Monday, October 2, 2008 - The Hollywood Reporter
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1<br />
<strong>Monday</strong>, <strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong><br />
&<br />
daily<br />
the<br />
Pusan
Q&A<br />
How Kim Dong-ho<br />
turned PIFF into<br />
Asia’s premier<br />
film festival.<br />
SPECIAL WORLD<br />
REPORT BEGINS<br />
ON PAGE 7<br />
By Maggie Lee<br />
Coming Friday: review of opening-night film “<strong>The</strong> Gift to Stalin”<br />
daily<br />
the<br />
Pusan<br />
Thursday,<br />
&<br />
Dreams collide with<br />
reality in Shinya<br />
Tsukamoto’s<br />
prequel<br />
‘Nightmare Detective 2’<br />
Although “Nightmare Detective” and its sequel are both<br />
directed by Shinya Tsukamoto, they are as different in<br />
style as “Nightmare on Elm Street” is<br />
from “<strong>The</strong> Devil’s Backbone.” Like Part 1, REVIEW<br />
“Nightmare 2” also deals with the paranormal<br />
phenomenon of murders committed in the realm of<br />
dreams. But Tsukamoto has eschewed the bloodshed and<br />
crude shock tactics of the original.<br />
Functioning more as a prequel, the film unravels the secrets<br />
continued on page 17<br />
150,000 in India film strike<br />
By Nyay Bhushan<br />
NEW DELHI - About<br />
150,000 Indian film<br />
industry workers began an<br />
indefinite strike Wednesday in<br />
Mumbai protesting against low<br />
wages, late payments and the<br />
employment of non-union<br />
members in Bollywood.<br />
<strong>The</strong> strike was called by the<br />
Federation of Western India Cine<br />
Employees, a group that has<br />
more than 20 affiliate unions<br />
representing the interests of<br />
actors, technicians and camera<br />
operators, among others.<br />
This was the first time in the<br />
50 years of the federation’s existence<br />
that such a protest has<br />
been staged. FWICE is hopeful<br />
for an early resolution. ∂<br />
By Gregg Kilday<br />
LOS ANGELES —<br />
“East is East,<br />
and West is<br />
West, and never<br />
the ’twain shall<br />
meet,” Rudyard Kipling<br />
proclaimed in 1892. But more<br />
than a century later, <strong>Hollywood</strong><br />
is determined to prove the<br />
poet wrong.<br />
This summer, DreamWorks<br />
Animation’s “Kung Fu Panda,”<br />
facing down criticism from<br />
some quarters that it exploited<br />
Chinese culture, became the<br />
top-grossing animated film ever<br />
at the Chinese boxoffice.<br />
By Karen Chu<br />
“A<br />
ll<br />
Hark’s entry at the 13th<br />
About Women,” Hong<br />
Kong director Tsui<br />
Pusan International Film Festival,<br />
has been withdrawn.<br />
<strong>The</strong> film, produced by Beijingbased<br />
J.A. Media and Tsui’s Film<br />
Workshop, is in the process of<br />
obtaining a permit from the Chinese<br />
authorities for its release in<br />
China, but it could not be<br />
approved in time because of the<br />
Chinese National Holidays, J.A.<br />
Media vp marketing and strategy<br />
Mandy Chong said Wednesday.<br />
Chinese films can’t be<br />
<strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong><br />
THR.com/pusan<br />
day<br />
1<br />
Looking East<br />
Asia opens doors to best of West<br />
Universal’s action<br />
sequel “<strong>The</strong><br />
Mummy: Tomb of<br />
the Dragon<br />
Emperor” — a<br />
co-production<br />
with Shanghai<br />
Film Studios,<br />
Beijing Happy<br />
Pictures and the<br />
China Co-Production<br />
Film Corp. — opened in<br />
China in the wake of the Beijing<br />
Olympics and pulled in $14 million<br />
in its first 14 days.<br />
“<strong>The</strong>re’s a tremendous awareness<br />
of American tentpole blockbusters,<br />
and there’s a tremendous<br />
continued on page 19<br />
Hark’s ‘Women’ stays home<br />
screened outside the country<br />
before being officially approved.<br />
“Women” was scheduled to<br />
hold its world premiere Saturday<br />
as a gala presentation. It will not<br />
be replaced in the lineup.<br />
Tsui will make an appearance<br />
at the festival Sunday to give a<br />
master class. ∂<br />
WHAT’S INSIDE<br />
>Reviews. PAGE 16-17<br />
><strong>The</strong> Biz. Entertainment news<br />
from around the world. PAGE 20
news Thursday,<br />
Fest focus on wider scope<br />
By Steven Schwankert<br />
Kazakhstan will plant<br />
its flag firmly into<br />
South Korean soil<br />
tonight when Rustem<br />
Abdrashev’s “<strong>The</strong><br />
Gift to Stalin” kicks off the<br />
Pusan International Film Festival<br />
as the opening film.<br />
It will be one of two times that<br />
the Central Asian nation draws<br />
the spotlight at the 13th annual<br />
festival, which will feature 315<br />
films from 60 countries, including<br />
48 international premieres.<br />
Producer Gulnara Sarsenova<br />
(“Mongol”), who is based in<br />
Kazakhstan, will receive the<br />
Asian Filmmaker of the Year<br />
Award on <strong>Monday</strong> night.<br />
Richard Pena, program director<br />
at New York’s Lincoln Center,<br />
will get the Korean Cinema<br />
Award. Both Sarsenova and Pena<br />
will receive the awards on Asian<br />
Filmmakers’ Night, which starts<br />
at 10 p.m. at the Paradise Hotel.<br />
Alongside the festival is the<br />
third Asian Film Market, the<br />
region’s top co-production and<br />
film distribution event. It will<br />
be stationed at the Paradise and<br />
Seacloud hotels in Busan’s Hae-<br />
By Pip Bulbeck<br />
SYDNEY — “<strong>The</strong> Sparrow,” a<br />
crime adventure from Hong<br />
Kong director Johnnie To and<br />
part of the Pusan International<br />
Film Festival’s A Window on<br />
Asian Cinema sidebar, led the<br />
way at the second Asia Pacific<br />
Screen Awards with four nominations<br />
Tuesday.<br />
Turkish film “Three Monkeys,”<br />
screening in PIFF’s World<br />
“<strong>The</strong> Gift<br />
to Stalin”<br />
undae Beach area.<br />
Included in the AFM is the<br />
11th Pusan Promotion Plan,<br />
designed to support young, predominantly<br />
Asian filmmakers<br />
with finance and distribution<br />
options. Thirty films from 16<br />
countries and territories were<br />
selected from 200 applicants. It<br />
will run Friday-<strong>Monday</strong>.<br />
Also part of the AFM is the<br />
three-day Asian Film Funds<br />
Forum, which opens Friday<br />
against the backdrop of global<br />
financial uncertainty. Seminar<br />
panelists include Continental<br />
Entertainment Capital CEO Benjamin<br />
Waisbren, ACTI CEO Intaek<br />
Yoo and Irresistible Films<br />
managing director Nansun Shi.<br />
On Saturday and Sunday, the<br />
Asian Film Funds Forum will<br />
feature presentations by leading<br />
regional film-finance representatives,<br />
including Asian Film<br />
Fund vp Bey Logan, Irresistible<br />
Films director Buddy Marini<br />
and RGM Entertainment CEO<br />
Devesh Chetty. Asian Film<br />
Funds Forum events will be held<br />
at the Paradise.<br />
AFM is presenting Korean<br />
Producers In Focus with the<br />
Producers Guild of Korea, featuring<br />
five films and a Korean<br />
co-production panel, with producers<br />
from Korea, Thailand,<br />
Japan and Hong Kong.<br />
PIFF closes Oct. 10 with the<br />
premiere of Yoon Jong-chan’s<br />
“I Am Happy,” featuring Korean<br />
television star Hyun Bin. ∂<br />
‘Sparrow’ flies highest at APSA noms<br />
Cinema section, received three<br />
noms.<br />
<strong>The</strong> films are in the running<br />
for best feature film alongside<br />
“Om Shanti Om” (India), “<strong>The</strong><br />
Red Awn” (China) and “Tulpan”<br />
(Kazakhstan).<br />
Six of the<br />
nominated<br />
films, including<br />
“Monkeys,”<br />
“Tulpan” and<br />
the animated<br />
For a complete<br />
list of<br />
nominees<br />
feature “Waltz With Bashir”<br />
(Israel), are co-productions<br />
with European countries.<br />
“Sparrow” also picked up<br />
nominations for directing, cinematography<br />
and acting (Simon<br />
Yam), while “Monkeys” also<br />
received nods in the director<br />
and cinematography categories.<br />
Thirty-seven films from 17<br />
countries will compete in nine<br />
categories, with the winners to<br />
be announced Nov. 11. ∂<br />
THR.com/pusan<br />
<strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong><br />
Pusan Daily Edition<br />
Office 115, Seacloud Hotel<br />
Haeundae-Gu,<br />
Busan, Korea 612-020<br />
Eric Mika<br />
Publisher<br />
Elizabeth Guider<br />
Editor<br />
David Morgan<br />
Deputy Editor<br />
Deeann J. Hoff<br />
Director — Art<br />
EDITORIAL<br />
Kevin Cassidy (International Features Editor),<br />
Steven Schwankert (China),<br />
Karen Chu (Hong Kong),<br />
Park Soomee (Korea),<br />
Nigel D’sa (Korea),<br />
Patrick Hipes (Copy Chief)<br />
REVIEWS<br />
Maggie Lee (Film Critic),<br />
Elizabeth Kerr (Film Critic)<br />
GENERAL<br />
Claire Sanghi Ham (Special Project Manager)<br />
CORRESPONDENTS<br />
Pip Bulbeck (Australia), Leo Cendrowicz<br />
(Belgium), Alex Dai (China), Rebecca Leffler<br />
(France), Scott Roxborough (Germany),<br />
Nyay Bhushan (India), Eric J. Lyman (Italy),<br />
Gavin Blair (Japan), John Hecht (Mexico),<br />
Ab Zagt (Netherlands), Janine Stein<br />
(Singapore), Pamela Rolfe (Spain),<br />
Joel Gershon (Thailand), Jolanta Chudy<br />
(United Arab Emirates)<br />
ART<br />
Emily Johnson (Senior Designer)<br />
OPERATIONS + IT<br />
Nina Pragasam (International Marketing<br />
Manager), Gregg Edwards (Senior Production<br />
Manager), Armen Sarkisian (Network<br />
Administrator)<br />
THR.COM<br />
Scott McKim (Managing Editor),<br />
Karen Nicoletti (Senior News Editor),<br />
Ralf Ludemann (Copy Editor)<br />
Gerry Byrne<br />
Senior Vice President,<br />
<strong>The</strong> Entertainment Group<br />
Copyright ©<strong>2008</strong> Nielsen Business Media, Inc.<br />
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be<br />
reproduced, stored in any retrieval system or transmitted,<br />
in any form or by any means — electronic, mechanical,<br />
photocopying, recording or otherwise — without<br />
the prior written permission of the publisher.<br />
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4
q&a Thursday,<br />
Iconic French actress-writerdirector-producer-composer-singer<br />
Anna Karina will bring her wide talents<br />
into play this year as head of the<br />
Pusan International Film Festival’s<br />
New Currents jury. Darling of the New<br />
Wave, the Danish-born Karina first<br />
came to prominence as the muse and<br />
later wife of director Jean-Luc Godard.<br />
She starred in many of his films,<br />
notably “Pierrot le fou” and “Alphaville,”<br />
and also starred in films from<br />
New Wave luminaries Agnes Varda<br />
and Jacques Rivette. Karina’s second<br />
film as director, “Victoria,” is being<br />
presented in PIFF’s World Cinema section<br />
this year. On the eve of her first<br />
trip to South Korea, she talked to<br />
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Hollywood</strong> <strong>Reporter</strong>’s French<br />
correspondent Charles Masters.<br />
How are you approaching your<br />
role as jury president in Pusan?<br />
Anna Karina: It’s not the first time<br />
I’ve been president of a festival<br />
jury; I’ve done it several times<br />
before. Obviously it’s an adventure<br />
because it takes place in a<br />
country that I don’t yet know, so<br />
I’m quite excited. I’ve heard a lot<br />
of good things about this festival,<br />
so it should be a wonderful<br />
vital stats<br />
Anna Karina<br />
> HEAD OF NEW CURRENTS JURY<br />
Nationality: French<br />
Date of birth: Sept. 22, 1940<br />
Film in Pusan: “Victoria”<br />
(World Cinema)<br />
Selected filmography: “<strong>The</strong><br />
Nun” (1966), “Pierrot le Fou”<br />
(1965), “Alphaville” (1965), “<strong>The</strong><br />
Outsiders” (1964), “<strong>The</strong> Little<br />
Soldier” (1963), “Cleo From 5 to 7”<br />
(1962), “A Woman is a<br />
Woman” (1961)<br />
Notable awards: Cesar nomination<br />
best supporting actress,<br />
“Cayenne Palace” (1988); Berlin<br />
International Film Festival best<br />
actress award, “A Woman is a<br />
Woman” (1961)<br />
adventure. <strong>The</strong> first thing is to<br />
see the films. I’m not going to tell<br />
you how I work; I’ve got my own<br />
little system. But I think you have<br />
to speak with your heart, and we<br />
have to agree among us which<br />
are the three best films.<br />
You’re going to see 14 films from<br />
very diverse origins across the<br />
wider Asia region. Are you familiar<br />
with Asian cinema?<br />
Karina: I know the kind of Asian<br />
cinema that finds its way to<br />
Paris. But I can’t say I know it as<br />
well as French, Italian or other<br />
European cinema because there<br />
are fewer (Asian) releases here<br />
(in France). But it’s a very interesting<br />
prospect to discover<br />
these films. I hope they’re subtitled<br />
in English, otherwise I<br />
won’t understand much.<br />
You’re also going to present your<br />
latest film as director, “Victoria.”<br />
What is the film about and how<br />
did you come to make it?<br />
Karina: In fact it was a film that<br />
was initially destined to be<br />
made with two French singers<br />
and set in Quebec. It was going<br />
to star Philippe Katerine, who’s<br />
now a star in France. But he<br />
couldn’t be in the film because<br />
he went on tour. So I transposed<br />
the story and found two Canadian<br />
singers to replace the two<br />
French ones, played by Jean-<br />
Francois Moran and Emmanuel<br />
Reichenbach. It’s a road movie<br />
which recounts their adventures<br />
on tour and their<br />
encounter with the mysterious<br />
Victoria, who is played by me.<br />
At times you wonder what’s<br />
going on, but you don’t know<br />
until the end. If you like, on one<br />
level it’s a human manipulation;<br />
she sort of kidnaps them. It’s a<br />
micro-budget film that we shot<br />
in 19 days. We must have covered<br />
4,000 miles because Quebec<br />
is enormous. It’s an entirely<br />
Canadian production produced<br />
by Hejer Charf.<br />
This is your first film as writerdirector<br />
since “Living Together” in<br />
1973. What made you go back<br />
behind the camera?<br />
Karina: I was on tour for 6 1 ⁄2<br />
years with Philippe Katerine.<br />
We met Hejer Charf in Spain<br />
when we were giving a concert<br />
in Bilbao, and she invited us to<br />
Canada and said why don’t you<br />
shoot the film here? She said<br />
she’d produce it, so I wrote the<br />
screenplay. At the last minute,<br />
Katerine couldn’t participate in<br />
the film as an actor, but he<br />
wrote the music, because there<br />
are songs in the film.<br />
You are giving a master class in<br />
THR.com/pusan<br />
<strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong><br />
cinema here in Pusan on Oct. 8.<br />
What kind of lesson would you<br />
like to give?<br />
Karina: I don’t exactly how this<br />
class will be structured. I suppose<br />
people will ask me questions<br />
and I’ll answer. It depends<br />
what people ask, but I’ll try to<br />
answer with my heart. You<br />
know, everyone is so different in<br />
this world that I don’t think you<br />
should impose your point of<br />
view. Life’s like a game of chess<br />
with feelings. I started in cinema<br />
aged 14, so it’s been a long,<br />
long road full of adventures and<br />
good moments but also some<br />
disappointments. We sometimes<br />
think we’ve made a good<br />
film, but of the 80 or so films<br />
I’ve made, they aren’t all masterpieces.<br />
It still gives me great<br />
pleasure that I receive a lot of<br />
letters from some very young<br />
people, and when I present<br />
films abroad its usually to audiences<br />
of between 15 and 35 years<br />
old, which proves that films like<br />
“Pierrot le fou” still have an<br />
appeal, even for a 17-year-old<br />
today. That gives me a lot of<br />
pleasure.<br />
For more<br />
Q&A with<br />
Anna Karina, go to THR.com/pusan.<br />
Los Angeles 323.525.2000 | New York 646.654.5000 | London +44.207.420.6139 | Beijing +86.10.6512.5511 (ext. 121) | THR.com/pusan | day 1<br />
5
world Thursday,<br />
<strong>The</strong> Fest<br />
Man<br />
Under the shrewd stewardship of<br />
Kim Dong-ho, the Pusan International<br />
Film Festival has rapidly become<br />
Asia’s premier film showcase<br />
By Mark Russell<br />
SEOUL — In 1995, Kim Ji-seok and his partners were at an<br />
impasse. For three years they had worked on creating a major<br />
film festival for Korea, a place where people could come and<br />
see that there was more to cinema than <strong>Hollywood</strong> blockbusters<br />
and local melodramas. <strong>The</strong>y chose Busan, the port<br />
city on the southern end of the Korean Peninsula, to avoid the<br />
egos and turf wars of Seoul, the nation’s sprawling capital.<br />
But their ambitious plans never got much traction. Few<br />
outside Korea’s then-tiny movie community knew who they<br />
were, and without government or commercial support, raising<br />
the $2.5 million they needed for the festival was pretty<br />
much impossible.<br />
Clearly, they needed a representative, someone with the<br />
clout and connections to open doors, help them navigate the<br />
government’s Byzantine bureaucracy and force the powersthat-be<br />
to take the plans seriously. And so, on a hot August<br />
afternoon in a fancy hotel lobby in Seoul, they asked Kim<br />
Dong-ho to be their guide and festival director.<br />
It would quickly prove a fortuitous choice.<br />
Born in the mountainous Gangwon Province in 1937, Kim<br />
graduated from Korea’s prestigious Seoul National University in<br />
1961 and promptly joined the Ministry of Culture. He worked<br />
there for 27 years, eventually rising to the rank of vice minister,<br />
before serving stints as head of the Korea Motion Pictures<br />
SPECIAL REPORT:<br />
KIM DONG-HO<br />
THR.com/pusan<br />
<strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong><br />
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7<br />
CHUNG SUNG-JUN/GETTY IMAGES
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Hollywood</strong> <strong>Reporter</strong> | Thursday, <strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong> special world report | kim dong-ho salute<br />
Promotion Corp. (the forerunner of the<br />
Korea Film Council), the Korea Performance<br />
Ethics Board and the Seoul Arts Center. In<br />
short, he was the ultimate cultural insider.<br />
Right away, Kim got to work in his new<br />
role. <strong>The</strong> then-vice mayor of Busan was an<br />
old friend, so Kim arranged a meeting.<br />
That led to a meeting with the mayor himself<br />
and soon they had their first significant<br />
pledge of funding — more than<br />
$400,000. Fundraising dinners and special<br />
events were arranged, and within a few<br />
months they had raised nearly all the<br />
money they needed for that first festival.<br />
On Sept. 13, 1996, the Pusan International<br />
Film Festival made its debut. It was<br />
chaotic but undeniably successful, with<br />
184,000 people attending over the event’s<br />
nine-day run.<br />
“My great pleasure and honor was that<br />
first PIFF,” Kim says. “I will never forget it.”<br />
“<strong>The</strong>re could have been no better front<br />
man for PIFF than Kim Dong-ho,” film<br />
critic and longtime PIFF adviser Tony<br />
Rayns says. “(Kim was) extremely well<br />
connected throughout the government and<br />
with the heads of various jaebeol (conglomerates).<br />
His involvement cut through<br />
much red tape and drew sponsorship from<br />
all and sundry. Thanks to him, the festival<br />
got off to the best possible start.”<br />
Another vital impact Kim had was helping<br />
the festival overcome the Korean government’s<br />
infamous penchant for censorship.<br />
One of the major goals of PIFF was to<br />
present films and ideas that normally could<br />
not make it into Korea. Despite opening<br />
greatly since the end of military rule, Korea<br />
remained a conservative, Confucian culture<br />
with a heavy-handed bureaucracy. What<br />
good would PIFF be if government scissors<br />
could chop up offending ideas before anyone<br />
saw them?<br />
Having led the Korea Performance Ethics<br />
Board for a time (before being removed for<br />
being too lenient), Kim knew just how the<br />
organization worked. So he came up with a<br />
novel two-pronged strategy: drink and<br />
delay. Kim met often with review board<br />
members and, while consuming more than<br />
a few alcoholic beverages, asked for some<br />
leniency and understanding. While Kim<br />
played nice by night, the rest of the PIFF<br />
staff did their best to gum up the works,<br />
holding off answering the committee’s<br />
questions for as long as possible and backlogging<br />
the whole process.<br />
“My great pleasure and<br />
honor was that first PIFF.<br />
I will never forget it.” CHUNG<br />
It might seem like a pretty passiveaggressive<br />
resistance strategy, but it<br />
worked. <strong>The</strong> committee’s reviewers agreed<br />
to travel to Busan to prescreen the movies<br />
(usually these screenings were only done in<br />
Seoul). And by the time they got to the festival’s<br />
headquarters, there was too little<br />
time to review all the movies.<br />
PIFF GM Oh Seok-geun, meanwhile, did<br />
his best to distract the reviewers whenever<br />
sex and nudity turned up on the videos and<br />
kept the most controversial films out of<br />
sight as much as possible. <strong>The</strong> distributor of<br />
David Cronenberg’s “Crash” ended up submitting<br />
an expurgated version to the festival,<br />
but most of the films made it to that<br />
first PIFF without censorship, and many<br />
avoided being prescreened altogether.<br />
Since then, PIFF has grown into one of<br />
the most important events on the Asian<br />
movie industry calendar. In addition to<br />
promoting films from all over the region,<br />
PIFF today also features an array of profes-<br />
sional and educational events — including<br />
the Asian Film Market, Pusan Promotion<br />
Plan, and the Asian Film Academy — all<br />
designed to improve the Korean and Asian<br />
movie industries. And this year it will<br />
break ground on the Busan Film Center,<br />
the future home of PIFF.<br />
“<strong>The</strong> thing about Kim that I love and<br />
respect so much is that he’s the picture of<br />
integrity,” said Richard Pena, program<br />
director at the New York Film Festival and<br />
Film Society of Lincoln Center. “<strong>The</strong> reason<br />
that PIFF gained so much respect so<br />
quickly is that it set a high standard for<br />
itself and it kept to it. I don’t think it was<br />
just a mouthpiece for Korean cinema, it<br />
was a mouthpiece for very good Korean<br />
Festival director<br />
Kim Dong-ho<br />
at a PIFF news<br />
conference<br />
cinema, and that’s why people began to<br />
trust it — for that and other films.”<br />
In recognition of all that Kim has<br />
accomplished, <strong>The</strong> <strong>Hollywood</strong> <strong>Reporter</strong> is<br />
presenting Kim with a Nielsen Impact<br />
Award at this year’s PIFF.<br />
In addition to Kim’s skills within Korea’s<br />
corridors of power, he proved equally<br />
adept at working with filmmakers, executives<br />
and bureaucrats from around the<br />
world. He travels constantly, frequently<br />
serving on film juries and attending more<br />
than a dozen film festivals each year. And<br />
his drinking prowess is legendary, with<br />
Kim going late into the night, night after<br />
night, only to arise early the next day for<br />
breakfast and exercise (only in the last<br />
couple of years has Kim been forced to cut<br />
back, due to doctor’s orders).<br />
“I am very proud of my career at the<br />
Ministry of Culture,” Kim said, adding with<br />
a laugh, “But I prefer now, working with the<br />
film side at PIFF. It’s my second life.” ∂<br />
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8<br />
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NIELSEN IMPACT AWARD HONOUREE<br />
CONGRATULATIONS KIM DONG-HO<br />
ASIA PACIFIC SCREEN AWARDS VALUED<br />
JURY MEMBER INAUGURAL YEAR 2007.<br />
FROM YOUR FRIENDS AT APSA AND<br />
FELLOW MEMBERS OF THE ACADEMY<br />
OF THE ASIA PACIFIC SCREEN AWARDS.<br />
Congratulations on this recognition of your outstanding and globe-spanning contributions to Asian<br />
and international cinema, and for the impact you have made in bringing Korean fi lms to the world.<br />
Your valued role as an international jury member in the inaugural APSAs, and ongoing involvement<br />
as a member of <strong>The</strong> Academy of the Asia Pacifi c Screen Awards, continues your lifetime contribution<br />
to bridging cultures, and creating tolerance and understanding.<br />
We thank you for helping us to encourage dialogue, collaboration and opportunities for fi lmmakers<br />
across the 70 countries and areas of our region.<br />
ACADEMY PATRON<br />
Jack Thompson AM<br />
ACADEMY MEMBERS to date include:<br />
Aamir Khan<br />
Adrienne Mc Kibbins<br />
Ajay Bijli<br />
Akie Namiki<br />
Alireza Aghakhani<br />
Amir Muhammad<br />
Anne Démy-Geroe<br />
Anne-Dominique Toussaint<br />
Antonio Gloria<br />
Ari Folman<br />
Ari Sihasale<br />
Aruna Vasudev<br />
Auraeus Solito Jr<br />
Aziza Semaan<br />
Azize Tan<br />
Baran Kosari<br />
Behnam Behzadi<br />
Bulat Galimgereyev<br />
Cemal Noyan<br />
Chen Weidong<br />
Cheng Siu-keung<br />
Daria Moroz<br />
Dervis Zaim<br />
Ehud Bleiberg<br />
Eilon Ratzkovsky<br />
Elena Yatsura<br />
Elissa Down<br />
Endi Balbuena<br />
Eran Kolirin<br />
Eran Riklis<br />
Erkan Can<br />
Erros Djarot<br />
Erwin Navarro<br />
Evgeniy Antropov<br />
Fabienne Vonier<br />
Fatih Akin<br />
Fei Zhao<br />
Feroz Abbas Khan<br />
Gao Feng<br />
Garin Nugroho<br />
Gauri Khan<br />
George Miller<br />
Gerhard Meixner<br />
Gisele Aouad<br />
Gökhan Tiryaki<br />
Gotot Prakosa<br />
Gulnara Sarsenova<br />
Habib Ahmadzadeh<br />
Hadeel Kamel<br />
Hanan Turk<br />
Hanna Lee<br />
Hansen Liang<br />
Hassan Agha-Karimi<br />
Helen Barnes<br />
Henryk Romanowski<br />
Hiam Abbass<br />
Hong Sang-soo<br />
Hong-Joon Kim<br />
Hooman Behmanesh<br />
Jafar Panahi<br />
Jean Chamoun<br />
Jeannette Paulson Hereniko<br />
Jeon Do-yeon<br />
Jimmy Jack<br />
Joan Chen<br />
Joanna Moukarzel<br />
Johnnie To<br />
Karl Baumgartner<br />
Keith Griffi ths<br />
Kero Nancy Tait<br />
Kiiran Deohans<br />
Kim Dong-ho<br />
View APSA Nominees <strong>2008</strong> online now<br />
www.asiapacifi cscreenawards.com<br />
Kim In-soo<br />
Kim Jee-woon<br />
Kim Yoon-suk<br />
Kioumars Pourahmad<br />
Kiyoshi Kurosawa<br />
Klaus Maeck<br />
Konrad Ng<br />
Lee Chang-dong<br />
Lee Mogae<br />
Lee SeungGu<br />
Li Xudong<br />
Lin Nianxiu<br />
Linda Cordova<br />
Mahdi Moniri<br />
Mai Masri<br />
Marg Slater<br />
Mark Ping-bin Lee<br />
Mark Turnbull<br />
Masahiko Minami<br />
Max Mannix<br />
Mehdi Homayounfar<br />
Mehrdad Seddiqian<br />
Menardo Jimenez<br />
Miao Pu<br />
Michael James Rowland<br />
Mohammad Atebbai<br />
Mohammad Belhaj<br />
Mohsen Abdolvahab<br />
Nadine Labaki<br />
Nafi sa Ali Sodhi<br />
Nam Kyu-sun<br />
Nik Powell<br />
Noritaka Kawaguchi<br />
Nuri Bilge Ceylan<br />
Oleg Kirichenko<br />
Omarbekova Nesipkul<br />
Önder Çakar<br />
Palitha Perera<br />
Paul Morales<br />
Peng Tao<br />
Peter Thompson<br />
Philip Cheah<br />
Pierette Ominetti<br />
Puad Onah<br />
Raimond Goebel<br />
Rajat Kapoor<br />
Rakhshan Bani etemad<br />
Raphaël Berdugo<br />
Renuka Balasooriya<br />
Reza Naji<br />
Roman Paul<br />
Rosnah Mohd Kassim<br />
Russell Edwards<br />
Ryu Deok-hwan<br />
Sachiko Tanaka<br />
Sally Ayre-Smith<br />
Sanjeev K Bijli<br />
Sasson Gabai<br />
Serge Lalou<br />
Sergey Dvortsevoy<br />
Sergey Melkumov<br />
Sergey Selyanov<br />
Sergey Trofi mov R.G.C.<br />
Setiawan Djody<br />
Sevil Demirci<br />
Shabana Azmi<br />
Shawkat Amin Korki<br />
Siham Haddad<br />
Simon Field<br />
Simon Yam<br />
Socorro Fernandez<br />
Soheir Abdel Kader<br />
Suha Arraf<br />
Sun Xiaoxi<br />
Tainui Stephens<br />
Tan Chui Mui<br />
Tao Yang<br />
Thanassis Karathanos<br />
<strong>The</strong>irry Garrel<br />
Tian Zhuangzhuang<br />
Tristram Miall<br />
Vahid Mousaine Simani<br />
Valerie Fischer<br />
Valerio De Paolis<br />
Vardan Hovhannisyan<br />
Vincent Ward<br />
Wang Shunsheng<br />
Wang Yu<br />
Xie Fei<br />
Yael Nahlieli<br />
Yasmine Al Masri<br />
Yutaka Sugiyama<br />
Zeynep Özbatur<br />
Zhanna Issabayeva<br />
Zhou Meiling<br />
APSA1207 HR1008
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Hollywood</strong> <strong>Reporter</strong> | Thursday, <strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong> special world report | kim dong-ho salute<br />
Kim Dong-ho has been a<br />
formidable force in Korean culture<br />
for five decades, working at the<br />
Ministry of Culture, the Korea<br />
Performance Ethics Board, the Seoul Arts<br />
Center and, for the past 14 years, as the head<br />
of the Pusan International Film Festival. <strong>The</strong><br />
recipient of the Nielsen Impact Award recently<br />
spoke with <strong>The</strong> <strong>Hollywood</strong> <strong>Reporter</strong>’s<br />
Mark Russell about his past and PIFF’s future.<br />
How has Korea’s cultural landscape<br />
changed since you began at the Ministry<br />
of Culture in 1961?<br />
Kim Dong-ho: In the 1960s, Korea’s film<br />
industry was weak for many reasons. <strong>The</strong>re<br />
was strong censorship from the government,<br />
especially from 1972. Just after the military<br />
government started, they instituted the Motion<br />
Picture Law in 1962, which I helped write, which<br />
restrained filmmaking, distribution and importing.<br />
It started a quota system for importing films.<br />
Before 1961, foreign films were most common, but<br />
after the quota, there were only 20 to 25 foreign films a year.<br />
Prince of<br />
Pusan<br />
THR’s Nielsen Impact Award<br />
honoree discusses<br />
Korea’s cultural evolution,<br />
the current state of the<br />
film business and<br />
the future of the<br />
Pusan International<br />
Film Festival<br />
Los Angeles 323.525.2000 | New York 646.654.5000 | London +44.207.420.6139 | Beijing +86.10.6512.5511 (ext. 121) | THR.com/pusan | day 1<br />
12<br />
Q&A
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Hollywood</strong> <strong>Reporter</strong> | Thursday, <strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong> special world report | kim dong-ho salute<br />
From the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s was<br />
the first Golden Age of Korean cinema. <strong>The</strong><br />
second Golden Age was from about 1997 to<br />
2006 or ’07. It was my experience to work<br />
at the Ministry of Culture in the 1960s. I<br />
was very impressed and pleased to be<br />
working in culture. It was my first experience<br />
with culture of any sort. But in the<br />
1960s and ’70s, the culture industry was<br />
very weak. In 1972, I helped establish<br />
long-term cultural policies in the government.<br />
It was our first five-year plan for<br />
cultural promotion policies. We established<br />
the Korean Cultural Foundation and<br />
made cultural laws and cultural policy. We<br />
also established fundraising policies from<br />
the theaters. In the cultural budget, the<br />
first priority was maintaining and restoring<br />
our cultural heritage. After that, we<br />
invested in the other arts, such as literature,<br />
painting and performance. <strong>The</strong>n,<br />
there was no support system for the film<br />
industry. We just restricted foreign films<br />
and had the quota. You could make big<br />
money then if you imported foreign films,<br />
therefore we wanted those people to<br />
invest in Korean films.<br />
You spent time in the early 1990s as the head<br />
of the Korea Performance Ethics Board, the<br />
organization responsible for rating movies<br />
and, back then, censoring them. But as the<br />
head of PIFF, you were a key proponent of<br />
ending censorship. How do you reconcile<br />
those two positions?<br />
Kim: I only worked for the Ethics Board for<br />
two years because there was too much trouble<br />
between the government and me back<br />
then. For example, I allowed “<strong>The</strong> Crying<br />
Game” and did not cut it at all. I also allowed<br />
in (Sergei) Eisenstein films like “Battleship<br />
Potemkim” and “<strong>October</strong>,” which had been<br />
banned before then. And Oliver Stone’s<br />
“Natural Born Killers.” So the government<br />
disliked my way of running the board.<br />
Why has the Korean film industry been having<br />
problems recently?<br />
Kim: <strong>The</strong> slump of recent years is because of<br />
two major reasons. One reason is that many<br />
blockbusters failed. <strong>The</strong> other is that production<br />
costs have grown too high. Because<br />
of those problems, investors now hesitate to<br />
invest in Korean movies and therefore the<br />
number of films being made has gone down.<br />
What can PIFF do to help the local film<br />
industry?<br />
Kim: <strong>The</strong> film festival circuit these days is<br />
seriously competitive. <strong>The</strong>re are many<br />
challenges — from Japan, Hong Kong and<br />
China. <strong>The</strong>refore, we have to have creative<br />
works, we need to develop creatively. From<br />
2006, the 10th anniversary of PIFF, we<br />
established the Asian Film Academy and<br />
the Asian Cinema Fund. I personally think<br />
that the festival itself must maintain the<br />
<strong>The</strong> film festival circuit these days is seriously<br />
competitive. <strong>The</strong>re are many challenges — from Japan,<br />
Hong Kong and China. <strong>The</strong>refore, we have to have<br />
creative works, we need to develop creatively.<br />
right size, but creatively, on the project and<br />
the programming side, we need to make<br />
more and more efforts.<br />
What are you most proud of in your career?<br />
Kim: During my time at the Ministry of Culture,<br />
I have been mainly in the creative<br />
fields. I helped establish the Korean Cultural<br />
Foundations. And after that, I planned the<br />
construction of the Seoul Arts Center and<br />
Independence Hall. While I was president of<br />
the Korea Motion Picture Promotion Corp.<br />
(the forerunner of KOFIC), I established the<br />
construction of the Namyangju studios.<br />
Now at PIFF, we are building the Busan Film<br />
Center, and will finally start construction<br />
this year. I am very proud of my career at the<br />
Ministry of Culture. But I prefer now, working<br />
with the film side at PIFF. It’s my second<br />
life (laughs).<br />
What is in the future for PIFF?<br />
Kim:: My hope is that PIFF will be the center<br />
of the Asian film industry. It’s possible<br />
Korea could be the center of Asian film<br />
because of several factors — there’s PIFF<br />
itself, plus there are many universities with<br />
film departments in Busan, so there are so<br />
many film professionals being produced<br />
there. Also, KOFIC and many studios will<br />
move to Busan around 2012, when the<br />
Busan Film Center will be done. <strong>The</strong>n, I am<br />
confident Busan will be a center for the<br />
Asian film industry.<br />
How would you like to be remembered?<br />
Kim: My great pleasure and honor was that<br />
first PIFF. I will never forget it. We faced<br />
many challenges, first all, the budget. It<br />
was a big problem raising enough money<br />
for our first festival. Another big problem<br />
was how to avoid the influences of the city<br />
and national governments, especially political<br />
influence. But because of my career in<br />
the government, I knew how to protect the<br />
festival.<br />
What has been your biggest<br />
disappointment?<br />
Kim: I don’t have any (laughs). Personally,<br />
I am living with all the possibilities of<br />
achievement, and I have an optimistic view.<br />
So I guess I have not faced disappointment<br />
yet. ∂<br />
Kim Dong-ho, left, and Tokyo<br />
International Film Festival<br />
chairman Tom Yoda attend the<br />
Japanese Pavilion party at the<br />
Hotel Majestic Barriere during<br />
May’s Festival de Cannes<br />
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14<br />
MICHAEL BUCKNER/GETTY IMAGES
CONGRATULATIONS<br />
MR. KIM DONG-HO<br />
ON WINNING<br />
NIELSEN IMPACT AWARD<br />
KOREAN FILMS<br />
ARE PROUD OF YOU!<br />
FROM A FRIEND OF PIFF,<br />
SHOWBOX / MEDIAPLEX
eviews Thursday,<br />
‘Cape No. 7’<br />
By Maggie Lee<br />
TAIPEI, Taiwan — In<br />
Wei Te-sheng’s “Cape<br />
No. 7,” a motley crew<br />
of goofballs and<br />
eccentrics form a band<br />
to perform in their hometown’s<br />
biggest gig ever. <strong>The</strong>re are colorful<br />
character sketches, rowing<br />
and bonding, love interests and<br />
family feuds, the pursuit of<br />
dreams — old riffs you’ve heard<br />
before, from “<strong>The</strong> Commitments”<br />
to variations like<br />
Korea’s “This Happy Life.”<br />
But with a little rearrangement<br />
to suit local taste, plus<br />
plenty of heart from cast and<br />
crew, the film hums its own<br />
sweet melody.<br />
<strong>The</strong> film won the Grand<br />
Prize of the Taipei Award this<br />
year at the Taipei International<br />
Film Festival. <strong>The</strong> homecooked<br />
brew of grassroots sentimentality,<br />
extremely local<br />
vernacular and light, cheery<br />
score propelled local boxoffice<br />
takings to about $1.6 million.<br />
<strong>The</strong> film is suitable for musicfriendly<br />
festivals.<br />
Aspiring rocker Aga (Van)<br />
failed to cut it in Taipei’s band<br />
scene and bides his time as a<br />
postman in his seaside town.<br />
When asked to assemble a<br />
warm-up band for an outdoor<br />
gig by a hot Japanese singer, he<br />
is at first skeptical as his<br />
recruits are like extras suddenly<br />
given leading roles in a<br />
blockbuster.<br />
Anyone who enjoys seeing<br />
small-time dreamers learn their<br />
groove, bicker, struggle and<br />
finally jell as a team will not be<br />
disappointed. <strong>The</strong> characters,<br />
though caricatured for comic<br />
effect, are pulled straight out of<br />
> A WINDOW ON ASIAN CINEMA<br />
BOTTOM LINE<br />
Sunny rock band blues beats<br />
with the rustic pulse of<br />
provincial Taiwan.<br />
CAST: Van, Chie Tanaka, Min-Hsiung,<br />
Ma Nien-Hsien, Ying Wei-Min, Shino Lin.<br />
DIRECTOR-SCREENWRITER: Wei Tesheng.<br />
EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS:<br />
Jimmy Huang, Wei Te-sheng.<br />
PRODUCERS: Jimmy Huang, Lin Tien-<br />
Kui, Lewis Lu, Tong Hu, Chang Chang-ti.<br />
SALES AGENT: Good Films Workshop.<br />
No rating, 133 minutes.<br />
THR.com/pusan<br />
<strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong><br />
Taiwan provincial life, including<br />
a Chinese banjo player in his<br />
80s and an aboriginal who<br />
keeps breaking into indigenous<br />
folksong.<br />
<strong>The</strong> love plot between Aga<br />
and Tomoko (Chie Tanaka), an<br />
over-the-hill Japanese model,<br />
alternates with a romance<br />
between a Japanese teacher in<br />
colonial Taiwan and the local<br />
girl he abandoned when made<br />
to repatriate at the end of<br />
World War II. <strong>The</strong> two couples’<br />
entwined fates emerge through<br />
recitation of the teacher’s love<br />
letters to his fiancee.<br />
Although the film gives too<br />
much screen time to each minor<br />
character, which makes the narrative<br />
very spread out, its guileless<br />
charm makes one overlook<br />
its flaws. <strong>The</strong> ace cinematography<br />
shows off the stunning natural<br />
beauty of Taiwan’s southern<br />
coastal towns. ∂<br />
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16
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Hollywood</strong> <strong>Reporter</strong> | Thursday, <strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong> | reviews<br />
By Maggie Lee<br />
TOKYO, Japan — Charting<br />
the highs and lows of a 10year<br />
marriage is a film subject<br />
as prosaic as a TV ad for life<br />
insurance, but in the hands of<br />
Ryosuke Hashiguchi (“Hush”), it<br />
is nothing short of transcendent.<br />
“All Around Us” connects<br />
intense personal experiences<br />
with the troubled zeitgeist of<br />
Japan’s post-bubble ’90s.<br />
Despite taking characters to the<br />
emotional deep end, it offers<br />
optimism as precious and fragile<br />
as the human bonds it depicts.<br />
<strong>The</strong> film enjoyed an unexpectedly<br />
long run domestically,<br />
but its gently undulating rhythm<br />
and self-effacing style might not<br />
catch the eye of auteur-hungry<br />
viewers. Making its overseas<br />
debut at Toronto gives it the<br />
recognition it deserves.<br />
We enter the lives of Kanao<br />
(Lily Franky) and Shoko (Tae<br />
Kimura) in 1993 as the newlyweds<br />
strive to conceive. Subtitles<br />
indicate keystone years,<br />
such as Kanao’s new job as a<br />
court illustrator, Shoko’s<br />
descent into depression after<br />
their baby’s death and family<br />
gatherings that are by turns<br />
tense and tender. In the courtroom,<br />
(fact-based) trials of lurid<br />
‘Nightmare 2’<br />
continued from page 1<br />
of the eponymous hero’s past<br />
like a detective thriller with<br />
rudimentary Freudian logic.<br />
Exploring the nature of fear, it<br />
probes into characters’ psyches<br />
to reveal vulnerability<br />
rather than evil, eliciting not<br />
fear but pity. <strong>The</strong> horror mas-<br />
> MIDNIGHT PASSION<br />
BOTTOM LINE<br />
Inward-looking horror film<br />
exploring the nature of fear.<br />
CAST: Ryuhei Matsuda, Yui Miura,<br />
Hanae Kan, Miwako Ichikawa.<br />
DIRECTOR: Shinya Tsukamoto.<br />
SCREENWRITER: Shinya Tsukamoto,<br />
Hisakatsu Kuroki. EXECUTIVE<br />
PRODUCER: Kaz Tadshiki. PRO-<br />
DUCERS: Shinya Tsukamoto, Shinichi<br />
Kawahara, Takeshi Koide, Yumiko<br />
Takebe. SALES AGENT: Movie-Eye<br />
Entertainment. No rating, 97 minutes.<br />
‘All<br />
Around<br />
Us’<br />
> A WINDOW ON ASIAN CINEMA<br />
BOTTOM LINE<br />
A soul-stirring portrait of<br />
married life, for worse or better.<br />
CAST: Lily Franky, Tae Kimura, Mitsuko<br />
Baisyo, Susumu Terajima, Akira Emoto.<br />
DIRECTOR-SCREENWRITER-EDITOR:<br />
Ryosuke Hashiguchi. PRODUCERS: Eiji<br />
Watanabe, Tetsujiro Yamagami. SALES<br />
AGENT: Celluloid Dreams.<br />
No rating, 140 minutes.<br />
crimes and sordid corporate<br />
corruption form a grim undercurrent<br />
that accentuates the<br />
couple’s defeated morale, until a<br />
vow of committment heralds a<br />
ter of the “Tetsuo” series<br />
already has a collectivist fanbase<br />
that laps up whatever he<br />
makes, but this work has the<br />
emotional depth to move<br />
beyond such circles to a more<br />
mainstream market.<br />
Ryuhei Matsuda has perfected<br />
his art as grungy, Hamlet-like<br />
hero Kyoichi, who can<br />
read minds and enter people’s<br />
dreams. Yukie (Yui Miura), a<br />
high school girl, seeks his help<br />
because her classmate<br />
Kikukawa (Hanae Kan) has<br />
disappeared after Yukie and<br />
her friends played a prank on<br />
her. She thinks Kikukawa is<br />
invading their dreams to terrorize<br />
and kill them. Kyoichi<br />
becomes intrigued by<br />
Kikukawa’s resemblance to his<br />
mother, who’s abnormally<br />
high strung and attacks people<br />
when scared.<br />
<strong>The</strong> jumpy editing never<br />
shows a complete figure of<br />
moving transformation.<br />
Verbally, the film sustains a<br />
graceful, sometimes heartbreaking<br />
silence, but images orchestrate<br />
a symphony of feeling.<br />
Kanao’s mechanical sketches of<br />
intractable criminals and hysterical<br />
victims contrast starkly<br />
with Shoko’s exuberant drawings<br />
of flora and fauna. Both<br />
mirror their states of mind. Body<br />
motions become poetic tools of<br />
self-expression. In a scene<br />
denoting ineffable joy, a pregnant<br />
Shoko strokes Kanao’s back<br />
during a stroll. Toward the end,<br />
they lie on a temple tatami;<br />
close-ups of their feet entwined<br />
Kikukawa, and her face<br />
remains blurred until the<br />
denouement. Her elusiveness<br />
is the most unnerving element<br />
in the film. Although there is<br />
no orgy of Tsukamoto’s trademark<br />
body-mutation effects<br />
to blow one away, some<br />
inventive facial distortions<br />
playfully together evoke<br />
renewed love and desire.<br />
Celebrity artist Franky makes<br />
a startling screen debut. His<br />
awkwardness in front of the<br />
camera actually gives him<br />
authenticity as the homey, taciturn<br />
Kanao. Veteran Kimura<br />
conveys an unpredictable rawness<br />
beyond professional pitchperfection.<br />
Supporting performances<br />
also are as natural as<br />
breathing. <strong>The</strong> limpid cinematography<br />
has the fluidity of<br />
water colors, connecting<br />
changing moods like a ride<br />
through the tunnel into emerging<br />
light. ∂<br />
occurring in timely moments<br />
imbue the atmosphere with<br />
the surreal color of Dali’s<br />
paintings.<br />
When tracing Kyoichi’s<br />
relationship with his mother,<br />
Tsukamoto uses the same<br />
flashbacks too many times.<br />
However, their accumulative<br />
effect is finally felt at the end,<br />
when the same scenes are<br />
suddenly given a new context<br />
with a moving resolution.<br />
Tsukamoto subverts the<br />
horror genre by making the<br />
‘villain’ a timid creature terrified<br />
of everything rather than<br />
a demonized, vengeful power.<br />
He suggests that human<br />
nature is scarier than any<br />
supernatural being — the<br />
hyper-sensitive protagonists<br />
live in fear only because they<br />
read people’s minds and realize<br />
what monsters they are.<br />
Originally reviewed at the<br />
Festival de Cannes in May.<br />
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18
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Hollywood</strong> <strong>Reporter</strong> | Thursday, <strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong> | news<br />
East and West<br />
continued from page 1<br />
want-to-see in China,” Hong<br />
Kong-based producer Andre<br />
Morgan said. “And the Chinese<br />
are also doing a better job of controlling<br />
DVD piracy.”<br />
But when films move from<br />
East to West, they don’t always<br />
meet the same reception.<br />
Ang Lee’s “Crouching Tiger,<br />
Hidden Dragon,” a co-production<br />
between the China Film<br />
Co-Production Corp. and<br />
Columbia Pictures Film Production<br />
Asia — the Sony arm<br />
has a long-standing presence in<br />
the region — set the bar when it<br />
was released stateside in 2000.<br />
It made $128.1 million to<br />
become the high-grossing<br />
foreign-language film in America,<br />
a record no other film has<br />
since come close to challenging.<br />
This past year, for example,<br />
Stephen Chow’s “CJ7,” an<br />
effects-filled fantasy produced<br />
by Chow’s Star Overseas and<br />
Columbia Asia, was a hit in foreign<br />
markets, grossing more<br />
than $47 million and topping<br />
the 100 million yuan ($14.6 million)<br />
mark in China. But on U.S.<br />
shores, its limited release<br />
attracted a little more than<br />
$200,000.<br />
<strong>The</strong> U.S. market for foreignlanguage<br />
films is so depressed<br />
that distributors aren’t offering<br />
more than mid-six figures for<br />
North American rights. As a<br />
result, with no serious offers<br />
coming from buyers, such big<br />
Asian action movies as Peter<br />
Chan’s “<strong>The</strong> War Lords” and<br />
John Woo’s “Red Cliff” are currently<br />
without American distributors.<br />
<strong>The</strong> hard truth is that most of<br />
the Asian-produced films that<br />
will screen at the 13th Pusan<br />
International Film Festival will<br />
never win U.S. exposure. And<br />
even big-budget American<br />
movies can get lost in translation<br />
when they try to conquer<br />
Asian markets.<br />
Still, when <strong>Hollywood</strong> eyes<br />
Asia, it sees an enormous opportunity<br />
simply because there are<br />
so many ticket buyers lining up<br />
to see both locally produced<br />
product and American imports.<br />
In 2007, according to the<br />
MPA, Asia accounted for the<br />
“Forbidden<br />
Kingdom”<br />
largest number of ticket buyers<br />
in the world. While North<br />
American moviegoers racked up<br />
1.4 billion admissions, the Asian<br />
Pacific region registered 4.17<br />
billion. In terms of U.S. dollars,<br />
Asia Pacific rang up $6.92 billion,<br />
closing in on the $9.63 billion<br />
in North American boxoffice<br />
revenue.<br />
Given the size of the potential<br />
Asian audience, <strong>Hollywood</strong> is<br />
stepping up its efforts in some<br />
parts of Asia, looking to foster<br />
local productions that will play in<br />
their home markets as well as the<br />
occasional crossover hit that can<br />
travel to other territories. If in the<br />
process it further opens doors for<br />
the exhibition of Americanmade<br />
titles, all the better.<br />
Universal, which also has<br />
been ramping up its international<br />
production arm — Universal<br />
Pictures International<br />
Studios, led by Christian Grass<br />
— sees developing ongoing relationships<br />
in territories as part of<br />
its larger international strategy.<br />
“To be competitive overseas,<br />
it’s vital that we are also making<br />
movies for those international<br />
audiences,” Universal co-chairman<br />
David Linde said.<br />
In the case of China, Linde<br />
and James Schamus, who heads<br />
Uni’s Focus Features, have a<br />
long-standing relationship with<br />
Hong Kong producer Bill Kong,<br />
with whom they worked on<br />
“Crouching Tiger.” That has led<br />
to a multi-tiered partnership:<br />
His production services company<br />
paved the way for “Mummy”<br />
to film in China, he distributes<br />
Uni titles in both Hong Kong<br />
and mainland China through his<br />
company Edko, and the studio<br />
expects to make two or three<br />
local movies with him during<br />
the coming year.<br />
At the same time, in Japan,<br />
where it has one of its own execs<br />
in place, Uni has set up a couple<br />
of co-productions, “Dororo”<br />
and “Midnight Eagle.” And last<br />
month, Uni and Focus joined<br />
forces with Korean’s CJ Entertainment<br />
to co-produce director<br />
Park Chan-wook’s next film,<br />
“Thirst.” CJ will distribute in<br />
Korea and retain international<br />
sales rights, while Focus will<br />
handle the North American<br />
release of the vampire tale about<br />
a priest who volunteers for<br />
medical experiments.<br />
“Films like ‘Old Boy’ and<br />
‘Sympathy for Lady Vengeance’<br />
got sold internationally after<br />
their domestic release, but in<br />
the case of ‘Thirst,’ it is a first<br />
for a Korean film to get U.S. studio<br />
investment and distribution<br />
in North America before its<br />
domestic release,” said Park,<br />
acknowledging that the deal<br />
reflects his growing profile<br />
abroad.<br />
In May, Fox Filmed Entertainment<br />
launched Fox International<br />
Prods., headed by San-<br />
ford Panitch, and quickly<br />
became the latest studio to lay<br />
down a marker in Asia. At Hong<br />
Kong’s Asia Media Summit last<br />
month, Fox and satellite broadcaster<br />
Star, both units of News<br />
Corp., announced a new joint<br />
venture, Fox Star Studios, to<br />
develop local-language films.<br />
Beginning with a unit in India,<br />
under the direction of Vijay<br />
Singh, they’re also planning<br />
Greater China and Southeast<br />
Asia operations.<br />
“Outside of Japan, Star is the<br />
largest satellite provider in Asia,<br />
so for us, it felt like a natural<br />
partnership to take on an essential<br />
TV player,” Panitch said by<br />
phone during a stop in Tokyo on<br />
his way to Pusan. Since American<br />
films only command 5%-<br />
7% of the market in India, the<br />
key to success there is developing<br />
local movies with appeal in<br />
their home territory.<br />
“As a global distribution<br />
company, if there is an opportunity<br />
to find a ‘Kung Fu Hustle’<br />
or a ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ or a ‘La<br />
Vie en Rose,’ a movie that has<br />
the potential to cross over, that<br />
is great,” he added, “but our<br />
primary goal is for the movie to<br />
be successful in the market that<br />
it’s made for.”<br />
Fox also has turned its attention<br />
to Japan, where it is putting<br />
together a slate of Japanese-language<br />
movies. First up, in partnership<br />
with Fuji TV, is a theatrical<br />
remake of “Sideways.”<br />
Warners, where Richard Fox<br />
handles international production<br />
efforts, has been seeking<br />
local partners since 1999, producing<br />
and/or distributing more<br />
than 230 films outside the U.S. It<br />
recently scored in Japan with the<br />
two “Death Note” movies as well<br />
as Hideo Nakata’s thriller “L:<br />
Change the World.”<br />
“Many of these films may<br />
never be seen beyond their<br />
national borders, but they represent<br />
an important contribution<br />
to cultural<br />
diversity,<br />
entertainment<br />
and business<br />
sectors in their<br />
countries and<br />
help Warner<br />
Full story at<br />
THR.com/pusan<br />
Bros. to develop relationships<br />
with directors, producers and<br />
talent,” studio spokesman Scott<br />
Rowe said. ∂<br />
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19<br />
“CJ7”
the biz Thursday,<br />
Universal in the lead<br />
DreamWorks execs closing in on new distribution deal<br />
By Carl DiOrio<br />
LOS ANGELES — Universal<br />
is the prohibitive<br />
favorite to win distribution<br />
rights on films produced<br />
by the new<br />
DreamWorks, with ongoing talks<br />
focused on a related $150 million<br />
NBC Universal loan to the soonto-launch<br />
new company.<br />
<strong>The</strong> loan could be drawn upon<br />
only if other bank funds were<br />
exhausted, and its recoupment<br />
would be subordinate to Dream-<br />
Works’ senior bank debt. Universal<br />
has offered the backup<br />
funding as part of a Dream-<br />
Works financing package of up<br />
to $1.3 billion.<br />
Reliance Big Entertainment<br />
recently agreed to provide<br />
$550 million for a 50% stake in<br />
“Quantum<br />
of Solace”<br />
the company. JPMorgan Securities<br />
is overseeing the remaining<br />
debt portion of the package.<br />
<strong>The</strong> investment bank itself<br />
will put up at least $100 million,<br />
so with the NBC Uni contribution<br />
that would leave about<br />
$500 million for<br />
JPMorgan to raise<br />
through a syndication<br />
of other banks.<br />
It’s also possible<br />
that JPMorgan or<br />
Spielberg<br />
RBE will find<br />
another bank to<br />
put up an additional big chunk<br />
on its own, making it possible to<br />
keep the syndication to a more<br />
manageable $400 million or so.<br />
“All of this stuff is going to<br />
probably take until the end of<br />
December to close,” a participant<br />
in some of the talks said.<br />
By Nyay Bhushan<br />
NEW DELHI — James Bond is<br />
making an unprecedented side<br />
trip before his next adventure<br />
reaches the U.S.<br />
Sony Pictures Releasing India<br />
said Tuesday that “Quantum of<br />
Solace” will open Nov. 7 in India,<br />
marking the first time a major<br />
<strong>Hollywood</strong> title has opened here<br />
before its U.S. premiere. <strong>The</strong> film<br />
will debut in U.K. theaters Oct. 31<br />
Disney remains a distant second<br />
in the contest for distribution<br />
rights. But should it prevail,<br />
the Burbank studio would be<br />
expected to provide a loan similar<br />
to what Univerasl has offered.<br />
Steven Spielberg, Dream-<br />
Works chairman David Geffen<br />
and DreamWorks CEO and cochairman<br />
Stacey Snider already<br />
have given notice to Paramount<br />
of their financing plans. Par<br />
responded by letting the execs<br />
out of their contracts immediately,<br />
and the studio also served<br />
noticed that 150 other DW employees<br />
are free to leave as well.<br />
Under current plans, Dream-<br />
Works will try to get a first film<br />
project into production by September<br />
and gradually ramp up<br />
to an annual slate of six films by<br />
2010. ∂<br />
Bond’s passage to India<br />
“James Bond has a huge<br />
equity in this country, and<br />
Bond films have always<br />
been a hit here.”<br />
—Kercy Daruwalla, Sony Pictures<br />
Releasing India<br />
and be released Nov. 14 in North<br />
America.<br />
“James Bond has a huge equity<br />
in this country, and Bond<br />
films have always been a hit<br />
here,” said Mumbai-based<br />
Kercy Daruwalla, managing<br />
director of Sony Pictures<br />
Releasing India.<br />
“Solace” will be released on<br />
about 700 prints dubbed into<br />
regional languages Hindi, Tamil<br />
and Telegu, “which could make<br />
this the biggest <strong>Hollywood</strong><br />
release of the year here,”<br />
Daruwalla said.<br />
Directed by Marc Forster,<br />
“Solace” picks up where things<br />
left off in the previous Bond<br />
film, 2006’s “Casino Royale.”<br />
Daniel Craig returns for his second<br />
outing as Agent 007. ∂<br />
THR.com/pusan<br />
<strong>October</strong> 2, <strong>2008</strong><br />
DIGEST<br />
“Everybody<br />
Hurts”<br />
HBO wrestles with Lear<br />
LOS ANGELES — In his first major<br />
collaboration with HBO, TV icon<br />
Norman Lear has teamed with the<br />
premium cable network for a<br />
drama series project set in the<br />
world of 1970s pro wrestling.<br />
Written by Aaron Blitzstein and<br />
produced by Lear’s Act III Prods.,<br />
the character-driven drama is tentatively<br />
titled “Everybody Hurts.”<br />
‘Panda’ pairing<br />
LOS ANGELES —<br />
Jack Black is reuniting<br />
with “Kung Fu<br />
Panda” writers<br />
Jonathan Aibel and<br />
Glenn Berger for an<br />
untitled live-action<br />
Black<br />
action comedy at<br />
Universal. Black will produce with<br />
his Electric Dynamite partner Ben<br />
Cooley. A sort of comedic “<strong>The</strong><br />
Bourne Identity,” the story sees<br />
Black as an American who finds<br />
himself washed up the shores of<br />
Cuba with no idea of who he is and<br />
how he got there. He comes to the<br />
conclusion that he must be a superspy,<br />
though in reality he is far from<br />
one. Universal picked up the project<br />
as a pitch in a seven-figure deal.<br />
Bangkok ends strong<br />
BANGKOK — Tuesday’s world premiere<br />
of “Nanayo,” shot almost<br />
entirely in Thailand by Japanese<br />
director Naomi Kawase, closed out<br />
a Bangkok International Film<br />
Festival that organizers are terming<br />
a success. Organizers<br />
expressed delight that 14,000<br />
tickets were sold.<br />
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