anyway, the laptop had been with me for more than 3 years, a usual life span for laptops?
I just opened its hard disk and hooked it up to my new comp just now because I needed to extract some information needed for tomorrow's final Masters' Thesis presentation. Then I saw some of the photos from my last day in Cannes which I have yet to upload on Flickr, and also an earlier video, so here you go.
This video was taken on May 18th, when Professor Ando was bringing us to this nice place for dinner.
25th of June. Everyone were leaving Brignogan. Before that they were waiting at the hotel lobby, it was the only place where the Wi-Fi signal was decent.