English text below

Un mot de ma productrice, l’excellente scénariste américaine Alexis Niki :

Certains d’entre vous savent déjà que je produis une série en anglais pour internet que j’ai écrit qui s’intitule MY BITCHY WITCHY PARIS VACATION. La série est realisé par Kartik Singh, filmé par Nicolas Bilder, avec Timothy Smith en producteur executif. Tous les quatre, nous sommes membres de DreamAgo. Le tournage commence dans douze jours. Nous avons un excellent casting et de très beaux decors, mais nous avons encore besoin d’un coup de main pour les choses suivantes :

1. Une caméra Panasonic HVX-200 à emprunter pour 3 jours, le 7, 8 et 11 novembre.

2. Un trépied pour la HVX-200.

3. Des figurants pour le 7 novembre (scène de café), le 8 novembre (une lecture publique à la Bibliotheque Américaine, et le 11 novembre (scène dans une église).

Nous cherchons également une scripte et un monteur. Le travail n’est pas remuneré mais nous comptons créer plein de buzz autour du projet. Entre autres, on va tout faire pour que le projet soit classé sur IMDb.

Plus d’infos ici : www. bitchywitchy.com. Contactez-moi si vous pouvez nous aider : alexis@thethirddraft.com.

Merci !

Alexis Niki

A helping hand on our project.  Here’s a word from my producer, the outstanding American screenwriter Alexis Niki:

Some of you already know that I’m producing an English-language web series I wrote called MY BITCHY WITCHY PARIS VACATION. The series is being directed by Kartik Singh, filmed by Nicolas Bilder, and executive produced by Timothy Smith, all members of DreamAgo. We’re two weeks away from shooting. We’ve got a great cast and some beautiful locations, but we’re still looking for a couple of things:

1. An HVX-200 camera to borrow for 3 days, Nov, 7, 8, and 11.

2. A tripod to hold the HVX-200 camera.

3. Extras for Nov. 7 (a cafe scene) and Nov. 8 (a book reading at the American library).

We’re also looking for a continuity person and an editor. All work is unpaid, but there will be a big publicity push and every effort will be made to get the web series up on IMDb.

More info here: www. bitchywitchy.com. Contact me at alexis@thethirddraft.com if you can help.

Thanks!

Alexis Niki

Il y a eu une projection au Chat noir le 14 septembre, puis deux projections à New York il y a quinze jours. Si vous n’avez pas encore vu le film, ou vous l’avez vu et vous avez envie de participer au débat,  il reste une occasion à Paris, ce lundi 12 octobre à 20h30. Vous verrez, il y a marqué une participation aux frais. Si vous me contactez avant, je peux vous mettre sur la liste des invités. Voici l’info:

Crypte Ararat

Ciné-ReligionS

Lundi 12 octobre 2009, de 20 h 30 à 22 h 30, projection-débat autour du film

de Kartik Singh,

« Français langue étrangère »

Thème :

« Indifférence, tolérance ou respect mutuel  entre chrétiens et musulmans »

Après la participation du P. François Lainé, curé de Sainte-Anne de la Butte-aux-Cailles,

de Slimane Zeghidour, journaliste à TV5 Monde,

et du réalisateur Kartik Singh

Crypte Ararat : 11 rue Martin Bernard, 75013 Paris (derrière l’église Sainte-Anne de la Butte-aux-Cailles)

Métro : Place d’Italie

Participation aux frais : 5 euros

Réservation : skartix@yahoo.com

FRANCAIS LANGUE ETRANGERE, Kartik SINGH, 12m30s, 2009.  In a French for foreigners language course, a heated debate arises between two Muslim women over the right to have Muslim headwear on during class.

The film will be premiering this month at the Urbanworld Film Festival.  It shows in the Shorts 2 program at the

Herald Square AMC (34th St. between 8th & 9th Ave.) on:

Thursday, September 24th at 12:15pm

Saturday, September 26th at 1:30pm

Since making this film in January 2009, the response has been wonderful.

I am so grateful that this film even got made, as it all came together by accident.  After the success of Saving Mom & Dad, I had no plans to make another short film.  I felt ready to move into features.  This transition has been enjoyable, but longer than I had imagined.  SMD shot in February 2007, so by late last year, I was dying to be back on set, working with actors, making another movie.

How do you make a film when you have no money?  None.  Zilch.  Enough to pay for a few meals at best, definitely not enough to rent stuff and hire folks.  For the past 3 years, I have been teaching film for a technical high school and college in France.  One fine day, I asked what they do with the equipment when it’s not being used by the students.  Long story short: we turned my project into an official school project.  I selected a DP (director of Photography) and the rest of the crew is 20 year olds who had never made a movie.  This brought a lot of fun and unpredictability to the set as you can imagine.

It was deeply satisfying for me to make this film.  Islam in Europe is a sticky situation to say the least.  I am fascinated by this question of how people should live.  How should the immigrant behave in her new society?  In this case, two immigrants are in total disagreement about whether to wear the veil.  I believe this confusion is present for many in France.  I was especially interested in dealing with this subject after the 2004 law forbidding expression  of any religious signs in schools and town halls.  While I think the law targets Islam, my own community, the Sikhs, are caught in the crossfire.  The issue resonates with me, and I spent last fall developing the script.

I had the pleasure of working with fine actors.  The two leads, Behi Djanati Atai and Maud Buquet have each done several feature films.  In fact, while making our film, Behi was promoting three other features, including an amazing film For a Moment, Freedom, in which she plays the lead.  It’s a wonderful film, powerful in emotion and bittersweet.  (I mentioned it in my list of favorite films from last year).

I’m so glad to be back in New York with another film, and I can’t wait to see how it is received by audiences.

I have had a strange relationship with David Lynch’s films.  For many years, I rated my favorites of his work as Elephant Man and The Straight Story.  The lover of good narrative that I am, I had a hard time giving myself over to works like Lost Highway and Mulholland Drive.  Still, I always admired the freedom with which he played.  His technique could include characters like the Cowboy, who show up and leave, without giving us any reason why.  His work integrated a lot of dream world.  So I understood why people loved his stuff, even if I felt a little bit outside of that world.

As I often do, I stumbled upon and became obsessed with a huge phenomenon – about twenty years after everybody else liked it.  Recently, thanks to TF1 in France putting out the box sets, I discovered Twin Peaks.  I could fill many pages with my impressions and admiration of the show.  It was hugely inspiring for me, and I would include the series finale as one of my favorite films – film or television – of all time.

Soon after, I found out that Lynch wrote a book with advice for artists about creativity.  It’s called Catching the Big Fish.  I got it here in its French version: Mon histoire vraie : Méditation, conscience et créativité, and I wanted to share a couple of my favorite quotes from it.  If anyone has access to the English version, please post in the comments.  Enjoy.

La Vie d’Artiste. Au lycée, c’est en lisant THE ART SPIRIT de Robert Henri que j’ai eu l’idée de mener une vie d’artiste. J’entendais par là me consacrer à la peinture – m’y consacrer pleinement, en reléguant tout le reste au second plan.

C’était le seul moyen, estimais-je, d’aller suffisamment au fond des choses pour faire des découvertes. Dans cette optique, tout ce qui vous détourne de la voie de la découverte ne fait pas partie de la vie d’artiste, qui est fondamentalement synonyme de liberté. Ce qui semble, je pense, un brin égoïste. Sauf que ce n’est pas nécessairement égoïste ; cela signifie seulement qu’il faut du temps.

Pour une heure de peinture, il faut avoir quatre heures devant soi. On ne se met pas à peindre comme ça de but en blanc. Il faut s’asseoir, se concentrer, réfléchir un tant soit peu, avant de se lancer et d’accomplir les bons gestes. Et puis toutes sortes de matériaux doivent être prêts. Il faut par exemple fabriquer le châssis sur lequel on monte la toile avant de la mettre dans le cadre ; ça peut prendre beaucoup de temps de préparer ce sur quoi on va peindre. Et ensuite on se met au travail. Il suffit d’une idée de départ pour s’y mettre, car, pour moi, ce qui vient après relève du procesus d’action et de réaction. Il s’agit toujours d’un processus de construction puis de destruction. Dans ce qu’on a détruit, on découvre quelque chose, et c’est à partir de là qu’on se remet à construire. La nature joue un rôle gigantesque dans cette dynamique. Le fait d’assembler des matériaux rétifs – comme lorsqu’on expose quelque chose au soleil, ou lorsqu’on utilise des matériaux antagonistes – provoque en soi des réactions organiques. Il s’agit ensuite de prendre du recul et d’étudier ce qui se passe, étudier, étudier, étudier ; et soudain on bondit de sa chaise, on repasse à l’action et on attaque l’étape suivante. C’est le principe de l’action et de la réaction.

Mais si vous savez que vous devez être quelque part dans une demi-heure, il est peu probable que vous réussissiez à pousser ce processus jusqu’à son terme. Par conséquent, la vie d’artiste, c’est la liberté de s’octroyer du temps pour que les bonnes choses arrivent. Ce qui ne laisse pas toujours beaucoup de temps pour autre chose.

Watching Twin Peaks, I appreciated one of Lynch’s strongest suits.  He is able to create mood and ambiance very well.  In this quote, he explains his technique, which I will apply to my own filmmaking.

La Sensation du lieu, c’est très important au cinéma, parce qu’on a envie de pénétrer dans un autre monde. Chaque histoire a son propre monde, son ambiance, une atmosphère qui lui est propre. Alors on essaye d’allier tous ces éléments – ces petits détails – pour créer cette sensation d’un lieu.

Le son et l’éclairage jouent un rôle crucial. Les sons qui entrent dans la pièce peuvent contribuer à dépeindre un monde, à le rendre plus riche. Si de nombreux décors sont suffisants pour des plans larges, dans mon esprit, ils devraient résister à un examen plus minutieux, les petits détails devraient être visibles. Il est possible qu’on ne puisse les voir tous, mais d’une certaine manière il faut qu’on sente qu’ils sont présents, qu’on sente qu’il s’agit d’un endroit véritable, d’un monde réel.

I have yet to see Inland Empire.  Though I have heard a lot of negative feedback on this film, I still look forward to seeing it.  For a long time, I was caught up in plot and the importance of working out the story.  Discovering Twin Peaks made me to realize that some of the most beautiful images and concepts, the ones that haunt us and stay with us long after, are ones that have nothing at all to do with advancing the story.  Thank you, Mr. Lynch.

Sometimes having access to technology can be a negative thing.  I was in a bad place this spring, checking e-mails eight times a day, spending too much time on Facebook.  I was in need of a change.  I had a three week trip to India planned in March. So I made a promise to myself: no e-mail while I am there.  Making that declaration felt liberating.  No tired eyes, no cyber world, just real life with people, interactions, and events happening the way they used to.

When the challenge began,  I went through a kind of withdrawal.  It was like quitting smoking or skipping coffee.  It was having physiological effects on me.  I was itching to get back.  Dying to know if I as missing something.  I was jittery.  These reactions wore off in the first 4 days, leveling off to the occasional urge which I let go.

In the end, I had 23 days without e-mail, and it felt so great that I made myself another promise.  I will go for another month without internet sometime within 2009. When?  I don’t know yet.

When I talk to people about this, they look at me like I am insane.  Maybe I am.  But I had a wonderful time just being.  Not chasing after e-mails.  Not being the good guy.  The nice guy who replies to everything that comes in within 24 hours, the guy you can count on to put out fires, even when after the fact, you realize you didn’t really that guy.  That guy.  He’s not a happy guy.

I got inspired to do this when I read about Sally Field.  (By the way, Norma Rae is one of my favorite films.  If you haven’t seen it, go check it out!)  Field talks about her process when she prepares for a role.  In order to get deep into the work, she turns everything off.  Total isolation.  No phones, e-mails, correspondence of any kind.  In that way, she is in a space where her imagination can really work.

She has an assistant who is handling a lot of this stuff, acting as a buffer.  Of course there are things Sally Field needs to deal with, but she chooses to only give priority to things involving her immediate family members.

I don’t have an assistant.  So I put up a handy vacation responder with my dates for the India trip.  It included my cell number as an emergency contact.

I was not preparing for a film.  I was not writing.  So it was not a creative space that I was trying to protect.   I just wanted to be fully present in what was happening around me in India.  I was successful in that.  It was undoubtedly the best India trip I have ever had.  Being offline contributed to that, I’m sure of it.  Checking e-mail would have been a way to engage with Paris, the US, and other places.  It would have taken me out of India.  Why would I go to India if it’s just to be plunged back into my everyday mundanities?

Did anyone use the emergency contact?  Yes.  Two people did.  One was completely unnecessary – it was someone trying to sell me something I didn’t need.  The other was an offer for a job.  A television series in France wanted me to act.  It would have meant cutting my trip short.  Was the money good?  Yes, I found out.  Was it the lead role?  No.  I turned them down.  Staying in India with family was too rare and precious an occasion to give up.

I think about this when I see people who are always connected.  I don’t want it.  I don’t want an iPhone or a BlackBerry.  If you have these things and they work for you, fine.  I’m not judging you or saying that it’s bad.   I am just talking about me.  When I am constantly connected, when I am in that space where I start feeling unloved because no one has sent me an e-mail in the past five minutes and that people are not commenting on my tweets, I know that something is very wrong.

In the end, I survived 23 days without e-mail and surfing the web.  I even enjoyed it.

Those of you who know me know that my goal is to write stories that touch people’s lives.  I know that if I am too distracted by the internet or anything else, it takes away from my writing. I don’t observe as well or as deeply as I could.  So I make it my intention to use the internet in smaller doses.

To be continued.

A very special screening this fortnight at Monday Shorts. The Bombay Elektrik Projekt in association with Short Circuit proudly bring you the very best of The Asian Hot Shots festival. What a night and what a line up of some of the best shorts across Asia. About ASIAN HOT SHOTS BERLIN – festival for film and video art: New digitial filmmaking techniques have enabled more and more Asian filmmakers to translate their unique perspectives onto film, realising bold, provocative and experimental cinema beyond the mainstream. Independent filmmakers, providing alternative images to match the powerful Asian film industry, guarantee a diverse and exciting programme. Our goal is to offer independent filmmakers and their individual and wildly varied modes of expression an appropriate platform for their work. The festival wants to bring our audience closer to other ways of life; the festival will give insights that are not shown in the mass media and mainstream film. asian hot shots berlin further aims to create a cultural exchange between German/European and Asian filmmakers. We aim to support young filmmakers with inspiration, contacts and new perspectives that open doors for new projects and international cooperation. The association behind the festival is GREEN CHILIES ASC. : green chilies asc. was founded in Berlin in April 2007. The aim of the organization is the development of cultural exchange between Berlin (Germany/Europe) and Asia, primarily in the field of film and video art. In addition to the annual festival the green chilies organize film series and screenings all over globe, e.g. in Bern/Switzerland, Bombay/India, Manila/Philippines, Jakarta/Indonesia and many more. The logo of a green chili pepper matches the name and goals of the project: young, fresh, sharp-witted.

The Line up:

GOD ONLY KNOWS – Winner 1st Prize Green Chilies Audience Award 2009 Philippines/USA 2008, Mark V. Reyes, 17 min A hear-ripping story from the slums: forced by economic circumstances a mother has to look for foster parents for her infant son. However, paradise expected in the first world can easily mean hell, too. ——————–

HOOLAHOOP SOUNDINGS – Winner 2nd Prize Green Chilies Audience Award 2009 Indonesia 2008, Edwin, 7 min It is a story of a girl who hula-hoops to let customers of phone sex hear the noise. It is a remade film of a graduate work by Joel Coen in college. I have not seen this film, but Ranbir saw it in Clermont and here’s what he said, “It’s pretentious.  Rips off Wong Kar-Wai.  Sexual theme, so don’t bring the kids.” ——————–

SUKRIT’S SUNDAYS India 2008, Vasant Nath, 8 min The magic of a simple ritual used to bring him and his grandfather together every sunday for as long as he can remember. ——————–

EVOLVING IDENTITIES POST-INDEPENDENCE India 2008, Elvis D’Silva, 1min Using animated text, photographs and dynamic music, the film generates imagery from the lives of people that represent different facets of India. As characters appear in the frame, icons and images distinct to them highlight their evolving identities. ——————–

LITERATURE Philippines 2007, Khavn de la Cruz, 10 min One hell of an existeltialistic one-man hard-boiled crime story. Visions from the streets of Manila. Life passes by. Literature can be deadly if taken seriously. Is this how poetic justice looks like? ——————–

LAINER Germany/China 2007, Dana Löffelholz&Anna Intemann, 8 min Out of the heat into the frying pan. Long-term unemployed Rainer from Berlin tries to find a lucky new life in Beijing. However, this culture is completely alien to him.  I love this film.  One of my favorite films from Asian Hot Shots, this film has a subtle, humorous tone as it deals with the topic of unemployment from an unlikely and hilarious pov. ——————–

SAVING MOM AND DAD India 2007, Kartik Singh, 14 min Eight-year- old Ravi learns at school that non-believers in Christ will go to hell. Knowing his parents are not Christian, his challenge is “Saving Mom and Dad”. One last time to see the film in India. ——————–

SHOPPING CART BOY Taiwan 2007, Hou Chi-jan, 21 min A love story between a supermarket employee and a shopping cart, the film tells a post-industrial allegory set on the fringes of an urban jungle of mega-marts. ——————–

A VERY SLOW BREAKFAST Indonesia 2002, Edwin, 6 min The film explores feelings about individuality and the loss of family values. An attempt to redefine the meaning of family in the changing realm of modernity. ——————–

KARA – THE DAUGTHER OF A TREE Indonesia 2005, Edwin, 7 min Kara‘s mother has been killed and her father has disappeared. The intrusion of a journalist into her isolated life prompts her to seek her mother‘s killer and an ultimate answer. ——————–

GANDHI AT THE BAT USA 2006, Stephanie Argy&Alec Boehm, 11min http://www.gandhiatthebat.com In 1933 Gandhi made a top-secret trip to the United States. Now at last, newly unearthed newsreel footage proves the wild rumors true… and does it show? Gandhi is playing Baseball! This is a very cute short film that showed in the same program as SMD in Florence in December 2007.

Showdown between two women about whether or not to wear a veil.

On March 5th, an informal gathering was held at Lycée Suger to screen FRENCH FOR FOREIGNERS. The event allowed many of the participants to see each other for the first time since the filming on January 10-11. In attendance among the class were Stephanie, Sylvain, Cristina and Gyaltsen. Several soccer fans also turned up: Olivier, Marcus and Romain among others.  Crew members present included Clara, Kahina, Alexandre, Benoit, Mylene, and Lorin.

Severine treated guests to a lavish spread of “petits fours”, soup, and sandwiches. A toast was made with champagne served in dixie cups. Two announcements were made at that time. Firstly, there is festival and television interest in our film. And second, on Tuesday, April 28th at 2pm at L’Ecran, Behi will present Pour un instant, la liberté. Please reply here if you wish to come join us for that screening.

For those of you in France or Germany tonight (Tuesday 17 Feb 09), there is an amazing film showing on ARTE at 11pm.  I would hope it is also available on Netflix, and I read that it has been released on dvd.

STESTI manages to engage our interest while following a large cast of characters.  From a writing standpoint, this is very difficult.  As young writers, we are taught to keep it simple, have just one protagonist with a clear goal.  Here the filmmaker brings us into the many lives of an entire apartment complex in the Czech Republic.  And he does it brilliantly.  This is the kind of film where from the very first shot, you know you are in the hands of a master.

I saw this film when it showed at Premiers Plans in Angers in January 2006.  At the time, I was attending a DGA sponsored directing workshop.  All of the students as well as our teacher Ron Underwood were blown away by the humanity of this unique film.  We spent much of the evening talking about it.

The next morning, I ran into the filmmaker at breakfast.  After congratulating him on his work, I was dying to ask him a question relating to my work.  Since I was getting ready to shoot with a child (for Saving Mom and Dad), I wanted to know of any tips he could give me since the two child performances in his film are among the best I have ever seen.

He explained that these children were really orphans who he  found through social services in the Czech Republic.  They came on board the film and were “adopted” by him as well as the cast and crew throughout the shoot.

Out of curiosity, I asked if he is in touch with these children and where they are now.  I was expecting him to say that they are safe and sound, back at the orphanage, enriched from the experience of making the film.

“I am in touch with them”, he replied, “I see them every day”.  I was puzzled until he added, “I legally adopted them”.

Wow.

In the intensity of making a film, close bonds are formed.  But after the filming, they usually evaporate.  One tragic and widely reported case of this was the Kubrick-Malcolm Mcdowell relationship on Clockwork Orange.  Throughout filming, they had an almost symbiotic relationship, and Kubrick became a real father figure for the young actor.  However once they wrapped, Kubrick no longer returned his phone calls.  Ouch.  And yet, this is probably very common.

When Bohdan Slama does the opposite, it tells me that he is not just a great filmmaker, but also a great human being.  The story does not end when the filming ends and neither does his love for these children.  Slama understands and lives by a deeper truth.  That film and life are intricately related, just as all things are connected.

Sangam (2004) by Prashant Bhargava.  I had the pleasure of meeting the filmmaker and his lead actor Hesh Sarmalkar (amazing!).  It was at the Clermont Ferrand Film Festival, where the film was in official selection.

-

Midnight Lost and Found (2007) by Atul Sabharwal.

-

Little Terrorist (2004) by Ashvin Kumar (nominated for the Oscar). I had the pleasure of screening Saving Mom & Dad with this gem, like a textbook for young filmmakers on the economy of narrative in short film storytelling.  I am reprinting the article from Showreel, Issue 4 (Summer 2004), by MarBelle:

From script to screen, the production of Little Terrorist was completed between November 2003 and March 2004. Little Terrorist was originally written for Fox Searchlight who, having seen Road to Ladakh on the film festival circuit, approached writer/director Ashvin Kumar to make a short for their lab.

However, Kumar eventually decided to make the film independently and began assembling the crew through his production company, Alipur Films in London. With the help of associate producer Sarah Tierney, an experienced crew was formed via Shooting People, who all worked for free, traveling to India at their own expense to be part of the project. On The Road Productions, a Los Angeles and Bombay-based company headed by co-producer Dileep Singh Rathore, brought line-producer Vans Pradeep Singh onboard to co-ordinate the Indian end of the production.

With a shoestring budget, the shoot began with the crew welcoming in the New Year at a tented camp in the middle of the Rajasthan desert. As the shoot progressed, the crew had to contend with freezing mornings and nights, a remote location, a multi-dialogue production team, and logistical nightmares.

In the middle of the shoot, a freak accident almost brought the production to an early close as the tent containing the film stock caught fire and was burnt to the ground. Fortunately, members of Vans Pradeep’s crew bravely ran into the burning tent and retrieved the stock. Other shoot mishaps included a herd of cows, panicked by DoP Markus Huersch hovering above them with his camera on a crane, head-butting each other and almost trampling three actors who were crouched under a bush waiting for them to pass.

With word spreading quickly of a film shoot in this remote desert location, tractor-loads of cinema crazed villagers poured onto the set, all dressed in their best waiting in vain for Megnaa (Rani in the film) to break into a traditional Bollywood dance sequence. One day saw around 200 villagers crowded dangerously on the lip of an amphitheatre-like quarry where a complicated scene was being shot. Getting live/sync sound during these periods was by no means an easy task for sound recordist Roland Heap.

Due to the limited budget and director Kumar’s insistence on authentic Rajasthani music for the film, several troupes of Laangar musicians auditioned for the cast and crew after wrap each night. The selected Laangar troupe were called out to the wrap party, where Heap set up a virtual studio and recorded everything they sang that night. The Laangar troupe not only provided the music in the film, but also feature in it as the wandering minstrels. The rustic sounds of the desert were added to composer Nainita Desai’s score, and what started as an improvised cost-saving impulse became a lyrical and unique fusion of Indian folk and traditional western composed film score.

A self-funded professional crew, a multi-dialect production team, the remote location, a very stretched budget, crew illness, burning tents, broken equipment and unwanted extras were just a few of the unusual and challenging elements of shooting Little Terrorist, but in the end the crew’s dedication enabled Kumar’s vision to come to life.

-

American Made (2003) by Sharat Raju.  I heard about this film when I was at Clermont Ferrand in 2004.  I was unable to see it then, and the movie slipped off my radar.  In the summer of 2007, I caught the director’s impressive feature length documentary Divided We Fall (which you can read more about in other blogs).  I finally saw the film recently, and I loved it.  It gives a great portrayal of a Sikh family on a road trip to the Grand Canyon.  When their jeep breaks down, they are unsuccessful in getting help from passing cars.  Youngest son Ranjit says to his pukka Sikh father, “They’re not stopping because they think you’re a terrorist”.  A wonderful exploration of identity where we feel the point of view of each character.  Elder son Jagdish goes by Paul when with American friends.  Mom’s obsession is for Ranjit to read the scriptures (I could relate to this, there are a few women like this in my family too!).  The performances are truthful.  I especially liked Bernard White as the father.  Sharat Raju’s direction is impeccable.  He knows how to move the camera well, and brings a lot of visual interest to a story shot in this single location.

Indian Short Films I would like to see:

A Very Very Silent Film (2001) by Manish Jha (Cannes Jury Prize)

Supriyo Sen’s trilogy – Way Back Home, Hope Dies Last in War, & Wagah (2009 Berlin Today Award)

Udedh Bun by Siddharth Sinha (Silver Bear – Berlin)

This year marks the fifth consecutive year that I have been working for the festival as a translator during the Q & A sessions. I have gotten a lot out of meeting the filmmakers and finding out how they create.

Going to Clermont is always more special when you have a film there. And with my BTS students at Suger, we managed to just finish the film in time for me to start burning dvd’s.

Since it was not my first film, it was easier for me, because I knew some of the short cuts to take. Some of the buyers who are worth approaching, others who aren’t. All in all, I was able to strategically place about 25 dvd’s in the hands of buyers and festival organizers. We’ll see what the outcome is.

By the way, the new film is called FRENCH FOR FOREIGNERS, “Français Langue Etrangère” (12 min – 2009) starring Behi Djanati Ataï, Maud Buquet, Roland Bouvet & Momoko Fructus.

I am proud of it, and I had a blast making it. I have also had people tell me they like it better than my last film, so that is of course encouraging. I will let people know as soon as there is a screening.