A lot of the Asian markets have chosen their champions to enter the fray of Best Foreign Film contention for this year's Oscars. And as the deadline looms on October 1st a lot has happened in the last couple weeks. Here's the breakdown so far...
Hong Kong just announced Johnnie To's "Exiled" will be their entry. I am not afraid to admit this film makes me weep at parts. It is fantastic.
"Donsol" by Adolfo Alix Jr. has been selected to represent the Philippines. The movie is about two lonely people who find refuge in Donsol, a small fishing town and a popular tourist destination for whale shark spotting.
"I Just Didn't Do It" (Soredemo boku wa yattenai), Masayuki Suo's courtroom drama, will be Japan's entry this year.
South Korea has selected Lee Chang-dong's "Secret Sunshine", a story about a young widow who moves from Seoul to start over in a provincial city. I am sorry I missed this one at TIFF this year. Just too popular.
Royston Tan's "881" has been selected to represent Singapore. The film is set in the gaudy and bizarre world of "getai" and features a particularly Singaporean style of music played to please seasonal ghosts.
Bangladesh has picked "Swopnodonay" (On the Wings of Dreams) from tyro director Golam Rabbany Biplob. The film is about a peddler of herbal remedies who finds foreign currency in a pair of second-hand pants and how it changes relationships around him.
India has gone with "Eklavya: The Royal Guard" from Vidhu Vinod Chopra. The film stars Amitabh Bachchan as the so-called guard who protects a contemporary Indian royal family and its dark secrets.
Thoughts? Are these the right choices based on what you know of these films?
I have seen exiled I think it may have been a good picked, I am in the process of finishing Secret Sunshine, I think SS may win because it shows strong emotional feelings with the characters in the movie, that and because it involves religion....
What about Indonesia Mack?
Exiled won't have any chance to win anyway, since pretentious arthouse dramas will always get more votes than anything remotely related to the 'action' genre, but at least the choice is a nice move by HK.
It would be great if "pretentious arthouse dramas" would actually get the votes - however, to me it seems they just favor titles that drew in the most cash at the box office.
I doubt Exiled wins, just because it's probably eyed for a remake by now and the actual prize will go to that in a few years ;)
Personally I'd love to see Royston Tan get some recognition, although I haven't seen this newest venture of his. Then again, I hardly value Oscars, as these days they're about everything else except the actual films...
I'm fairly sure the winner is Secret Sunshine - they don't even need to view the titles for that, just go with "What.. we need to read subtitles?! Oh man... Hey, didn't this one do well at Cannes? Let's pick this one, yeah!" ;)
LOL. 'shallow remakes of Hollywood movies'. Oh saadnawab you do make me laugh.
That was a bit rhetorical. But there are some good movies in Hollywood. For example, you get a stupid completely nonsensical remake of Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs which is titles Kaante (Thorns). It stars some of the big-shot actors of the Indian film-industry. The film was pathetic. The same director of Kaante, Sanjay Gupta went on to make a remake of Oldboy that was a frame by frame copy. The censors and the critics thought that it was an original concept or something and praised the director. How I wish they be informed about a guy called Chan-wook Park