The 5th World Film Festival of Bangkok (เทศกาลภาพยนตร์โลกแห่งกรุงเทพฯ ครั้งที่ 5) opened on 25th October and will close on 4th November. Most screenings take place at Esplanade Cineplex. The event’s main attraction is a sidebar screening: Jiří Menzel, one of the leading directors of the Czech New Wave, will speak about his classic Closely Observed Trains (Ostře sledované vlaky) at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand on 1st November.
Taiwanese drama Help Me Eros (幫幫我，愛神), directed by and starring Lee Kang-Sheng, is screening on 31st October and 2nd November. Kang-Sheng has acted in several films by Tsai Ming-Liang, and Help Me Eros is clearly influenced by him. Many scenes are filmed with diagonal compositions from a static camera, with the action contained within a corner of the frame, as befitting the film’s lonely, uncommunicative characters. There are two clips from a fictional TV cookery show, in which a carp is filleted alive and an unhatched ostrich is fried.
Taiwanese drama Help Me Eros (幫幫我，愛神), directed by and starring Lee Kang-Sheng, is screening on 31st October and 2nd November. Kang-Sheng has acted in several films by Tsai Ming-Liang, and Help Me Eros is clearly influenced by him. Many scenes are filmed with diagonal compositions from a static camera, with the action contained within a corner of the frame, as befitting the film’s lonely, uncommunicative characters. There are two clips from a fictional TV cookery show, in which a carp is filleted alive and an unhatched ostrich is fried.
This evening, the great-grand-daughter of Georges Méliès introduced a selection of his films at Alliance Française, in an event titled Georges Méliès: Le cinemagicien. (It will take place again tomorrow.) Méliès was one of the pioneers of cinematic special effects, and although his films have a quaint Victorian charm their technical genius still impresses even now.
For their screenings at Alliance Française, Méliès’s films were accompanied by narration and a piano recital, both performed live, to recreate their original theatrical presentations. The recreation only went so far, however: the mostly expositional narration also included some (slightly incongruous) historical information about the director, and the films were screened on DVD rather than the advertised 16mm.
Some of Méliès’s most famous films were included, such as A Trip to the Moon (Le voyage dans la lune). In many cases, the Méliès films shown did not match those listed in the schedule published in advance.
For their screenings at Alliance Française, Méliès’s films were accompanied by narration and a piano recital, both performed live, to recreate their original theatrical presentations. The recreation only went so far, however: the mostly expositional narration also included some (slightly incongruous) historical information about the director, and the films were screened on DVD rather than the advertised 16mm.
Some of Méliès’s most famous films were included, such as A Trip to the Moon (Le voyage dans la lune). In many cases, the Méliès films shown did not match those listed in the schedule published in advance.
