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Film fest celebrates pearl anniversary

More than 200 films featured in 30th Starz Denver Film Festival

By Joe Nguyen, AsiaXpress.com

Nov. 8, 2007

DENVER – Thirty years ago, the first Denver Film Festival was held at the Old Centre theatre to a packed crowd of 1,200 patrons.

Oh, how time has changed.

There will be more than 200 films featured at the 30th Starz Denver Film Festival, which will take place Nov. 8-18 primarily at the Starz FilmCenter.

The 11-day festival will also include four red-carpet events, panels, seminars and tributes to some of the industry's finest. In years past, stars such as Ang Lee and Tim Robbins have been recepients of the festival's awards.

Among the vast array of films and events this year are several Asian and Asian-American-related movies, as well as a 90-minute panel discussing diversity in the entertainment industry today.

Asian- and Asian-American-related films
Capsules provided by the Starz Denver Film Festival
“Getting Home”
“Tuya's Marriage”
“Faces of a Fig Tree”
“Life Can Be So Wonderful”
“Owl and the Sparrow”
“All in this Tea”
“Mystic Ball”
“Nanking”
“Quantum Hoops”
PANEL: Casting The American Scene
Diversity in the Entertainment Industry Today

“Getting Home” (China, 2007)
Running time: 110 min.
Genre/Subjects: Comedy, Foreign, Road Movie
Language: Mandarin with English subtitles

Director: Yang Zhang
Screenwriter: Yao Wang, Yang Zhang

Marking his return to gentle slice-of-life comedies à la Shower, director Zhang Yang traces the odyssey a working stiff undertakes to fulfill a debt of friendship in Getting Home.

Sponsored by Asian Art Coordinating Council

Friday, November 09, 4:00 p.m.
Starz FilmCenter

Saturday, November 10, 5:15 p.m.
Starz FilmCenter

Tuesday, November 13, 4:15 p.m.
Starz FilmCenter

“Tuya's Marriage” (China, 2006)
Running time: 92 min.
Genre/Subjects: Asian, Drama, Foreign, Social Issues, Women's Issues
Language: Mandarin with English subtitles

DIRECTOR: Wang Quan'an
Principal Cast: Nan Yu, Bater, Sen'ge, Zhaya

In his 2007 Berlin Film Festival top prize-winner, director Wang Quan'an reminds us that the search for a better life is as fraught with complications on the Inner Mongolian plains as it is anywhere else.

Sponsored by Asian Art Coordinating Council

In cooperation with The Denver Chinese Language Meetup Group

Saturday, November 10, 5:15 p.m.
Starz FilmCenter

Tuesday, November 13, 4:15 p.m.
Starz FilmCenter

Tuesday, November 13, 7:00 p.m.
Starz FilmCenter

“Faces of a Fig Tree” (Japan, 2006)
Running time: 94 min.
Genre/Subjects: Family Issues, Foreign
Language: Japanese with English subtitles

DIRECTOR: Kaori Momoi
Principal Cast: Hanako Yamada, Kaori Momoi, Saburo Ishikura

In this wonderfully eccentric work – full of humor, pathos and elements of surrealism – first-time director Kaori Momoi (Memoirs of a Geisha) gives a charismatic performance as Mrs. Kadowaki, a devoted homemaker who dotes on her family in a traditional Japanese dwelling with a garden dominated by a fig tree that has never borne fruit. Aside from some suspicions about her husband’s extramarital activity, they live a tranquil, well-ordered life that seems ordinary enough, at least until the day Mr. Kadowaki – a simple, rough-mannered construction worker – decides to move into an unfurnished flat near his worksite, patching up by night the mistakes his less conscientious colleagues have made by day. It is here that he spies on a nymphal neighbor in a mysterious turn of events that lead to his sudden collapse and death – and to the transformation of Mrs. Kadowaki as she starts her life over again. She moves in with her daughter – a journalist with her own peculiarities – and finds work in a restaurant, eventually marrying her boss and moving back to the house with the once-barren fig tree. Now flowering, it proves an influential character in the Kadowakis’ story, watching over them through their meals, quarrels, trials and new beginnings.

Turning her back on conventional storytelling, Momoi employs a quirky sense of mise-en-scène, sudden shifts of perspective and even a one-off animated interlude involving two hilariously irreverent ants to bring Faces of a Fig Tree into focus.

Sponsored by Asian Art Coordinating Council

Sunday, November 11, 3:15 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Monday, November 12, 3:45 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Tuesday, November 13, 9:00 PM
Starz FilmCenter

“Life Can Be So Wonderful” (Japan, 2006)
Running time: 70 min.
Genre/Subjects: Asian, Black Comedy, Experimental, Family Issues, Foreign, Substance Abuse, Women's Issues
Language: Japanese with English subtitles

DIRECTOR: Osamu Minorikawa
Principal Cast: Ryuhei Matsuda, Mikako Ichikawa, Hitomi Katayama, Miyuki Matsuda

Osamu Minorikawa makes his feature-film debut with a mesmerizing anthology of cine-poems lovingly assembled to convey atmosphere over conventional narrative structure. A tender mood piece that recalls the work of experimental filmmaker Jennifer Reeves and Surrealist masters Man Ray and Maya Deren, Life Can Be So Wonderful adds up to far more than the sum of its parts. All five episodes are drawn from everyday life: a middle-aged female nude model develops a passion for the weeds that grow on the side of the road; an elderly barfly reflects nostalgically on his lifelong passion for booze; a young woman fantasizes about vending machines while engaging in ambivalent sex with her boyfriend; a young cosmologist regards his girlfriend’s pregnancy as the imminent birth of a new universe; an undistinguished office worker speculates on the ineffable amid the mundane. Although Minorikawa uses a different visual style for each episode to underscore its independence, the film as a whole does not feel fragmented. On the contrary, a subtle commonality begins to emerge as the facets of each character’s life and outlook are revealed; Life Can Be So Wonderful is very much a single piece and a beautiful one at that.

Incorporating the poetry of Jacques Prévert and a soundtrack featuring world-famous opera singer Norie Suzuki, Minorikawa – with the aid of his cast, headed by Ryuhei Matsuda (Big Bang Love, Juvenile A) – strikes exquisite notes throughout this celebration of the grace, serenity and beauty just discernible in the minutiae of the day-to-day.

Sponsored by Asian Art Coordinating Council

Saturday, November 10, 9:45 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Friday, November 16, 6:00 PM
Starz FilmCenter

“Owl and the Sparrow” (Vietnam/USA, 2007)
Running time: 97 min.
Genre/Subjects: Asian, Coming of Age, Drama, Foreign, Romance, Social Issues, Women's Issues
Language: Vietnamese with English subtitles

DIRECTOR: Stephane Gauger
Producer: Timothy Linh Bui (Executive), Nam Doan Nhat , Van Quan Nguyen, Ham Tran
Principal Cast: Cat Ly, The Lu Le, Han Thi Pham

To make a movie in Vietnam, a director requires the stamp of approval of the country's strict ministry of culture. Fortunately, first-time feature filmmaker Stephane Gauger made the cut with Owl and the Sparrow, an enthralling tale of the search for connection amid the frenzy of the modern-day metropolis – in this case Saigon, whose hectic pace daily pushes eight million inhabitants to keep up.

Among them are Thuy, Lan and Hai. Thuy (lovely newcomer Pham Thi Han) is a feisty 10-year-old forced to work in her uncle's bamboo factory – until she runs away to the big city, where she scrapes by selling postcards and flowers on the street. But her yearning for family soon leads her to play matchmaker to two of her customers, whose lonely hearts Thuy wisely recognizes. Hai (Le The Lu) is a zookeeper who hides out in his shack on the park grounds, bereft by a recent split with his fiancée. Lan (Cat Ly) is a visiting flight attendant embroiled in an affair with a pilot. Her layover gives Thuy just four days to form a surrogate family with the pair before her uncle whisks her back to the factory – or Saigon officials cart her off to the orphanage.

Saigon itself serves as a vital character in Owl and the Sparrow; native son Gauger used handheld cameras to shoot his script guerrilla-style in 30 locations citywide over the course of 15 days, capturing the quirks and quick rhythms of his birthplace. The result not only lends his film a touch of social realism but suffuses it with the innovative spirit of new wave.

In person – Stephane Gauger

In Competition - The Emerging Filmmaker Award

Friday, November 09, 4:15 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Friday, November 09, 9:30 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Saturday, November 10, 12:00 PM
Starz FilmCenter

“All In This Tea” (USA, 2007)
Running time: 70 min.
Genre/Subjects: Asian, Documentary, Educational
Language: English

DIRECTOR: Les Blank, Gina Leibrecht
Principal Cast: David Lee Hoffman, Gaetano Kazuo Maida, James Norwood Pratt

Acclaimed filmmaker Les Blank has been crafting documentary gems since the 1960s, often concentrating on the legends of American folk and blues – from Lightnin’ Hopkins to Ry Cooder. But periodically, he departs from his pet subject to focus on other types of artists; take 1982's Burden of Dreams, which tracked notorious director Werner Herzog as he risked life and limb, not to mention those of his crew, on the nightmarish set of Fitzcarraldo.

Blank’s new film with co-director Gina Leibrecht, All In This Tea, constitutes a similar sort of departure in its portrayal of a subject as consumed by his passion as he is driven by the pursuit of its perfection. In this case, we’re following not Herzog (who nonetheless makes a cameo appearance) but David Lee Hoffman, a tea expert and merchant from Berkeley, California. Obsessed with locating the world’s best handmade teas, Hoffman travels to the farmlands of China to work directly with the few remaining practicioners of an ancient but dying art. Joined by Blank – who serves, digital camera in hand, as a one-man film crew – Hoffman seeks his holy grail even as he struggles both to overcome language barriers and to challenge modern business models that privilege mass production over the preservation of cultural traditions and honest foodways. The fly-on-the-wall approach Blank and Leibrecht take to the scenes depicting Hoffman’s journey is balanced by the formality imbuing the segments that contextualize it. From a brief history of 19th-century British botanist Robert Fortune – Hoffman’s predecessor on the trail of superior tea – to interviews with fellow authorities like James Norwood Pratt and Winnie Yu, All In This Tea shows us just how much really does go into a single cup.

In person – Les Blank and Gina Leibrecht

Sunday, November 11, 2:30 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Tuesday, November 13, 4:00 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Tuesday, November 13, 6:45 PM
Starz FilmCenter

“Mystic Ball” (USA/Canada, 2007)
Running time: 83 min.
Genre/Subjects: Asian, Documentary, Educational, Political, Religion, Social Issues, Sports
Language: Burmese, English English Subtitles

DIRECTOR: Greg Hamilton

Some 20 years in the making, Mystic Ball is a testament to the passion and perserverance of Canadian director Greg Hamilton – not only as a filmmaker but as a champion, in every sense of the word, of chinlone, the national sport of Myanmar.

As its leading foreign expert and player, Hamilton does a thorough – not to mention visually stunning – job of introducing Western audiences to this underrecognized, unique and mesmerizing game. Invented over 1500 years ago and considered by many to be the oldest form of soccer, chinlone is a little like hackey sack, a little like tai chi, a little like dance and a lot like meditation. Teams composed of both men and women, forming an ever-morphing circle, try to keep a woven rattan ball (the word chinlone means “cane-ball”) from touching the ground by employing any of the 200 different kicks that have evolved over the centuries. In chinlone, which is played to music, no score is kept; the focus is not on winning or losing but rather the sheer beauty and joy of the play.

Over the course of the documentary, much of which takes place in Mandalay, we meet some of the sport's greatest athletes – including “Golden Princess” Su Su Hliang, Ko Maung Maung and Aung Soe Moe – as well as its avid amateurs, from children to octogenerians. We're treated to the transfixing exhibitions in which teams like the famed Dream Lovers participate during huge Buddhist festivals devoted to chinlone. And all the while we become, along with Hamilton himself, immersed in the colorful, dynamic culture of the Burmese people.

Even more relevant in the wake of the unrest coursing through Myanmar this fall, Mystic Ball – like the game it portrays – shows the importance of play for the prospect of unity and peace.

Sponsored by Kroenke Sports Enterprises
In cooperation with: Aurora Asian/Pacific Community Partnership

Saturday, November 10, 12:45 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Sunday, November 11, 12:30 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Monday, November 12, 6:30 PM
Starz FilmCenter

“Nanking” (USA, 2007)
Running time: 89 min.
Genre/Subjects: Asian, Drama, Educational, Political, Religion, Women's Issues
Language: English

DIRECTOR: Bill Guttentag, Dan Sturman
Principal Cast: Stephen Dorff Woody Harrelson, Mariel Hemingway

A timely and powerful reminder of the heartbreaking toll war takes on the innocent, Nanking recounts the Japanese invasion of Nanking, China, in the early days of World War II. As part of a campaign to conquer China, the Japanese army subjected Nanking – then the nation’s capital – to months of aerial bombardment; upon its fall, ground troops committed atrocities – murder, rape, torture – on an unimaginable scale. In the midst of the rampage, a small group of Westerners banded together to establish a safety zone where over 200,000 found refuge. Unarmed, these missionaries – university professors, doctors and businessmen, as well as a Nazi party member named John Rabe – bore witness to the very carnage from which they risked their lives protecting civilians.

The story unfolds not only through deeply moving interviews with Chinese survivors of the invasion but also through the testimony of the Japanese soldiers who terrorized them. Supplementing these accounts is an abundance of chilling archival footage, as well as staged readings from the correspondence of the founders of the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone by Woody Harrelson, Mariel Hemingway and Jurgen Prochnow. The composite narrative succeeds in dropping the viewer onto the streets of Nanking and bringing the all-but-forgotten past to shocking life. Winner of the Documentary Editing Award at this year’s Sundance Film Festival and recipient of the Humanitarian Award for Best Documentary at the 2007 Hong Kong International Film Festival, Nanking is at once a testament to the courage and conviction of individuals compelled to act in the face of injustice and a tribute to the resilience of the Chinese people – a gripping account of light in the darkest of times.

Tuesday, November 13, 6:00 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Wednesday, November 14, 4:15 PM
Starz FilmCenter

Wednesday, November 14, 6:45 PM
Starz FilmCenter

“Quantum Hoops” (USA, 2007)
Running time: 85 min.
Genre/Subjects: African-American, Asian, Coming of Age, Documentary, Family Friendly, Social Issues, Sports
Language: English

DIRECTOR: Rick Greenwald

Consistently ranked as one of the top five academic institutions in the world, Caltech is known for its Nobel Prize-winning faculty - and a basketball team that hasn't won a game in more than 20 years, counting over 240 consecutive losses. Quantum Hoops seats viewers at center court for the final week of the 2006 season as five seniors try to win just one single game – and maintain the school's NCAA affiliation.

To say that sports is an afterthought at this prestigious university – which served, after all, as the model for the campus in the cult classic Real Genius – is an understatement, as director Rick Greenwald attests via the historical background his droll yet inspirational documentary provides. But during the unprecedented moment on which Quantum Hoops hinges, the focus shifts from the classroom to the basketball court, where coach Roy Dow has assembled a team that boasts more valedictorians than high-school lettermen – future scientists and engineers who are all brains and only a tiny bit of brawn. Anatomically speaking, that is. Attiudinally, the Caltech Beavers display a combination of determination, discipline and heart (along with a modicum of skill) that sees them through one of the most remarkable and exciting seasons on record – a dramatic reversal of fortunes for a team that just two years prior had lost every game by an average of 60 points.

Defying a mind-boggling streak of crushing defeats and the constant ridicule of rival fans, these brilliant amateurs show the kind of spirit that, against all odds, makes them winners in every sense of the word.