FAR EAST FILM FESTIVAL 2024  

The value of cinematic testimony at the most important annual European event for Asian cinema 

Menene Gras Balaguer 

 

The most important Asian film festival in Europe closes its 26th edition with a success of audiences that far exceeds expectations for a program that has brought together great titles, with ten world premieres, 23 European previews and 19 Italian ones. The numbers for its director, Sabrina Barachetti, say it all, not only concerningwith the data related to the number of spectators who attended all the sessions but also to the activities that have been developed in parallel, with talks, panels, meetings, master classes and all those related to the FOCUS ASIA project and the Campus. The latter, an educational project that recruits young journalists, five Europeans and five Asians over 18 and under 26, who learn to write about film and get to know a film festival behind the scenes, carrying out a program related to their training. The access to such a wide and specific program as well as to directors, screenwriters, producers, actors and actresses, or with critics and theoreticians coming from all over the world to this festival becomes for its candidates an opportunity that can decide their trajectory. Twenty-six editions, without ceasing to experience a permanent growth, and whose archive is worth exploring to check the magnitude of their proposals and the progressive development of their respective contributions for their distribution in Europe. Respectively, FOCUS ASIA, a platform created in 2015, conceived as a platform to encourage the co-production and post-production of projects between Asia and Europe, and to put in contact markets of both continents, has not ceased to be news both for the achievements reached in the signing of agreements in the industry, such as the one signed between Italy and Japan for co-production, and for the visit of the official delegation of producers, distributors and filmmakers from Indonesia that in this edition have had a promising presence, attending to the development that this cinema is having in this country.

The festival’s balance sheet lists the number of films screened, the number per country, those competing in the different sections and those that form part of the tributes to directors with a renowned career, together with the restored films, as a way of recovering their respective main contributions. The history of cinema is built every day with new productions that dissect the current world or that imagine a world or a future in anticipation of what will or may happen. But, in any case, precedents are essential to evaluate what has been done and to constantly innovate in order to go further than those who precede us. The FEFF takes into account the countless aspects and factors that intervene when presenting what is being done in cinema, expanding a cartography that is limited to what we still call the Far East. A wide geography that this year has encompassed the film production of nine countries, in competition, and that of three others out of competition. Among the first are those with the largest film industry in an unequal map and with great differences between some of its members. 

Beyond the genres represented, the number of productions per country is important, but even more so is the excellence of some of the titles that have been included in the program. As for those grouped in the competition sections, China has had eight titles; Hong Kong, nine; Japan, ten; Indonesia, three; Malaysia, one; Philippines, three; South Korea, eleven; Taiwan, four; and Thailand, one. Numbers, as said before, always count, and in this particular case they make evident the predominance of some countries whose production not only reaches relevant figures but also other particularities that are attributed to the way some stories are told. Vietnam and Cambodia, to cite an example, are not counted this time among the countries with films competing in any of the sections, but nevertheless Indonesia recovers positions also in the section dedicated to Retrospectives and Hong Kong prevails with the nine titles produced between 2023 and 2024. On the other hand, Korea promotes itself with titles that resonate and a strong cinematography for a long time, rivalling the production of its more powerful neighbours, China and Japan, which remain at the same level with some interesting novelties, where changes are perceived in how stories are told and what stories are told.

The daily immersion in Asian cinema was total from April 24 to May 2, thanks to a program of films being made in this region of the world, both at the Teatro Nuovo with a capacity for over a thousand spectators and at the Visionario.  The followers of this festival otherwise seem to show a great interest in Asian cinema and a knowledge of its main authors and filmmakers. In general, all the sessions have a loyal national and international audience, who come to this annual event with the intention not only of getting to know the new productions that are screened as world or European premieres, but also to attend the various meetings that take place in panels, conversations and tributes, in which a broad and forceful vision of the cinema being made and its background is offered. During the nine days of the event, the city becomes an unrivalled platform for Asian cinema from the Far East and an opportunity for young and not-so-young directors to make contact with distributors, markets and audiences. The festival welcomes directors, actors and actresses, press from all over the world, and agents of a market that is increasingly present in Europe. It seems clear that Asian cinema has not only gained market share in Asia and beyond, but that its contributions are increasingly radical in terms of new paradigms in terms of storytelling and storytelling. 

Fifty titles have been selected from among the most recent productions made between 2023 and 2024, to which are added, out of competition, the restored classics and not so classics (Celebrating 50 years of Korean Film) and those that are part of the tributes (Zhang Yimou, Lee Hsing , Myung-se, Somai Shinji and Suo Masayuki), up to 79 unique screenings, with no possibility of repetition due to lack of time and due to the numerous theoretical and practical activities that coexist in this festival model. The recovery of some titles by the aforementioned filmmakers together with the programming of the titles in competition is a common practice at the FEFF, which contributes to take into account the link between the cinema being made today and its antecedents. It is also worth noting in this regard that Indonesian cinema has been a focus of attention for the programmers, who have tried to draw attention to some titles representative of the changing trends in a cinema that aspires to join the international market and to stimulate a growing industry that has seen the number of spectators increase locally in the last three years. 

The trends that are visible in the most recent productions, this year and last, are not exactly analogous, nor is it perhaps possible to establish one or several lines in which narrative models converge beyond the one that exists between titles of the same genre. It is inevitable to point out personal preferences among those titles that are identified with the dramatic genre and that respond to the festival’s appointment, Nuevos Narradores, Nuevas Narrativas, bringing together its protagonists. Below, I name the titles that I consider most relevant for their acceptance, such as CITIZEN OF A KIND (2024), Mulberry Award for Best Screenplay, by Korean filmmaker Park Young-ju, who has just turned 30 and is her second feature film, after Second Life (2018); YOLO, You only live once (2024), by Chinese director Jin Ling; TROUBLE GIRL (2023), by Taiwanese filmmaker Chin Chia-hua; CONFETTI (2024) first feature from Japan’s Naoya Fujita, second Mulberry Audience Award; TIME STILL TURNS THE PAGES (2023), third Mulberry Audience Award, from Hong Kong director Nick Cheik, formerly Best Director at the Asian Film Awards and Hong Kong Film Awards; RANSOMED (2023) by Korean director Kim Seong -hun; TRENDING TOPIC (2023) by Chinese director Xin Yukun; and A NORMAL FAMILY (2023) by Korean director Hur Jin-ho. These are not the only films to be named, but they are the ones that I consider to be most in line with my preferences in terms of the narratives from which they derive and the compositional aesthetics. They are films with good scripts and strong structure – what they narrate brings us closer to their protagonists and derives the physical and cultural boundaries that separate us. Each in its own way and for a different reason, but we are equally affected by the dramas of private life and those that have to do with the history of a country, as in the case of 12.12 THE DAY (2023), by Korean director Kim Sumg-son. The story of such momentous events as the December 12, 1979 coup d’état by a military group led by General Chun Doo-hwan, following the October 26 assassination of President Park Chung-hee, which put an end to the Yussin dictatorship (1972-1979), is masterful in the way it deals with the development of a dictatorship.

History of a country and history of all, which we are invited to explore to see how a military coup can be gestated and the immediate consequences of an action such as the one carried out establishing a totalitarian power system with the dictatorship that followed the insurrection of part of the South Korean army. The events have been the subject over the years of several cinematic accounts such as Chin Ji-young’s National Security (2012), about the 1985 arrest of Kim Geung-tee, who was tortured 22 days in a row forcing him to confess to crimes he had not committed. Or like Jang Hon’s A Taxi Driver (2017), a film that recounts the massacre of hundreds of citizens in Gwangju, on the occasion of the May 1980 popular uprising against the military dictatorship of Chun Doo-hwan. The only two witnesses to the events were a German correspondent in Tokyo and a cab driver, whom the former hired to drive him to the scene so that he could then report what was happening. 12.12 DAY in turn masterfully resurrects the chaos that the South Korean army takes advantage of to carry out the coup d’état that puts an end to the aspirations of another part of the army and civil society, in favor of political change and the arrival of democracy in the country. The vindication of history to avoid conflicts that are repeated over and over again is one of the keys to this film and those that are mentioned for providing a similar testimony. 

Among the titles mentioned in the first place, the similarities are scarce with respect to the contents narrated, but each one in its own way affects us very personally because of the issues they deal with. Citizen of a Kind, because the protagonist is the object of a swindle, for which she loses all her savings, something very common in today’s world, and we are shown the group and type of organization behind crimes that usually operate with impunity. Time still turns The Pages, because it shows the harassment of an authoritarian father and the life of a wife who is a victim of the abusive treatment of the father for two brothers, one of whom ends up believing that his life has no way out and that the best thing to do is to commit suicide. Trouble Girl, in turn, raises another psychological drama, about a teenage girl, victim of her parents’ divorce and a family conflict to which she decides not to give up.  Trending Topic, for showing to what extent social networks can reveal facts that no other means of communication can bring to light, and to what extent they can also become instruments of pressure for disinformation and deception of their recipients or of public opinion in general by accusing and concealing the truth.  A Normal Family is anything but a normal family, in which its protagonists, the children of two brothers, a lawyer and a doctor, end up committing a crime without thinking about it, but whose irresponsibility affects the respective parents, to the point that the conflict after a double turn of events ends in the tragic outcome that no one expects. 

Other powerful titles are also worth mentioning, such as DUST TO DUST (2023) by Hong Kong’s Jonathan Li; 13 BOMBS (2023) by Indonesia’s Amgga Dwman Sasongko; VOICE (2024) by Japanese director Mishima Yukiko; THE LYRICIST WANNABE (2023) by Hong Kong director Norris Wong; GOLDFINGER (2023) by director Felix Chong also from Hong Kong, or MOTION PICTURE CHOICE (2023) by Japan’s Nagao Gem. The latter, a film that recovers silent films and experiments with the moving image, renouncing the use of words and giving back to actors and actresses the power of gestures and parodic expression to communicate what they want to convey. An interesting and unique exercise that puts actors and spectators alike to the test.  Obviously, it is not a question of making here a complete inventory of the titles that have been screened, nor of naming all those who have come to present their films at this festival, but those who are mentioned are part of the preferences of those who can be said that a significant majority have done so with part of their respective teams. Access to the real protagonists behind the films being screened requires an effort that only the most established festivals can afford. Udine is an unmissable annual event for Asian cinema, as it is for its authors, its agents, the press, but above all for the industry in general. Conversations, panels, presentations and meetings also contribute to make it unique in its kind, making accessible this backstage where cinema moves and deals for production and distribution are hatched.

Zhang Yimou, twice Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, Golden Bear at the Berlinale and three Oscar nominations, closed this edition with a master class and the screening of three of his films, representative of the beginnings of a career that places him at the head of the fifth generation of Chinese cinema and of his presence in today’s cinema, where he has not ceased to make his influence felt in the generations that have followed him. These titles are RAISE THE RED LANTERN (1991), TO LIVE (1994) and UNDER THE LIGHT (2023), his latest film and international premiere in Udine. The tribute to Zhang Yimou for FEFF founders and directors Sabrina Baracetti and Thomas Bertacche was a debt owed to a filmmaker who was a true revelation for the West and for Chinese cinema, drawing our attention not only to a generation of filmmakers but to an industry awakening from its lethargy. The Golden Mulberry Lifetime Achievement Award that has been granted to him is more than a simple tribute, it is the recognition of a career that transcends individual stories to become part of the universal history in which we can all see ourselves represented in one way or another.