[KineJapan] Osaka Asian Film Festival

Thu Mar 22 12:07:51 EDT 2018

Thanks for your postings,Markus. I’ve never been to OAFF.

Isthere anything to say on translation? OAFF not titling themselves ‘international’,they aren’t actually obliged to provide English subtitles, but the full englishversion of all their pages carry that promise.  I guess these days that any fiction filmaiming for an international distribution comes on a DCP which has Englishsubtitles. So the festival has to concentrate on Japanese subtitles ? I sawsome warning about their being hard to read.

Andthe discussions and Q&As ?
Rogermacyroger at yahoo.co.uk

    On Tuesday, 20 March 2018, 12:19:22 GMT, Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum via KineJapan <kinejapan at lists.osu.edu> wrote:  

 Osaka Asian Film Festival ended on Sunday (http://www.oaff.jp/2018/en/index.html). It is a VERY different scene from Yamagata and Yubari, that's for sure. For one thing, I think there is a lot more fun going on at those other festivals—at least for the professional crowd on hand. There are parties in Osaka, but their are fairly staid affairs sponsored by the embassies of various countries. 
There is definitely a local fan base for the festival, and I'm not sure it's an exaggeration to say that it's dominated by middle-aged women. There is a strong fanish thing going on. It's most obvious after the screenings. Q and As include photo op at the end, where the directors and stars stand next to their poster and look left....then center....then right.....then towards the video cameras. It's a strange ritual, and followed by a sain-kai in the lobby where fans line up to get stuff signed. 
One bad rap OAFF gets is that the films "aren't great." Well, true. But only in a certain sense. They are clearly out to please the audiences. The films aren't terribly definitely not extreme. If you look at their flier, a majority of the PR photos for the films feature young couples. Says a lot. 
It's not the way I'd program a festival of Asian cinema. But I to appreciate the opportunity to see some popular films that otherwise don't get shown at festivals or get distributed. They also hold discussions on different topics about different parts of Asia. This year, I learned a lot about what's going on in Indonesia, which is increasingly looking like an industry that must be reckoned with. Growing like crazy, with enormous headroom for huge expansion and lots of young, creative filmmakers. 
Unfortunately, I didn't see the Japanese films that got awards—especially unfortunate since I didn't care for the Japanese films I saw. I heard especially good things about one of the Japanese award winners: Hayama Moët's KUSHINA, what will you be. 
Actually, my favorite film of the festival was the out-of-competition Poppy Goes to Hollywood Redux (http://www.oaff.jp/2018/en/program/n06.html), a Cambodian comedy about a transgender revue that flees to the countryside when they get in trouble with gangsters. No pretense to high art here. Just lots of fun upending gender norms, stereotypes, genres—basically everything. 
But the highlight of the festival for me was meeting director Chang Yi and actress Yang Hui-shan. They were huge figures in the New Taiwan Cinema. At Osaka, they showed a delightful and often stunning beautiful animated film which had four different stories about dogs—mysteriously programmed late on a weekend night when kids couldn't go. Chang checked out from filmmaking nearly three decades ago to become famous glass artists, but took up the challenge of animation from Edward Yang; the latter was a good friend and died during the production of an ambitious animated film. But the reason I was anxious to meet them was that I walked blindly into a Taipei theater one day in 1984 and encountered their Jade Love. I was blown away by the film, and right after that Hou's Summer and Grandpa's and then Yang's That Day on the Beach. Because of this I discovered how amazing Asian cinema could be and soon found myself in grad school a couple years later. So it's no exaggeration to say Chang and Yang changed my life and I feel grateful Osaka Asian gave me the chance to meet them. 
Markus   
      -    
OAFF 2018 Award Winners!

★Grand Prix (Best Picture Award) / “No. 1 Chung Ying Street”

★Most Promising Talent Award / Mikhail RED "“NEOMANILA” Director

★Best Actress Award / IIJIMA Shuna "“Bad Poetry Tokyo” Actress

★ABC Award / “Take Me To the Moon”

★Yakushi Pearl Award / Ryza CENON “Mr. and Mrs. Cruz” Actress

★JAPAN CUTS Award / “KUSHINA, what will you be”

★Housen Short Film Award / “CYCLE-CYCLE”

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