Yesterday evening Toronto's Reel Asian International Film Festival announced the lineup for their eleventh edition and it's a good one. The festival will open with Justin Lin's Finishing The Game and end with Mika Ninagawa's Sakuran with loads of good stuff in between. Of particular interst to Twitch readers will be the local bow of Romeo Candido's Ang Pamana: The Inheritance - much written about in these pages - and a special presentation titled simply Total Pen-Ek. Twitch is the official media sponsor of Total Pen-Ek and more than a little excited to be so ... the program is a collection of little seen works by Thai auteur Pen-Ek Ratanaruang, specifically his Jeonju commissioned short film Twelve Twenty, his Nike commissioned documentary Total Bangkok; and a reel of his commercial work - the man's got to pay the bills, after all - selected by Pen-Ek himself.
The festival runs November 14 - 18.
Thanks for posting this because I almost completely forgot that this film festival was coming up. Might catch Ang Pamana, even though I've watched Filipino movie in what seems like years now. I'm definitely going to see Total Pen-ek.
Pen-ek's commercials are well worth seeing. I especially enjoy "Gun", which he made for Thai Life Insurance, but could stand on its own without selling anything.