Cinema by the sea

Published on October 18, 2007

Cannes and Pusan have their beachside cinema blasts, which have grown into two of the world's most important film events. Now Phuket seeks to join in the fun, with the very first Phuket Film Festival, which runs from Sunday until October 27 at SF Cinema City's new five-screen multiplex in the recently opened Jungceylon shopping complex on Patong Beach.

The Spanish film "Dance Machine", a comedy about a supermarket worker who enters a contest for the "Dance Dance Revolution" videogame, will open the festival. Director Oscar Aibar is expected to be among the dozens of celebrities and industry players attending the screening, which will be the film's first outside Spain.

The closing film will be the Asian premiere of "Across the Universe", a candy-coloured, psychedelic homage to the Beatles, with the Fab Four's music performed by characters in the film. Directed by Julie Taymor ("Frida", the Broadway version of "The Lion King"), the film had its world premiere last month at the Toronto International Film Festival, and then played the Rome Film Festival, making Phuket its third stop on the festival circuit.

Now is the right time for the Phuket Film Festival, says the festival's director Scott Rosenberg. He's a film fest veteran who organised Thailand's first festival, back in 1995 for the BoI fair at Laem Chabang, and has sat on festival juries and been an attendee at many others. He actually started organising the Phuket fest back in 2004 to coincide with the Cineasia film industry gathering in December that year in Bangkok. High-season prices forced him to rethink his plan. That the tsunami occurred just a week after his festival was planned, "well, fate sometimes plays a strange hand", he says.

"It could be done," Rosenberg says, when asked why he's put together a festival in Phuket this year. More importantly, he says, "it should be done", given Phuket's beachfront "energy" and the "high demographic of both Thai people and foreigners who live on the island, who lack a rich cinematic culture". With SF Cinema City opening a new, high-tech multiplex right on the beach, the deal was sealed.

Rosenberg says he's aiming to make the Phuket Film Festival a "people's festival", a place where locals and film industry bigwigs can rub shoulders in a casual, yet "classy" environment, and more importantly, contribute to the local economy.

The festival is historic in that it includes many firsts, including the first time films have made their Thailand premiere outside Bangkok, signifying an important step for Phuket as an island that "is quickly awakening and taking its place in the international spotlight", Rosenberg says.

Highlights include the first screening of the newly restored 1941 Thai historical epic, "King of the White Elephant", which was performed in English and produced by statesman Pridi Banomyong as a work of anti-war propaganda in the months leading up to Thailand being invaded by Japan in World War II. It will be accompanied by never-before-screened footage of old Thailand and King Rama VII's visit to Phuket in 1928.

Additionally, Unesco officials will be on hand to award the Fellini Silver Medal to Thailand's National Film Archive, recognising the Archive's efforts at preserving Thai history on film.

More recent Thai films will also be shown, including MC Chatrichalerm Yukol's grand historical epic "King Naresuan" (parts I and II), Pen-Ek Ratanaruang's dreamy "Ploy", the amnesiac transvestite drama "Me … Myself", the dog-starring comedy "Midroad Gang" and last year's teen romance, "Seasons Change".

Another international premiere will be "Vignettes of Cambodian Culture", a package of short films by Cambodia's King-Father Norodom Sihanouk and HRH Princess Bopha Devi.

The Greek road movie "A Hero … In Rome" makes its first screening outside Greece.

A package of films from the Philippines will be shown, including critically acclaimed coming-of-age drama "The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros", with the cast and crew on hand for questions and answers.

Making its Thailand premiere will be "Surf's Up", an animated feature about surfing penguins. It plays at 4.45pm on Sunday, and then opens in wide release in Thai cinemas on Tuesday, Chulalongkorn Day. Another surfing film, the documentary "Zen and Zero", will also be shown at the Phuket fest. Environmental awareness will get another boost with the global-warming documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" by recent Nobel Prize winner Al Gore.

The Phuket fest partly conflicts with the Nation Multimedia-organised World Film Festival of Bangkok, which runs October 25 to November 4. Rosenberg insists his dates were set first. Furthermore, Phuket's compact schedule of premieres and hard-to-find films along with the lure of sand and surf offer tempting reasons for Bangkokians to consider abandoning the capital.

As for future years, Rosenberg has hopes it will grow into a major film festival.

"There is no competition here," says Rosenberg. "If the Phuket Film Festival is successful this year, we will grow to play a major part in the international film festival arena. This of course will happen only with solid sponsors and the support of the public."

Wise Kwai

 The Nation