by Bastiaan Houtkooper NSC

The Film festival itself was a great mix of national and international movies. Too many to see all (but I tried hard).
Besides the Film festival there was a 'Film market' with Asian companies presenting themselves and some seminars in different places, usually outside the festival area. Names like Terry Gilliam, Catherine Deneuve, Oliver Stone and Roger Coreman were there to attract more public.
Tickets were only available 1 or 2 days in advance which gave a constant stream of visitors and guests and usually plenty of movies to choose from. That system worked well and the low Thai prices made it also possible for a lot of Thai to see the movies.
The Cinematographers day are initiated by Luciano Tovoli who was also one of the cofounders of Imago. Not surprisingly it aims for some of the same goals: Trying to get together Cinematographers, talking about work and life, watching movies and learn from each other. Cinematography, although always working in a team, can be a lonely business when it comes to the real art of Cinematography.
Another reason to keep the Cinematographers days at a public festival is to raise awareness about the role we play: To be recognized as (co) authors of movies for example.

For the third year in Bangkok, in a brand new building with strong support of the Thai Tourism organization during the Thai Film festival , the Cinematographers days looked like a serious event. Organized by David Kaminsky and Frederic Goodrich, who did a massive and impressive job! Guest included Christopher Doyle, Anthony Dod Mantle, Donald McAlpine, Garret Brown and Shoji Ueda.
The program as advertised:

First day: Dancing Through Glass: The Choreography of the Lens
This program focused on the cinematographer’s role in translating theatrical musical dance to the screen, the ballet of human motion as metaphor captured by the camera, fight sequences, and camera movements, contrasting Steadicam with hand-held.

Second day: A Tribute to Anthony Dod Mantle
Anthony Dod Mantle’s expertise in still photography evolved to cinematography when he entered the National Film School of Denmark. His pioneering work with hand held image capture earned him a Camerimage Golden Frog nomination for the dogma film, “Festen”. His masterful visual imagery in almost fifty feature films has been rewarded with numerous prizes, including the prestigious European Film Award for Cinematography for two films, Dogville and 28 Days Later. The Bangkok International Film Festival is honored to present him with its Crystal Lens Award.

Third day: Through Asian Eyes
The unique perspective of cinematographers from Japan, Thailand, Hong Kong and Korea emphasized by discussion of techniques used to capture cultural images reflecting the diversity of their heritage as they influence world cinema. Shoji Ueda, whose work captured the visual intent of the master director Akira Kurosawa, will be honored with the Asian Perspective Award in celebration of his images.

With this good looking program I went for my first day to Cinema 9 where the Thai technicians were still battling the technical challenges for the first hours and basically for all days.
After David Kaminsky’s opening statement , we got started with Patricia Ward Kelly, the wife of late Gene Kelly.
She had compiled some scenes of Gene Kelly, and some really good stories from behind the scenes. Gene Kelly never wanted to be an actor and he was always very much involved with directing and choreographing movies. His love for the big screen made him search for new techniques that turned out pretty special. When you watch some scenes now and realize they did everything in camera, like double exposure, including crane and dolly shots in huge sets, he really deserves some serious respect. It was a joy to watch those scenes with the direct inside commentary of Patricia. Gene Kelly had also strict rules how he wanted to pictured and framed. The simplest being: Dancers should always fully in frame, head to feet. It forced him to find creative way to move the camera to keep the shots dynamic and reviewing his movies, he did that fabulous. The movie screened at the end of the afternoon (an American in Paris) underscored that very well. I have never been much of a fan of musicals but this was a great movie to watch. Incredible sets and settings, everything shot on the backlot in LA because the producers didn’t get permission to shoot in Paris. Everything done with an eye for details and with the terrific Technicolor colors that keep amazing me.

Garret Brown opened the afternoon with a hilarious (home) movie showing how he invented the Steadicam (and later the flycam). Seeing a young Garret running on the lawn with a piece of metal and a camera was great. Garret has a great sense of humor and was a joy to listen to. Nice footage and commentary about the proper (and even better) bad use of Steadicam movement as story teller in cinema rushed us through the afternoon. There was a little discussion forum setup with Donald McAlpine, Patrica Kelly, Anthony Dod Mantle (representing the handheld shooters) and Garret Brown. Donald showing and explaining a bit more how he did the dance scenes in Moulin rouge: 7 camera’s shooting from all angles and with all tools possible until they were sure they covered every possible shot. The complete opposite as most people shoot in Asia and Europe with the limited budgets and means. It gave some fierce discussions since Donald was the only Hollywood representative in between many ‘alternative’ Cinematographers. After the showing “An American in Paris” a nice day ended.

The second day was dedicated to Anthony Dod Mantle, who did many of the “Dogma’ films including “Dogville” en “Festen”. Anthony was rewarded the Crystal Lens Award for his work and had a brief introduction followed by some talks about his work. Anthony talked a bit about his styles and work but I found the discussion without real guidance going nowhere. It was clear that he had to prepare for a Gala in the evening and left us with his movies. We watched Dear Wendy, directed by Thomas Winterberg (Festen) and Millions (directed by Danny Boyle). Both completely different movies. Dear Wendy is shot on HD with a CameraRig like the Bodycam system. Mounted on the back, with a pole to the front. He had separated the camera from the recorder, creating a lightweight unit to follow the actors closely. Millions was a good mix of a kids movie and trainspotting. Good humor, funny angles and jokes. Nice movie with special camerawork for it.
As mentioned, Anthony disappeared and was not available to answer questions afterwards….

The third day was on paper the most interesting one for me. “Through Asian eyes” comes close to what I do for a living and the guests were Christopher Doyle who had the movie “Invisible waves” at the festival, Jeong-hun Jeong, a young DOP from Korea who recently shot “Sympathy for Lady Vengeance” and Shoji Ueda, from Japan, who did a lot of Kurasawa movies.
The morning opened with an introduction and movie from Hubert Niogret and Lorenzo Codelli: “ The nine lives of Korean Cinema”. Showed from DVD and very badly shot, it showed interviews with directors and producers telling about the changes in Korean Cinema through the last decade. An interesting subject but a bit out of place at a Cinematographers festival. There was no link or interview with any colleague, nor was the subject touched by the interviewed
The forum members showed some material and there was room for questions. Shoji Ueda showed some shots from “RAN” but most question where about Kurasawa and the way he worked. Details about Shoji’s cooperation and work came between the lines. “I worked 4 years on RAN but had to wait a lot in between until there was enough money to continue. I was not allowed to take another job, I had to be always available….”
The Korean DOP had not much to say and Christopher was chaotic as always. I think I can easily compile his answers to: “Cinematographers need integrity. Shooting is based on trust, especially between actors and DOP”. But he brought a funny home movie and as always had plenty of jokes to keep everybody happy. The moderator was not able to inspire or ask the right questions and we lost way to much time on translations. It sometime went from Japanese to English to Thai and back for a single question. This is clearly something that has to be changed next time. We need simultaneous translation with headphone, like anywhere else.

I skipped the afternoon demonstration of restoration film by Éclair Labratories as they were the main sponsors and I wanted to talk to some people before they left. This was clearly one of the weak points this festival. There was no central place were we could come together, lunch had to be done separated in the basement, after the days there was no place to go and talk. Besides that, there was a big difference between being a ‘guest’ DOP and being a ‘Forum DOP’. During the daytime special papers with programs and locations were distributed to the Forum DOP’s who usually left quickly at the end of the day or like the second day, already in the afternoon for their apparently special evenings. In the festival paper we could see the pictures the next day of parties, gala’s and special dinners but ‘guest DOP’s” were not invited nor was there an alternative get together.

To sum up: it is still a great idea to bring together colleagues but that needs a better system and communication. The technical aspects as well as the moderation of the days need serious work. The location is great, the program looked good and there where plenty of special guest but I would like to see more truly Asian DOP’s as guests joining the audience . Many of my Asian friends where afraid they would not be able to follow the English language, while we were waiting for translations for Thai visitors that were not even there…A place to socialize in the evening, even for DOP’s that did not attend the days could be a good start for those.

I would like to thank David Kaminsky and Frederic Goodich for all there work and efforts. Lets see if we can all help to make the Cinematographers days even better next time. See you in Bangkok next time?

Link to the website: http://www.cinematographersday.com

Part of the openings statement David Kaminsky:

Cinematographers represent the intimate union of art and technology for which the motion picture camera has become a substantial metaphor. Digital technology provides a contemporary tool for image capture, intermediate refinements, and eventual motion picture distribution, underscoring integration of the cinematographer throughout the filmmaking process. Despite their essential role, cinematographers have historically been denied recognition effusively provided to other members of the filmmaking team.

We advocate that the time has come for the cinematographer to be acknowledged as an author of “film” and as an artist with a refined technologist’s instinct and expertise.