2008 Film & Television News and Events Archive
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Under Construction: Dianne Daley
May 1 2008
A special Apitchapong Weerasethakul screening
Tropical Malady (Sud Pralad)
A film by internationally acclaimed experimental Thai filmmaker, Apichatpong (Joe) Weerasethakul. Cannes Festival Jury Prize winner (2004), Tropical Malady at first appears to be a relatively straightforward story of the developing, and at times tentative, gay relationship between a soldier and young villager. But the film takes an abrupt, unexpected and emotionally charged change of direction into the jungle. This highly personal, feature-length, experimental narrative, characteristically pushes boundaries and has puzzled critics. From the mundane to the mythical or supernatural and in “the space between”, the film operates on many levels, especially on the senses and heart, and can’t be easily categorised.
Thai films have created recent global interest with what has been described as a New Wave of Thai filmmakers since 1997. Few Thais work in experimental film and Apichatpong, also an artist, is one of the few filmmakers working outside the local studio system. He’s been described as “transnationally cosmopolitan” (Brett Farmer), and his films, despite their distinct “Thainess”, strike a chord with international audiences. Influences include Andy Warhol, Buddhism, early Thai melodramas and American B-grade grizzly bear movies. His latest feature, Syndromes and a Century (Sang Sattawat) 2006, which premiered at the 63rd Venice Film Festival, was banned in Thailand. Apichatpong refused to cut the film. Subsequently, he and other directors formed the Free Thai Cinema Movement. Apichatpong promotes experimental and independent films through his production company, Kick the Machine.
Dianne has a background in the print media and film and television (including Thailand). She teaches journalism at Monash (part-time) and has just begun work, at Monash, on her PhD thesis: “Beyond Eurocentric and exotic views of Southeast Asian cinema: gazing empathetically at the works of Thai filmmaker Apichatpong (Joe) Weerasethakul”.
Under Construction: Adrian Martin
15 May 2008
Social Mise-en-scene: A New Idea in Film Analysis
Adrian Martin (Monash)
The idea of mise en scène has become a classic - meaning historic and traditional – tool in film analysis. Conceived as the ‘creative gesture’ par excellence, the director’s mise en scène (the positioning and moving of actors and camera in relation to an environment) has long been imlicitly or explicitly seen as a way for cinema to give ‘form to the formlessness’ of space, time, body and place. But, more recently, particularly in various parts of Europe, a new idea has emerged: the idea that the ‘pro-filmic’ reality with which cinema frequently works is itself already (as sociology has long investigated) a complex matter of cultural or social mise en scène: a series of customs, rituals and manners that set bodies in circumscribed places and behaviours. Cinema, then, would be the interleaving or collision of two kinds or levels of mise en scène: social mise en scène and artistic mise en scène. My presentation will offer examples, from fiction films by John Ford to Roy Andersson, also taking in comedy and documentary, to demonstrate this fertile new idea in cinema analysis.
Under Construction: David Hanan
29 May 2008
Launch of DVD: Indonesia at the Margins
David Hanan (Monash)
In this session David Hanan will introduce and screen two films from the DVD he has recently completed, entitled Indonesia at the Margins: Political Documentaries and Essay Films by Garin Nugroho (1991-2002). The screening will be followed by a paper exploring issues pertinent to the films, including the filmmaker’s discourses on culture and multi-culturalism in an Indonesian context.
Garin Nugroho is Indonesia’s leading director of features and documentaries, having had a new film in international film festivals every two years since 1992, his most recent feature being the acclaimed Opera Jawa (2006). This new DVD, produced for distribution by the Monash Asia Institute’s ‘Between Three Worlds Video and DVD’, makes available for the first time a properly subtitled collection of four of Nugroho’s rarely seen documentary and essay films. The films to be screened are My Family, My Films and My Nation (1998), a unique 30 minute essay film, in which the film-maker reflects on five of his own films at a time of crisis in Indonesia, and Icon: A Cultural Map (2002), a 20 minute essay film about the May-June 2000 West Papuan Congress, in which Nugroho explores the significance of this opportunity—briefly provided during the Wahid era—for the West Papuans to celebrate their own culture and to openly express their views about their incorporation into Indonesia.
Included in My Family, My Films and My Nation are excerpts from the two other films on the DVD, Romi and Water (1991), a documentary (which Indonesian intelligence agencies attempted to ban) about pollution in the river systems of Jakarta and the delivery of clean water to slum areas, and Kancil’s Story of Independence (1995), a one hour documentary about street kids in Yogyakarta, deeply critical of Indonesia’s ability to support its own young people. Both these films were funded with foreign money, and are rare examples of critical documentaries made by an Indonesian during the repressive Suharto era.
David Hanan has a long history of engagement with film in South East Asia and particularly with the film industry in Indonesia, where his work has included film subtitling, film restoration projects, and film distribution, in addition to a variety of lengthy articles. He was the editor of the book Film in South East Asia: Views from the Region (Hanoi: SEAPAVAA and the Vietnam Film Institute, 2001). In the last two years he has had major projects with three of the most important film-making groups in Indonesia. He is currently completing a book entitled Moments of Renewal in Indonesian Cinema.
Film & Television Studies presents Robert Stam
5 June 2008
Robert Stam, University Professor in Cinema Studies, Tisch School of Arts. New York University, New York City.
From Revolution to Resistance: Alternative Aesthetics in Brazilian Film/Media/Music Video
Stam’s talk will consist of a taxonomy of aesthetic strategies in Brazilian media aimed at critiquing social/racial exclusion. He will present a series of brief clips (about 15 or so) drawn from fiction films/documentaries/and music videos. The talk will be followed by audience discussion.
Robert Stam’s books include: Flagging Patriotism: Crises of Narcissism and Anti-Americanism (Routledge, 2006); Francois Truffaut and Friends: Modernism, Sexuality, and Film Adaptation (Rutgers, 2006); Literature through Film: Realism, Magic and the Art of Adaptation (Blackwell, 2005); Literature and Film: A Guide to the Theory and Practice of Adaptation (Blackwell, 2005); Companion to Literature and Film (Blackwell, 2004); Film Theory: An Introduction (Blackwell, 2000); Tropical Multiculturalism: A Comparative History of Race in Brazilian Cinema and Culture (Duke, 1997); Reflexivity in Film and Literature (UMI Press, 1985); Brazilian Cinema (Associated University Presses, 1982), as well as many co-authored and co-edited books. His works are translated into and published in: French, Spanish, German, Portuguese, Italian, Greek, Farsi, Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, and Hebrew.
Refreshments will be served. This is part of Film & TV’s Under Construction seminar series. Click here for full programme details.
- Thursday 5th June 2008 @ 4pm
- Room S704, Building 11 (Menzies building), Monash University Clayton campus
Film & Televison Studies Colloquium
Fri, July 18 – Sat, July 19
Provisional Insight: Siegfried Kracauer in the 21st Century
Speakers include:
- Graeme Gilloch (Lancaster University)
- Lesley Stern (University of California, San Diego)
- Adrian Martin (Monash University)
- Ian Aitken (Hong Kong Baptist University)
- Helen Grace (Chinese University Hong Kong)
- Andrew Benjamin (Monash University)
- Jodi Brooks (UNSW)
