The Biennale College is a new initiative started last year by the Venice Film Festival to help support new directors around the world who are trying to do their first or second feature film.
This year, I was one of the twelve directors selected by the Biennale College to develop my feature film project.
After four years since my last trip at the Venice Film Festival, I was able to return to Venice again. With Ming Jin as my producer. (Biennale College invites director-producer teams)
I left for Venice on October 3. And today, Oct 15, I am preparing to return to Malaysia.
Here are a series of photos and Facebook posts of mine that chronicled the journey.
Post by Edmund Yeo.
Post by Edmund Yeo.
My first night in Venice.
It was the high water season in Venice, while walking past Piazza San Marco, people were preparing for the flooding that would come at night by putting up planks and wooden platforms. I never saw the flooding though :(
View from the Ponte dell"Accademia bridge.
Enjoying cichetti by the canal.
The experience was very... Venetian?
But I wasn't there for vacation. Most of the time I was on the island of San Servolo, doing the workshops.
Post by Edmund Yeo.
One of them, Paul Tyler's lego workshop, was particularly interesting!
Post by Edmund Yeo.
Post by Edmund Yeo.
Post by Edmund Yeo.
For an hour and a half, we would map out the story of the film with lego pieces, going through each character's backgrounds and motivations, their relationships, the plot points, etc etc. The discussions are in-depth and insane. I was able to unlock some of the issues that I had with my story.
And at the end of the session, Paul would do a voice-recording that summarizes the entire film based on the lego blocks on the table, not forgetting any single bit at all.
Meanwhile, Venice, which was initially rainy in the first few days that I was there... became sunnier.
I was finally able to see the sunset, its shift from evening to night. It was beautiful.
Post by Edmund Yeo.
