INDIEHK

SUMMER,

SUMMER, 2013 INDIE HK

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INDIE HK

GOLDEN GATE SILVER LIGHT

A WOMAN DIRECTOR’S LEGEND

The Magazine of Independent FilmSUMMER, 2013 VOL. 001

WHEN STEPHEN SILHA MEETS JAMES BROUGHTONPAST AND PRESENTFrom Hong Kong Indie Films to World Indie Films

SEVEN DAYS TOGETHER


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Editor’s NoteAsian independent films are being showcased in the ongoing Hong Kong Asian International Film Festival in April, but where is the local indie film scene anyway?

INDIE HK is the first English magazine based in Hong Kong for local in-dependent film industry, the artists who committed to explore film as a form of art, and whoever share a sincere interest in the unlimited scope of motion picture. Through carefully selected topics and insightful editorial content, INDIE HK provides you a feast of inspiring point of views in both filmmaking and filmmakers.

In Golden Gate Silver Light: A Female Director’s Legend, S. Louisa Wei brought the life journey of Esther Eng, a pioneer Chinese-American female film director, to light, seeking to remind the audiences of Esther Eng’s significance in a male-dominated film industry. Many people have noticed that the reason behind the lack of excellent local indie films in recent years is because there’s not enough new blood coming into this industry. From Louisa Wei’s point of view, the deeper reason actually lies in the high cost of living now in Hong Kong.

We also provide you with international indie filmmaker’s story in When Stephen Silha Meets James Broughton. Stephen Silha is an independent filmmaker who enjoys intimate relation-ships with James Broughton, a pioneering poet and filmmaker in America. This kind of sto-ries will give Hong Kong audience a fresh air, inspire and encourage them to make documen-taries on things they truly love.

Besides the feature stories, there is a session dedicated to promoting students’ project in progress, since the future of indie film in Hong Kong lies in the youth generation. In Film-makers’ Corner, Anson Mak, a local film, video and sound artist, will share with you useful

EDITO

RIALB

OARD

S U M M E R , 2013

VOL. 001

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Cherry Luo

MANAGING EDITOR

Lemon Lin

ASSOCIATE EDITOR

Vivian Xu

MARKETING DIRECTOR

Vivian Huang

ART DIRECTOR

Dong Xiaobo

PLANNING COORDINATOR

Katie Zhang

FOR SUBSCRIPTION, GIFT MEMEBERSHIPS, OR CHANGES OF ADDRESS, CONTACT CUSTOMER SERVICE AT INDIEHK.COM OR CALL 852-45674321.

OFFICE: INDIEHK, HALL3, CITY UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG, HKSAR

THE MAGAZINE OF INDEPENDENT FILM

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INDIE HKSUMMER 2013 THE MAGAZINE OF INDEPENDENT FILM

FEATURES

GOLDEN GATE SILVER LIGHT: A WOMAN DIRECTOR’S LEGEND

12 WHEN STEPHEN SILHA Meets JAMES BROUGHTON

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DEPARTMENTSEditor’s Note

Screenings

Effie’s Review

The Youth

Festivals

Filmakers’ Corner

Museum

Backstage

Editor’s Choice

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INDIE HK


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Movie Talk I: Ivy HoModerator: Law KarSpeaker: Ivy HoDate: 14.4.2013 (Sun) 4:30pmVenue: Cinema, Hong Kong Film ArchiveConducted in Cantonese, Admission Free

In this film screening and seminar series organ-ised and hosted by veteran film critic and historian Law Kar, experienced filmmakers are invited to se-lect three films by themselves or their film-making counterparts for screening. A two-hour seminar will be held after the screenings where audience will join host and guest watching clips of the selected films and gain better understanding of the featured guests’ experience and art as they intimately share with the audience the inspiration, motivation and process of their creative work.

Date: 11.5 - 20.7.2013Venue: Lecture Hall, Hong Kong Science MuseumPresented by: Leisure and Cultural Services Department Organised by: Hong Kong Film Critics Society

With its gifted power to transcend, art can relate an old tale in a brand new way. We have selected six feature films which serve as the pioneers or style-setters in the history of cinematographic narration and will approach them with three different topics: Mystery and Truth, Memoirs and Portraits and New Waves: New Ways of Storytelling.

Critics’ Choice 2013

The Cinematic Matrix of Golden HarvestTime: 10:00 – 19:00Date: 22.3 – 30.6.2013Venue: 50 Lei King Road, Sai Wan Ho, Hong Kong Film ArchivePresented by: Leisure and Cultural Services Department

“The Cinematic Matrix of Golden Harvest” is pre-sented in six chapters: “The Legend of the Dragons,” “Action Rejuvenated, “Comedic Schemes,” “Talents Abound”, “International Visions” and “Dare to be Unique.” They include early works directed by Jimmy Wang Yu, Huang Feng, John Woo and Michael Hui, plus cutting edge films made by young visionary film-makers, including Patrick Tam’s The Sword (1980), Tony Au’s I Am Sorry (1989), Alfred Cheung’s On the Run (1988) and Gordon Chan’s The Final Option (1994).

APRIL

MAY

JUNE

SUMMER, 2013 INDIE HKSCREENINGS


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“100 Must See Hong Kong Movies” has received very positive re-sponse from local and overseas since its launch in Oct 2011, and the Hong Kong Film Archive has succeeded in expanding its audience to a younger and more diverse mass as a result of collaborating with the Broad-way Cinematheque. Entering a brand new calendar year, both venues are committed to another round of showcase to encourage new perspectives in appreciating Hong Kong Cinema. To make the programme more fo-cus, we are condensing the film screenings to a quarterly showcase, while Broadway Cinematheque shall maintain their twice-monthly schedule. In January, films are chosen to go in line with the King Hu and Yam Kim-fai retrospectives; from February onwards, the focus will be tragic or heart-racking tales of love.

100 Must See Hong Kong Movies

Restored Treasures

For film archives, presenting restored films to the public is always a wonderful occasion. For preserving our cinematic heritage is a primary goal of archives and restoring films ravaged by time is an integral part of that goal. It is with great joy that the Hong Kong Film Archive is present-ing the new series, Restored Treasures, featuring films from all over the world that had enjoyed different forms of restoration. The program will continue by screening a restored film the first Sunday of every month, fea-turing a mix of works from Hong Kong and abroad.

REGULAR PROGRAMMES

SUMMER, 2013 INDIE HK SCREENINGS


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A celebration of an ancient, disappearing way of life and a beautiful relationship between the three

who live in a forgotten world.

By EFFIE TSUI

The Old Man and The Ox

There is no desperate struggle between heroes and the flick of finger of fate, no incessant hazards lurking beneath the surface of a quiet life, nor even any

thrilling plot turns or startling revelations in Old Partner, the first feature length documentary directed by South-Korean independent director Lee Chung-ry-oul. Yet, this is a film impossible to spoil. The story unfolds lentamente, prosai-cally as a chronicle foretold, with frames imbued with the fresh colors of nature and countryside. Subtly, it touches your heart, brings you nostalgia for home-land, and leaves your eyes brimming with tears.

to performing the actions that have de-fined his daily existence for almost forty years. He ruminates. He pulls a plow in the fields and sometimes a cart, on which sits Mr. Choe, moving back and forth with exquisite slowness as the world goes rushing by. His body is bony and massive. His face is a perpetual enigma, with his eyes expressing docility, stead-fastness, or sadness of declining years. When the bell around his neck rings, it’s either him turning his head, staring at Mr. Choe sowing the seeds in a short dis-tance, or Mr. Choe staring at him pacing

Simple as the title indicates, the documentary centers on the last year’s company of an ancient ox with an elderly farming couple, Choe Won-gun and Lee Sam-sun, who live in a village of hilly areas in eastern South Korea. Probably the oldest in the country, the ox lived 40 years, more than twice as long as the average age of his same kind. Not dignity and glory as a venerable did the ox gain due to his longevity, nor did he enjoy peaceful and relaxing retirement, but till his last days of life, the name-less, slow-moving beast of burden sticks

along the country road. Affinity connects the two whom hardly separate far from each other, while a love triangle is also in-volved, as Ms. Lee regards him as a rival for her husband’s devotion.

Mr. Choe, eighty when filmed, is frail and partially deaf, and one of his legs is debilitated by a long-ago accident. With his wife, he is taciturn and impatient most of the time, though they have raised nine children, all of whom have moved to urban areas and occasionally visit their parents. Ms. Lee, meanwhile, who has no grudge against the ox, peppers her husband but amuses audience with complaints that sound sincere and habitual. She blames her stubborn husband to keep her busy in fields at her age. She grouses that she’s tired and she has wasted her whole life on the wrong man.

Mr. Choe tunes her out, but he is ten-derly solicitous of the ox, always quick to

EFFIE’S REVIEW


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EFFIE TSUI, film critic based in Hong Kong. Blogger, Traveller, Columist, Lohas. She has written about film, jazz, television, and poetry for Modern Weekly, Ming Pao, and other publications.

respond whenever the ox seems to need something. Every early dawn he gets up to prepare special fodder instead of feed-ing him processed one, which he explains would easily induce flabby muscle and fleshiness. When told by veterinarian that the ox has, at most, one year to last, he re-fuses to accept it and drives the ox to the fields as usual. The ox paces on the trail and stops to take a break between times. Mr. Choe waits on the cart watching him, no spurring and no reproach. The two old partners stay still for a while, against the background of a rising sun.

In fact, the ox lives for another three years. Feebler though he becomes, he never spends a day idling around. Just like Mr. Choe and his wife, they used to cul-tivate in their fields to raise children, but they never cease even though their chil-dren have settled down and started careers in city. When, later in the film, Mr. Choe reluctantly goes to an agricultural fair to sell his ox, he is laughed at by others for overrating his ox and is annoyed by the low offers. Under the influence of some alco-hol, he yells to other villagers a story about how the ox saved his life and how he serves like a son to him. He says in the affirmative that he will hold a funeral for the ox after he takes his last breath.

The documentary is a tribute to a way of living that is fading before our eyes. The condition these three share can be

described only as happiness, though it is not the material comfort often associated with the word. Their way of living is not reduced by its simplicity and closeness to nature, but elevated. It may seem odd at first that Mr. Choe resists so-called mod-ern way of living by keeping farming ma-chine and pesticide away from his fields and processed fodder out of his shed, even though it adds much more burden to his frail body. In Mr. Choe’s world, work-ing might be a way to relieve him from solitude and aging. Getting a sense of use-ful and alive through hard work, he seems

to also project the feelings onto his old companions. Although the elder couple’s relationship with the beast of burden may seem a bit absurd to some, in a sophisti-cated way Mr. Lee shows his deep insight into the profound interspecies bonds.

LEE Chung-ryoul is the director of <Old Partner>, which soared into an uncharted territory for Korean documentary films and independent films by at-tracting 2.9 million viewers. He had long worked as a freelance pro-ducer on TV broadcast films, but faced difficulty in working on sub-ject matters of his liking due to dif-fering interests of his clients. LEE learned documentary filmmaking virtually on his own, without belong-ing to any particular documentary group or receiving formal training. It can be said that a stranger to the tradition of Korean documentary filmmaking pulled off the great-est feat of all documentary films.

PROFILEThe story unfolds lentamente, prosaically, with frames imbued with the fresh colors of nature and countryside. It touches your heart, brings you nos-talgia for homeland, and leaves your eyes brim-ming with tears.

EFFIE’S REVIEW


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GHer name has never appeared in English-languag history of Chinese cinema. But she definitely should be more famous than she is. Doc-umentary filmmaker S. Louisa Wei brought the life journey of Esther Eng, a pioneer Chi-nese-American female film director, to light with a 106 minutes documentary Gold-en Gate Silver Light. Wei seeks to remind audiences of Esther Eng’s significance in a male-dominated film industry.


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OLDEN GATE SILVER LIGHTG A woman director’s legend By CHERRY LUO

FEATURES


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Esther Eng made the “first Cantonese Singing-Talk-ing Picture made in Hollywood” (1935), directed

“national defense” dramas for China (1930s), gave Bruce Lee his screen debut (1941), and produced & directed the first all-Chinese motion picture in Hawaii. Yet people may never heard of this remarkable woman who directed 10 features in America and HK.

“Her story is really buried because of her identity as a Chinese-American.” Louisa Wei said, “She seems to fall into the crack between American film history and Chinese film his-tory. Nobody mentioned her, not on both sides.”

ESTHER ENGPioneer Chinese-American

Female Filmmaker in Hollywood

However, her importance in film history could never been ignored since she acted as the bridge that two cultures met and interacted with each other.

Golden Gate Silver Light, premiered at the Hong Kong International Film Festival on April 1, for the first time reveals the little-known life story of Esther Eng, who began her career in film industry at the age of 22 in 1935 with the first Canton-ese-language film shot in Hollywood, Heartache.


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Born and raised in San Francisco, Eng went to Hong Kong when she was 23 years old and quickly became a celebrated director and received a lot of coverage from news media, reporting her progress in filmmaking as well as her self-fashioning and love affairs with actresses. After helming 5 films in Hong Kong, Eng returned to San Francisco at the urging of her father before the Pacific War broke out. Esther wanted to see Chinese-American films soar beyond their Chinatown base and into mainstream American theatres without sacrificing their cultural roots, but most of her work was little documented in the U.S. outside of Chinatowns, with the exception of Golden Gate Girl (1941), a film that incorporates the fund-raising endeavor in support of the Chinese war effort dubbed “A Bowl of Rice Campaign”. In 1949, Eng made her last independent film and moved to New York to open three restaurants, which she ran until her death in 1970.

In the course of tracking Eng’s life stories and her works, the Hong Kong Film Archive is a vital repository for such materials since Ng Kam-ha (Esther Eng), as a prominent figure in HK cinema of the 1930s, “belongs” to both Hong Kong and her native America.

Actually, the documentary project kicked off when the Hong Kong Film Archive received a donation of over 600 personal photographs of Eng. Since then, Wei tracks down as many surviving family members and co-workers – many former Cantonese opera stars fleeing the war in the 1930s – as she could to paint a sketch of the unconventional woman.


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Top: S. Louisa Wei Left Bottom: Louisa Shooting in Honolulu ChinatownRight Bottom: Poster - Golden Gate Silver Light

THE WORLD

SEEN BY WOMEN DIRECTORS“It’s easy to identify a woman direc-

tor’s point of view.” Wei recognizes from the only two existing films of Eng and the synopsis of her other films strong themat-ic concerns of women’s life and fate: “In her stories, women’s roles are very strong. She always put women at the center of the story. They are the most important forces to push the story forward.”

Eng’s women’s roles are never pas-sive in their choice of lovers or fates. There are women who fall in love with a wrong man or a woman being a heroine in a war as a pilot. All these roles are not in line with traditional ways of depicting women as a mother, a daughter, or a wife. As Wei put it, “Eng extend women’s roles to those outside the family.”

Wei has been fascinated with the subject of women filmmakers since she viewed the 1985 debut film of Hu Mei, Army Nurse.

In 2009, co-authored with Y. Yang, Louisa Wei wrote a book Women’s Cin-ema: Dialogues with Chinese and Japa-nese Female Directors. She interviewed 27 female directors from Japan, Hong

rectorial debut Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl, for its value in presenting a missing part of Chinese women’s history during the Mao’s years on films. The film stared Li Xiaolu (Xiu Xiu), a 15-year-old girl liv-ing in the city of Chengdu, moves out to be “reeducated” in the countryside with a nomadic Tibetan, during China’s Cultural

“Women’s way of looking at the gender issues are naturally different from men.” Wei compares a similar situation of two films by a female and male director and finds interesting results.

If a middle age woman doesn’t pay at-tention to her looks, Wei says that a male director would use this as an excuse for her husband to have extra-marital affairs. However, in a female director’s interpre-tation, it is because the man has an issue with a lover that the wife would to pay close attention to her look.

“Their ways of dealing with male and female roles are often subtly different.” Wei says that is the interesting point in doing research on gender issues in film industry.

“Women directors don’t have a sense of com-munity in the film industry. This world is still dominated by men.”

Kong and the Mainland China on their ways of filming in the male-dominated film industry.

Wei thinks highly of Joan Chen’s di-

Revolution, instituted by Mao for getting rid of political enemies. But she was never able to go back to the city. Wei praises Chen’s film for its ability to contribute to a complete women history.

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“Their ways of dealing with male and female roles are often subtly different.” Wei says that is the interesting point in doing research on gender issues in film industry.

“Women director don’t have a sense of community in the film industry. This world is still dominated by men.” Wei says, but adds that women directors could do better than male directors in documen-taries, especially when family affairs and intimate communication are involved. Ac-tually, there are more documentary film-makers than feature filmmakers among women. The reason is women have an easier way to communicate with others. They don’t pose a threatening presence to people. “Women are better listeners” Wei thinks that’s why women directors do documentaries better.

Indie Film in

Concerning the conditions for younger genera-tions of independent filmmakers in Hong Kong,

Wei suggests that the most important issue at hand is the cost of living. “In the Mainland, you can live in Tibet with a few thousands yuan for a year to shoot. But this is impossible for filmmakers in Hong Kong.” Wei points out the sad truth that when people are busy making money, they don’t have time to pursue their film career.

Even though old footage of San Francisco, New York, and the 1930’s and 1940’s China cost a fortune, “I can use school facilities.” Wei explains that City University of Hong Kong helped her a lot in making Golden Gate Silver Light look like a million dollar pro-duction.

Now an associate professor with the City Univer-sity of Hong Kong’s School of Creative Media, Wei expects to see her students, especially female ones, to pursue a career in filmmaking.

Even though Hong Kong government is quite generous in giving funds, whether the funds are used properly is another question. Talking about this, Wei is worried for the future of Hong Kong indie films.

FEATURES

“Just go ahead and make films! It’s a pity that fe-male students always quit the filmmaking too quickly after graduation.” Wei urges that the world needs more voices from female directors. Existing examples like the 27 women directors Wei interviewed have proved that it is not impossible for female directors to compete with their male counterparts. Hopefully, the Esther Eng’s story would lend young women the cour-age they need and a sense of mission.

HK

Esther Eng (third left) at work. Courtesy of Frank Bren


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FEATURES

When

STEPHEN SILHA Meets

JAMES BROUGHTON

“Big Joy” explores Broughton’s passionate embrace of a life of

pansexual transcendence and a fiercely independent mantra:

‘follow your own weird’.By ZHANG DI

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When Stephen Silha stepped into the Museum of Modern

Art in New York in 1979, he did not ex-pect that his life would get changed dra-matically.

A film on showing that day was made by a filmmaker whose work is quintessen-tially Californian – exploring and engag-ing the polar frontiers of wildness and civility, male and female, body and spir-it—with the crash of Pacific Ocean waves echoing throughout.

Stephen Silha said he was attracted by the voiceover of the film immediately.

“It was saying ‘This is it and I am it and you are it and so is that’.” Silha says. “That is folksy yet meaty. ” The filmmaker is James Broughton.

His most famous film The Bed (1967) featured a number of San Fran-cisco luminaries (including Alan Watts, Imogen Cunningham, Anna Halprin, Gavin Arthur, Jean Varda) cavorting on a bed, which rolled over the hills of Marin County. It was pioneering in its celebra-tion of naked bodies, and was the quintes-sential hippie film.

Ten years later in 1989, when Silha met Broughton and had a chat with him, he could hardly believe that this lively man was already 75 years old.

“I have never seen such a lively nice old guy before. I want to know, where did he get that? ” Silha says, adding that Broughton became his mentor on how to live a good life and motivated him to make an independent film about Broughton.

When calculating the risk of living their own lives, people often get the math wrong. Broughton was just a big inspira-tion in this regard.

Died in May 1999, naked, he was a man who met his male soul mate at 61 and lived together for 25 years. “I believe the way they lived together, the way they created things together, and the interplay between these two would interest the au-dience.” Silha says.

However, nowadays, it seems that all but a small number of experimental film freaks and poetry aficionados have forgotten about Broughton. Hence, the

Top: Stephen SilhaBottom: James Broughton

the film BIG JOY: The Adventures of James Broughton came into being.

For Silha, it is hard to sum up how they gave birth to their “new baby” which involved raising money, composing mu-sic, and getting in trouble with the police for having a bed on the streets of Austin. None of this is a cakewalk.

Some people may think that good ideas are dying on the vine for lack of money. However, the crowd turns out to be pretty talented at identifying and boot-strapping promising creative endeavors.

Silha created an engaging sales video

for promoting the BIG JOY: The Adven-tures of James Broughton on Kickstarter, the highest-profile website engaged in the crowd funding of new ideas, including everything from board games to offbeat tech gadgets to movies.

The video did the job: the feature-length documentary breezed by its $12,000 funding goal, raising more than $12,976 from 128 backers in a month. These patrons won’t receive an owner-ship stake. All they’ll get in return is a warm, fuzzy feeling and a thank-you gift scaled to the size of their pledge, start-ing with a thank-you on the movie’s Face-book page and a downloadable video clip

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offered to anyone who donated at least $5.

“

Follow your own wired. Make the film you can make. Does not paly the film eve-rybody else can see it.

Praise and Thanks, and More Bubbly Please.

”

Silha regards websites like Kickstart-er as reliable and long-term sources for

when I first used Kicksrarter, 80% of the donations came from my friends whereas only 40% of the donations fell into this category the second time.”

Raising money, in Silha’s opinion, is not as a big problem as it used to be. Thanks to the advancement of technol-ogy, the total money required for such an independent film is largely reduced. Currently, a simple camera or even an iPhone can help reach the goal. It would cost them “roughly 40 million dol-lars” in the old days, he says in a relief.

Getting the money ready is just the be-ginning of the story. The shooting and post-production process usually took years. Silha says that he feels sad after all is done.

“You work on a film for four years, molding and shaping it, cre-ating and then ‘killing your chil-dren’ as you edit out scenes. ”

Together with his team, Silha cut out many crucial things, including 16 inter-views. “Finding the right person to inter-view is always paramount. Some may not in the mood of being interviewed,” Silha says, referring to the fact that Broughton’s

daughter turned down the interview re-quest due to some personal reasons.

When comes to his team members, Silha cannot be more grateful for what they have done. The film cannot be pro-duced without them,” he says, adding that their musician is “a highlight” since they applied soft music as a major key, which is mostly employed as a minor key.

Silha and his team ritually gave birth to the film, all 82 minutes of it, at the an-nual Summer Gathering of Radical Fa-eries at Breitenbush Hot Springs in De-troit, Oregon. It was apt and poetic that the organizing committee staged a sneak preview of their work-in-progress there. For it was there that Silha met James Broughton in 1989, at a winter gathering of Radical Faeries; they were assigned to the same cabin.

Silha never confuses about his dual role as an independent filmmaker and a journalist. Instead, he enjoys the interplay between the two roles. “They play off each other. The experience of journalism adds to my integrity in the filmmaking pro-cess,” He says. “As a filmmaker, I learn to think visually instead of just in words.”

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The year 2013 is the centennial of Broughton and Silha is more than happy to participate in the Hong Kong Independ-ent Film Festival. “It’s an honor to be part of a festival with over 300 films from 68 countries, showing in various places around this polyglot Asian citystate.” He says.

Roger Garcia, the director of Hong Kong Independent Film, was the per-son who invited Silha to bring James Broughton’s works—a fusion of West and East, male and female, fast and slow, this and that — into Hong Kong.

“When I met the festival’s direc-tor, Roger Garcia, in New York at Inde-pendent Film Week in 2011, he knew Broughton’s film and immediately warmed to the idea of a retrospective.” Silha says, adding that he also offered introductions to other festivals that “might consider do-ing the same”.

The reception to the film was all they could expect. Critics raved about the new independent film. Audience was inspired.

However, these were not all Sil-ha purses. In 1999, he witnessed Broughton’s death with champagne on his lips. Broughton’s last words were: praise and thanks, and more bubbly please.

Silha says he wants to inspire people as they walk out of the theatre.

“Follow your own wired. Make the film you can make. Does not paly the film everybody else can see it, ”he says.

It is certainly going to be a bumpy

road.

1913James born November 10th in

Modesto, California

1947

First poetry book: Songs for

Certain Children, San Francisco:

Centaur Press

1948First solo film, “Mother’s Day”-

Broughton and Kael separate

1954

“The Pleasure Garden” wins special

jury prize at the Cannes Film Festival,

presented by Jean Cocteau

1966

Professor, Department of Creative Arts, San Francisco

State University (through ‘76) - Starts teaching in the

filmmaking department of the San Francisco Art Insti-

tute - Makes “The Bed” (20 min) (commissioned by the

Royal Film Archive of Belgium

19701970 - Makes “This Is It” (10 min)

1972Makes “Dreamwood” (45 min), his

longest and most Jungian film

1975

Receives Film Culture’s Twelfth Independent Film

Award for his outstanding work of thirty years,

and was cited as “the grand classic master of

Independent Cinema”- Meets life partner, Joel

Singer

1989

Selected by the American Film Institute as the re-

cipient of the 1989 American Film Institute Award

for Independent Film and Video Artists (Lifetime

Achievement Award)

1994Publishes Big Joy (chapbook), Port Townsend ,

WA: Syzygy Press

James dies May 17th, at home in Port Townsend 1999

JAM

ES

BROU

GHTO

N TI

MEL

INE

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Seven days together

“We got together people who run counter to each other in social rule. We shared it and we enjoyed it. Finally we

named it as Together.”

The source of creative inspiration came from one of news on local newspaper

of Leo’s hometown. In Jiangxi, a theft bur-glarized his neighbor who was an old man. The theft implored the old man to take care of his young son when arrested due to burglary. The old man kept his words and raised the kid up until theft’s release. “ The news made a profound impression on me through people’s special identity and abnormality. Later on I decided to make it into a film inspired by Roman Po-lanski’s Oliver Twist, which featured an old theft and an orphan.” Leo explained.

Shot around seven days in Jiangxi Province, the low-budget film is not osten-sibly about the city itself, which includes characteristic architectures and local food like meat pie soup. Plentiful off-camera scenes in Leo’s childhood memory also sparkles the film. It is unfolded that the di-rector still preserves traces of childhood. “Actually I am still a big kid, I try to infuse the theft’s son Dongdong with my own childhood dream.” Dongdong broke up the old man’s window in swordsman cos-tume play is one of plots tailored to visual-ize the kid who like playing pranks.

Realizing director’s childhood dream in plots is the beauty of independent film in Leo’s eyes. “I can express what I re-ally want to say in my film regardless of trammels of politics and finance. With-out powerful financial and crew support, competing with commercial film on visual effects or movie stars, independent film

and finance. Without powerful financial and crew support, competing with com-mercial film on visual effects or movie stars, independent film will bite off more than it can chew. So we have to shape special director’s style for distinguishing from commercial ones.” Pursuing free-dom in independent film is the raw mo-tivation inspired him to give up CCTV’s well-paid job and come to Hong Kong for study filmmaking.

Leo had a hand in filmmaking of a few Hong Kong big films or documen-taries such as Action! Hong Kong! and Glory Land but this time is the most un-forgettable experience. “As the director, I had to arrive at shooting site before 8 a.m. every day and discussed with ac-tors,” There was a scenario, in which the kid was extremely hungry and ate the steamed bun picked up in garbage can,

and ate the steamed bun picked up in gar-bage can, impressed Leo most deeply. “ The kid actor was too afraid of trash to accomplish it after many times so that I demonstrated how to perform. But I was a neat freak in fact.” Leo recalled over cof-fee.

Another challenge in shooting pro-cess was that four kid actors, who have not been trained professionally, were too naughty to perform as planned. Finally, Leo had to push himself into a rigorous director and supervised the kids strictly although he was very good-tempered usu-ally.

Together was born on 2nd February in 2013 and has been in intensive editing. It will be on screen in coming June in Hong Kong Science Museum on schedule. Leo has started promotion and placed hope on his first independent film work: “We hope that we can bring audience thirty-minute surprise. Enjoy it together.”

Leo graduated from the depart-ment of Script Writing for TV and Film at Com-munication Uni-versity of China in 2010. After graduation, he worked in CCTV2 as an editor for the programme Trade Time. He re-sumed studies for a master degree at the department of Fine Arts in Film, Television and Digital Media of Hong Kong Baptist University. His published individual short film works called Election and Town Boy in 2011. One of his work Life Line got the award of merit in the Competition of Short Film Produc-tion held by Hong Kong Federa-tion of Youth Groups.

By VIVIAN HUANG

The first day of film shooting in Nanchang city of Jiangxi Province in China

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Long been a crucial platform for Asian filmmakers to present their productions in front of the audience across the world, the 37th Hong Kong International Film Festival has carried forward its dedication to strengthen global appre-ciation of Chinese film culture. The festival honors filmmakers with nine awards in five categories, namely the Young Cinema Competition, the Documentary Competition, the Short Film Competition, the FIPRESCI Prize and the SIGNIS Award. The SIGNIS Award represents a salute to films that fully express social and humanitarian concerns, as well as spir-itual and artistic values. The FIPRESCI Prize aims to promote young talent in Asian cinema. The Short Film Competition is funded by the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust and is a valuable platform for local and international filmmakers to exchange visions and ideas about film as a unique form of art. The Documentary Competition pays tribute precisely to documentarians who inspire audiences with their insights. The Young Cinema Competition aims to discover and honor budding filmmakers who push the envelope with their unique and innovative works.

ON THE SPOT

BIG JOY 201337TH HONG KONG INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

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The first and easiest idea is to show a bunch of your friends, and have them spread the word about it. Before you know it, more and more people will want to see your piece of art. Another way to have it shown to the world is to enter it in a traditional media art exhibit (like paintings, drawings, etc.). You may need to pull a few strings to get it in, but people love to see non-traditional media art mixed in with traditional.

Atomfilms.com is a great place to start. They are very strin-gent on their choices for films, but if you can get in there, you are going to be exposed twice as fast. Remember, never turn off your camera!

This is the centerpiece of your filmmaking gear package. What camera you choose depends on your budget, how you want your footage to look and the type of shooting you are doing. You can shoot a documentary on anything from your iPhone to a DSLR or a top of line Canon XF305 HD camcorder. Whatever camera you choose, make sure you capture excellent audio as well.

Another important thing is that your video camera has a large sensor size and a lens adapter. The larger the sensor it is, the clos-er you are to a film look. The best choice would be a 35mm cam-era, which is the most expensive choice, but with the improve-ment of the digital technology of today you can easily achieve the 35mm look using some of the following equipment: Red Digital Camera,Canon 1d Mark IV,Canon 7D,Canon 5D Mark II,Panasonic HVX200 with 35mm Redrock adapter.

All filmmakers, whether come from Hollywood, Indie, or Art, have a distinct feature that makes them different from every other film artist. To be a successful filmmaker, you need to de-velop your own style and flairs. If not, you will be stuck copying other people’s ideas for the rest of your career.

You need to stop trying to copy all the styles that you see. When you are behind the camera, just let your feelings flow. Know your scene, let it come from your gut, and shoot it. You will be amazed after long-term practice. You may still have not cemented your style even after a few years of trying to do this, but you are well on your way. This process will take time, but it is worth its weight in gold. When your audience says, “I have never seen anything like that before!” You will know you have got it.

How to get my work exposed more to the audience?

How to choose right camera? What equipment do you recommend to film a documentary in close film look? What key quality makes a good filmmaker?

Anson Mak is a film, video and sound artist. After graduated from the School of Com-munication at Hong Kong Baptist University in 1991, she worked in RTHK and TVB for a short period and realized that the mainstream TV was not a place for her. She then developed her career as an art administrator. At the same time, she continued to write and make music, film and video works in the 90’s.

While consumer cameras are not likely to have XLR inputs, many do have mic inputs that will enable you to plug in an external mic so that you can get the microphone closer to your subject and away from the camera. Even on some more expensive prosumer cameras, the onboard mic will capture some of the noise from the camera. The best way to avoid that and also ensure that you get a more professional final product is using an external shotgun or lavalier microphone or even a handheld digital recorder. If your camcorder does not have XLR inputs and you want to use a mic that has XLR connectivity, you can always solve that problem with a camcorder XLR adapter.

“To be a successful filmmaker, you need to develop your own style and flairs. If not, you will be stuck copying other peo-ple’s ideas for the rest of your career.”

How to control external sound effectively when shooting?

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Hong Kong Indie film has its person-ality. The spirit of independence is

tightly related to the local culture, his-tory, social movements, economy and more. Hong Kong Indie film is not only an artistic expression, but also acts as a means of voice expression representing individuals to pursue personal will or the whole society to express the spirit of freedom.

The rise of Hong Kong indie film went back to the 60s. Independent filmmakers took the first step on exper-imental films. With great efforts of Col-lege Students Film Association, Hong Kong indie films rose sharply and grad-ed attention in the 70s. Till the 80s, no evident difference was shown between local indie films and mainstream films. Market and recourses were shared equally. However, while mainstream films tended to be more commercial, indie films were facing downhill from the 90s.

Why independent film is significant to Hong Kong?

Representing voices, especially some that are ignored by the main-stream media, is what most indie films like to do. Indie films tell the story from an unusual and artistic perspective, and then rise attentions on some local so-cial issues such as compensated dating

Hong Kong Indie film is not only an artistic expression, but also acts as a means of voice expression representing individuals to pursue personal will or the whole society to express the spirit of freedom.

and surrogacy. They drew their materi-als from ordinary beings and storiettes in the society, and therefore to mirror some local problems covering politics, economy and society. and surrogacy. They drew their materials from ordinary beings and storiettes in the society, and

therefore to mirror some local problems covering politics, economy and society.

Taking a great fresh indie film direc-tor Siuyea Lo as an instance, both Lo’s indie films Love More and Days After n Coming are documentaries and focus on social movements. Documentaries are boring compared to splendid action films and hard to survive in the market ob-

viously. Nevertheless, no one can deny that this kind of films as vivid historical records has a vital role to reveal social problems.

Indie is an attitude

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PAST AND

PRESENTFrom Hong Kong

Indie Films to World Indie Films

By LEMON LIN

Vincent Tsui, the art director of ying e chi, a non-profit organization strongly supporting indie films, says that the reason why it is called “indie” is because they have no supports from big filmmakers, no enormous fundings and no sufficient human resources. As Vincent said, indie film is not aimed to become mainstream or withstand the mainstream films. Indie is an at-titude. Hong Kongers have their will and thoughts. They love to enjoy their freedom of speech and express their voices from diverse perspectives, and one of the best and artistic ways is the indie film.

World Indie Film development

Classically, an independent film was one that is made outside of the conven-tional studio system, be that Hollywood, Bollywood or Pinewood, with an emphasis on character development and a strong, original and/or controversial storyline.

Specifically, any movie that is funded with less than 50% of money that comes from one of the “big six” major film studios, which are Columbia Pictures (MGM and UA), 20th Century Fox, Walt Disney Pictures/Touchstone Pictures, Warner Bros. Pictures, Para-mount Pictures and Universal Studios.

In 1908, the Trust, a cartel, was established to hold a monopoly on film production and distribution compris-ing all the major film companies. Plenty of filmmakers who declined to join or were refused into the Trust come to be described as indie. The Trust was soon ended by the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States, which canceled the patent on raw film and all MPPC patents. The independent films were legalized and have laid the groundwork for the studio system of classical Hollywood cinema.

Following the advent of television

and the Paramount Case, the major stu-dios attempted to lure audiences with spectacle. The 1950s and early 1960s saw a Hollywood dominated by musi-cals, historical epics, and other films, which benefited from these advances. This proved commercially viable during most of the 1950s.

In1969, Dennis Hopper, an Ameri-can actor, made his writing and directing debut with Easy Rider. Along with his producer Peter Fonda, Hopper was re-sponsible for one of the first completely independent film of New Hollywood. Within a month, another young Corman trainee, Francis Ford Coppola, made his debut in Spain at the Donostia-San Se-bastian International Film Festival with The Rain People, a film he had produced through his own company. Though The Rain People was largely overlooked by American audiences, Zoetrope would became a powerful force in New Holly-wood.

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Left top: Dennis Hopper, an American actor Right top: Poster- The Rain PeopleMiddle: Francis Ford Coppola, an American Film DirectorBottom: Sundance Film Festival

The 1990s saw the rise and success of independent films not only through the film festival circuit but at the box of-fice as well while established actors, such as Bruce Willis, John Travolta, and Tim Robbins, found success themselves both in independent films and Hollywood stu-dio films. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in 1990 from New Line Cinema grossed over $100 million in the United States making it the most successful indie film in box-office history.

Independent movie-making has also resulted in the proliferation and re-popularization of short films and short film festivals. Full-length films are often showcased at film festivals such as the Sundance Film Festival, the Slamdance Film Festival, the South By Southwest film festival, the Raindance Film Festival, ACE Film Festival, or the Cannes Film Festival. Award winners from these exhibitions are more likely to get picked up for distribu-tion by major film studios.

Independent filmmakers are no longer dependent on major studios to provide them with the tools they need to produce a film. Us-ing the advanced technol-ogy, everyone can become a film-maker.

Today, due to the large volume of inexpensive, high end digital film equip-ment available at the consumer level, in-dependent filmmakers are no longer de-pendent on major studios to provide them with the tools they need to produce a film. Moreover the prevalence of smartphone and tablets contribute significantly to the development of the indie film. Using the advanced technology, everyone can be-come a film-maker. Postproduction has also been simplified by non-linear editing software available for home computers and thousands of Apps available for ordi-nary consumers. Thanks to the falling cost of technology, thousands of small produc-tion companies can obtain the resources they need to produce films at a fraction of the cost of the big Hollywood studios.

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Synopsis: Declaration of War is about the nightmare that every par-ent with a sick newborn fears, that something is not quite right with their child. This French film by Valé-rie Donzelli, who also shares a lead role, is ultimately about coping with experiences that one cannot prepare for in life. Interestingly, Declaration of War is an autobiography of the two leads in the film, which enables them to accurately tell the story from their point-of-view and how they persevered with the circumstance.

Synopsis: Dark Blood is a film directed by George Sluizer, written by Jim Bar-ton, and starring River Phoenix, Judy Da-vis, and Jonathan Pryce. The film wasn’t completed due to the death of Phoenix shortly before the end of the project and remained unfinished for 19 years. It pr emiered to a private guest audience on September 27, 2012, at the Netherlands Film Festival in Utrecht, Netherlands. The film was shown twice more, public-ly, on October 2, 2012 at the festival. It was shown at the 63rd Berlin Internation-al Film Festival in February 2013 and is scheduled to be shown at the Miami In-ternational Film Festival in March 2013.

Symopsis: Happy People: A Year in the Taiga is a documentary film directed by Werner Herzog and Dmitry Vasyu-kov and produced by Herzog. The film depicts the life of the people in the village of Bakhta along the Yenisei Riv-er in Siberian Taiga. The film premiered in Germany in November 2010, had its United States premiere at the 2010 Tel-luride Film Festival, and the U.S. West Coast premiere on 6 March 2011 at the San Francisco Green Film Festival.


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Symopsis: Happy People: A Year in the Taiga is a documentary film directed by Werner Herzog and Dmitry Vasyu-kov and produced by Herzog. The film depicts the life of the people in the village of Bakhta along the Yenisei Riv-er in Siberian Taiga. The film premiered in Germany in November 2010, had its United States premiere at the 2010 Tel-luride Film Festival, and the U.S. West Coast premiere on 6 March 2011 at the San Francisco Green Film Festival.

“Instead of focusing on the misfortune of the tumor itself, the film takes a different and refreshing direction by focusing on how the couple deals with the tragedy.”

by Dustin Jansick, Founder of Way Too Indie

“Dark Blood is a movie that will stay with you; not only because of the extreme situation surrounding

the film, but because it is an excep-tionally visualized film.”

by Willie von Tagen

“Herzog lends the golden touch that is his voice to the film, making the grueling, harsh

winter landscape lyrical and poetic.”

by Bernard Boo

Happy People: A Year in the Taiga

Dark Blood Declaration of War

SUMMER, 2013 INDIE HK EDITOR’S CHOICE


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