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Cinenews

UFCCU at Tribeca Film Festival-2008 in New York, NY

April 23 - May 4, 2008

 

Even though not a single Ukrainian film was selected for competition at the Tribeca International Film Festival the Ukrainian Film Club of Columbia University closely followed the events of this one of the biggest US international film forums. Our task was to identify future opportunities for a Ukrainian participation in it, to promote interest in Ukraine among international filmmaking community as well as to examine works and directors on the festival’s program from similarly situated cinematographies of the world. Our focus was on how the national is represented in world cinema and how it is understood by filmmakers of various cultural backgrounds. Here are some interesting pronouncements on the subject.

Grimaldi&Procacci: (From left) the director Antonello Grimaldi and producer Domenico  Procacci during a round table discussion with the press of their film Quiet Chaos (Caos calmo). Photo by Lise Stevens

Domenico Procacci, producer, feature narrative “Quiet Chaos”, Italy
(Produced more than seventy films).
“If you want to have a chance for your film, your story or whatever it is to travel to other countries and be seen by bigger audiences, the more specific you are, the more profoundly you describe your own country and your own world the better chance of succeeding you have. This is exemplified by Respiro (2002), another Italian film [I produced], that was distributed in the United States. It is a story, taking place on a small island, to the south of Sicily, its protagonists speak a language that even we, in Italy, do not understand, it is so very specifically local. I never expected that film to have an international life. So I do not think that if you want to speak to an international audience you should do something that can work for everybody everywhere. The more culturally specific you are the more chances you have to reach and convince a wider audience.”

The Argentine actor Leonardo Sbaraglia speaking with Yuri Shevchuk. Photo by Yuri Shevchuk

Leonardo Sbaraglia, actor, feature film “Love, Pain, and Visa Versa”, Mexico.
(Born and grew up in Buenos Aires, Argentina, lives in Spain, acted in more than forty films, one of six-seven most celebrated actors of Spanish-language film today).

Question. “Who do you primarily feel to be as an actor – Argentinean, Latin American, Spaniard, citizen of the world?
Answer. “Fundamentally I formed as a person in Argentina, the country whose culture I am familiar with best, where I express myself most easily. For eight years I have lived in Spain now, or to be more exact traveling between Spain and Argentina. Therefore I have also found my place in Spanish culture. Now I am for the first time in a Mexican-made film.”

(On the right) the director of the film “Newcastle” (Australia) Dan Castle with Yuri Shevchuk. Photo by Lise Stevens.

 

 

 

 

Dan Castle, writing director, feature film “Newcastle”, Australia.

Answering the question about how important for his film “Newcastle  the Australian component of the story was, the US-born film director said, “It could only be made in Australia. The actual town where the story takes place, the culture of Australia, the interesting characters, the people of Australia - those were things that inspired me to make the film at all. Such a film could never be made anywhere else”.

The Kurdish film director from Turkey Huseyin Karabey (left) speaking with Yuri Shevchuk.

Huseyin Karabey, director, “My Marlon and Brando”, Turkey.
Winner of the Tribeca Award for the Best New Feature Film Director, Turkish Kurd.

Question. “While you were making this film who did you see primarily as your viewer?
Answer. “Above all my target were my people both from the entire Turkey and from the region – Kurdistan, where we still have problems. I am taking sides, I am not trying to be objective. There are people in my target audience who like to watch films for fun and entertainment, there also are people who are well educated and who like to be provoked into thinking by a film. I believe all kinds of viewers can find something for themselves in my film. […] My language comes from the reality. When I met Agca [the principal actress and protagonist in “My Marlon and Brando] and she told me her love story, I felt that her personal story can help me tell other stories. We started working together, it took me two years to produce a script. So I use reality to produce fiction and through it in turn to create another reality.

Eugene O’Brien, script writer feature narrative “Eden”, Ireland.
The actress  Eileen Walsh starring in the leading role in “Eden” won the Best Actress Award, at Tribeca IFF 2008.
From the director’s statement, “Eden is about where I am from, Edenderry Co. Offaly. The people are characters that I knew, the events based on stories I’d heard. I wanted to restore the language of the town and the whole innards of that environment of where I am from; and that’s where the monologues came from …”



Ukrainian Film Club of Columbia University© 2015. For more information please contact Yuri Shevchuk