Odd dream from an afternoon nap

I always seem to get the weirdest dreams from afternoon naps, I think. Just like moments ago, when I unknowingly slip into a nap while watching something and dreamed of someone who had plagued my mind for the past few weeks.

Brief visit at Toho Studios, and foreshadowing Tsuyoshi Kusanagi's arrest

So yes, I've totally buried myself into the post-production of my film, KINGYO, in the past week, managing to find my stride again, rediscovering the excitement I had for the project through editing (hate to find that spark when you were separated from it for so long!), experimenting more with the possibilities of split screens.

Back in Tokyo, back to editing KINGYO

I've returned to Tokyo since Sunday night. It's been a hectic few days. I actually had a film shoot in Klang on Saturday and had managed to do another quick short film with the help of Lesly and Han, that film was an experiment with the Nikon D90, which I saw Ming Jin and Lesly used for their short film, THAT DAY WE WOKE UP. To be able to complete another short film, what a joy!

LOVE SUICIDES goes to Paris (Paris Cinema International Film Festival)

Arika Lee in LOVE SUICIDES

Today was like an emotional roller coaster.

I woke up and saw a MSN message from Fei Ling, telling me that she couldn't do my short film, EXHALATION, due to the fact that she's swamped with work (girl has a day job). I've intended to shoot the short on Thursday, with Lesly's D90, and with Ming Jin producing, but of course, since the screenplay's tailor-made for her, once she can't do it, I can't really get a replacement. So I called it off, and was in some sort of melancholic funk, despite trying very valiantly to suppress such feelings.

Afternoon came, I remained busy editing WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER, while my mind wandered. I was supposed to go to Klang with Lesly on Saturday (I'm returning to Tokyo on Sunday), check out the locations, shoot the places for an upcoming project in August. Then I thought... what happens if I try to immediately shoot a short film while we're looking at the locations! And voila, I felt better!

And then I received an email from the Paris Cinema International Film Festival telling me that my short film, LOVE SUICIDES, had been selected for presentation at the international competition this July. My jaw dropped open.

LOVE SUICIDES write-up on Twitch

Being a long-time reader of Twitch, I, was more than surprised and delighted when Todd did a write-up on my Yasunari Kawabata-inspired short film, LOVE SUICIDES.

There's coverage from a Spanish site too!

Thanks, guys!

CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY goes to Greece (Naoussa International Film Festival)

Dad (Chye Yang) pesters the Boy (Lim Ming Wei) into playing the PS2 with him in Chicken Rice Mystery


I actually received this email a couple of days earlier, and had posted it on Twitter (and Facebook) as well, about my short film CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY getting invited for screening at the Naoussa International Short Film and Video Festival.

It's the first festival screening of the film since last December's Dubai Film Fest. Here's the trailer of my short, if you haven't seen it before.

THAT DAY WE WOKE UP, a short film by Woo Ming Jin

I've actually put aside WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER in the past two days to finish up my editing on an earlier short film by Ming Jin called THAT DAY WE WOKE UP.

WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER shoot has ended

The two pictures above are screencaps from the film's raw footage, haven't done any colour correcting or anything



Wow, it's been a while since I've updated this blog. Despite having Internet access at Kuala Selangor, it was hard to really write about anything during a film shoot. Somehow, I just didn't seem to have the mood for it since all my attention's placed upon the film itself.

The 12-day shoot took place mostly in Kuala Selangor (except the last day, when we went to the famed waterfalls at Ulu Yam instead) and was an emotional roller coaster, and an intense physical exercise. We went to the jungle, to the river, to the middle of the sea, to shoot, then we shot at a salted fish factory and also a cockle factory. I was constantly assaulted by mosquitos during mornings and evenings (insect repellants can only help that much), and was also sunburnt.

It's all worth it though.

Ming Jin had gone off to Tokyo last night to attend his sister-in-law's wedding, so it's now up to me to edit the film.

Hopefully this will be considered as a worthy follow-up to Ming Jin's previous film, the award-winning THE ELEPHANT AND THE SEA.

WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER shoot begins, tentative Chinese title

Well, today's my dad's birthday, so happy birthday, dad. Too bad he's KO'd by a bad case of flu and had been sleeping the whole time in his room.

I'm heading off to Kuala Selangor in a few hours for the WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKING FOR WATER shoot. The shoot will begin tomorrow, and will last until the 30th. However, there will be 2-3 days of break, so I'm looking at a 10 to 11-day shoot instead of a non-stop 14-day one. I'm quite excited, but I feel a little regretful that I have to, once again, miss ANOTHER local screening of CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY (well, if they're still screening it despite my absence) I'm not THAT elusive, but it's just unfortunate that all these tend to happen while I'm not in Malaysia, or when I have something else to deal with, like this film.

I've posted on Twitter and Facebook asking for help with translating the film title, WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKING FOR WATER, into Chinese... because it is, after all, a Chinese-language film. Most friends translated it literally and I got some really amusing titles, like:

欲女止渴记 (sounds like a Hong Kong Category 3 film)
火烧女郎寻觅水 (totally literal translation, funny)
火女求水记 (also a cute and literal translation)
猛女灭火 (feels like another Hong Kong exploitative film, like Chicks in prison or something)

So, ah, noticing that most Chinese film titles aren't literal translation of the English titles, I eventually settled for something simpler and more relevant to the story. So the film's Chinese title, for now will be called 遗情.

The pain of replacing an actor

An excerpt from the journal I wrote in 2006 during the making of GIRL DISCONNECTED, my student short film.

20th Century Boys: Chapter 2 - The Last Hope 20世紀少年＜第2章＞ 最後の希望

I made sure I was able to catch a film in Tokyo when I went back, and I ended up seeing 20TH CENTURY BOYS: CHAPTER 2 - THE LAST HOPE, the second film of the planned trilogy directed by Yukihiko Tsutsumi. I saw the first film last September, which I rather enjoyed despite its flaws (read my review).

Set 15 years after the events in the first film, the protagonist of this film is the now-adult Kanna, played by Taira Airi, whose hairstyle in the film made me gape in awe.

Why did you bring your kid to the WATCHMEN film?

To the woman sitting behind me with her kid when I saw WATCHMEN two days ago:

Normally, I don't give a crap about the Malaysian rating system. Films that are rated 18 and above in Malaysia are mostly heavily-butchered, and tamer than most films that are rated PG in other countries. So I'm unsurprised that you overlooked the fact that this film is rated 18-PL (for overseas audience, this rating is reserved for films contain more than one element, either violence, sex or political/ religious content) and brought your kid along to see the film with you.

A quarter of a century

I've lived that.

Happy birthday to me.

Introducing 'WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER'

I've returned to Malaysia last night. The postproduction of my Japanese film, KINGYO, has to be postponed until April.

The main reason why I'm in Malaysia right now is because I'm producing Ming Jin's new feature film, WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER (good title huh?). This is his official feature film since THE ELEPHANT AND THE SEA (KURUS and CINTA TIGA SEGI were TV movies).

Production stills from my Japanese film, KINGYO

I've spent the last two days editing my Japanese film, Kingyo, which I finished shooting end of January a day before flying back to Malaysia for Chinese New Year, I have posted some stills from the dailies few weeks ago ('dailies' is the term used to describe raw, unedited film footage, it's known as 'rushes' in UK and Aus, I normally call it 'rushes' too). I only have two more nights left in Tokyo, so am trying to do as much as possible. It took me a while to familiarize myself with Final Cut Pro, and also the Mac, since all these while, everything I've done have been edited on Adobe Premiere Pro. Thankfully, it didn't really take that long for me to get used to things.

Progress is smooth, although I'm unlikely to finish anything until I return to Tokyo again in April. For the time being, I'll just share some production stills taken by Chou-san (he's from China, the surname 张 'Zhang' is read as Chou in Japan, which is what everyone calls him). My last post only had a single picture of my lead actress, Rukino Fukisaki ("Hellevator: Bottled Fools"), so I'll put some here.

An odd, unexpected dream

On the first night I returned to Tokyo, I dreamed of someone I never thought I would dream of again. The last time I dreamed of her was two years ago, which I had chronicled in painstaking detail to my friend Sebastian during a melancholic rant in Valentine's Day 2008.

In my dream, she and I were both in some sort of a bare living room adorned with illogically minimalistic decoration and furnitures, bathed in ethereal white glow. Even though it had been nearly three years since I've last seen her, when she had seemingly vanished from my life with inevitable finality, and I myself never making any effort to find out where she was, meeting the dream-her again made me joyous, a joy mirrored by the smile on her face that I have seldom seen on the face of her real-life counterpart.

Together we spoke, about many things, all kinds of things, but none of them I can really remember. Perhaps we spoke about nothing, yet because we were merely speaking, nothing felt like many things, or everything, or anything. Her voice from my memories used to sound like a lilting whisper, yet the voice of the dream-her was boisterous and snappy.

Flight Fright

I'm in Tokyo again, but only for a week. Had to settle some things before flying back to Malaysia next Tuesday to continue preparations for Ming Jin's new film, WOMAN ON FIRE LOOKS FOR WATER (I'm producing and editing).

Running into Hong Kong actor Nick Cheung and director Dante Lam

This happened on the 9th of February, the day before I saw snow for the very first time in Berlin. I was hanging out with the Singaporean filmmaker Michael Kam.



We were walking around at the main area of the Berlin Film Fest, Michael wanted to buy some souvenirs. But as we walked towards the Berlin Palast, I noticed a very familiar face.

My short film FLEETING IMAGES showing at HELP University tomorrow night

My short film FLEETING IMAGES will be making a premiere of sorts at HELP UNIVERSITY's Theaterette tomorrow (that's Thursday, 19th of February). It's one of the ten shorts at the Asiapromote Power and Grace Competition Screenings. The screening begins at 8pm.

Footsteps in the Snow

Returned to Malaysia just a few hours ago.

The past few days had been great. It's unfortunate that I didn't take a single photo during my brief trip in London. Three nights were too short for me, especially when I had such a hectic schedule. I saw a play starring Richard Dreyfuss called Complicity at the Old Vic, then I met up with a number of old friends from secondary school whom I've never seen since... secondary school, and after that, I went to do some hardcore book-hunting at the numerous antique bookshops in Charing Cross Road. So no, definitely not that much time to take photos.

But I'll rewind a little to the morning of 10th of February.

A Conversation With Quentin S. Crisp

Justin Isis has interviewed Quentin S. Crisp before, and that interview is probably the best place to start for general information on Crisp's writing and clothing style. The purpose of the following interview is to whore out Shrike, Crisp's soon to be released novella from PS Publishing. Before reading this you should order Shrike, especially the jacketed hardcover version. Shrike is one of Quentin S. Crisp's most exciting works to date, and by 'exciting' I mean 'tenser than injecting Red Bull directly into your blood stream'. Brief responses to Crisp's statements are given in [ ] brackets.

Arriving at the Berlin Film Festival

The flight to Berlin was a long one, but I needed to transit in Amsterdam first for 3 hours. I slept through most of the flight, so I was fine.

This is Amsterdam's Schiphol airport. I arrived at 5am in the morning.

NTV7's The Breakfast Show thought I was a headcrab zombie

As I waited to enter the studio to talk about videoblogging on NTV's The Breakfast Show in Monday morning, three thoughts were in my mind:

I'll be on tomorrow morning's NTV7 The Breakfast Show

It happened on Friday morning.

I woke up and saw a Facebook message and an email waiting for me, inviting me to appear on the 2nd of February's (that's tomorrow morning) edition of NTV7's The Breakfast Show. I'm supposed to talk mostly about videoblogging (that's why I posted this tweet on Friday, and got some interesting links in return), and also (hopefully) some stuff about my filmmaking.

I'll be arriving at the studio around 7:30am tomorrow morning, so I think I might appear around 8 to 9am? Quite early, I hope I won't be yawning repeatedly (or worse, dozing off) during the show! The chances of me embarrassing myself will be quite high, due to my personal discomfort with the camera (despite my acting aspirations!) I think it also had to do with... self-consciousness and vanity, I always worry that I don't look pretty enough, and the fact that I'm going to be on national TV will make things more complicated!

Snapshots of Chinese New Year 2009

When it comes to taking photos, I like taking the candid moments, when people are just talking, eating, doing things normally, everything without having to pose for the camera. Posing is fine, but I often ask people NOT to look at the camera when I'm snapping photos. I want... REALISM.

I didn't have my camera with me, I think I left it in Tokyo. So I used my sister's Nokia N78 instead.

The first day of Chinese New Year, as usual, was a visit to my uncle (dad's elder brother's) house. He and his family used to live in Malacca before moving over to Shah Alam 2 years ago, which is great, because going to his place takes only around half an hour as compared to nearly 2 hours in the past.

The entire family from my father's side were gathered, on that day, at my uncle's place. My dad's elder brother and his wife, my dad's eldest sister and her husband, my dad's youngest brother, my cousins, my cousin-in-laws, and the like. Seeing that one of my cousins is pregnant, I know that there will be more people at the family gathering next year.

Just some snapshots from my uncle's house.

John Woo's Red Cliff 2 赤壁 - 決戰天下 is rescued by Zhang Fengyi's Cao Cao

Before starting my review of RED CLIFF 2, let me tell you some of my thoughts on RED CLIFF 1, which I watched on DVD back in October.

I found RED CLIFF 1 somewhat entertaining, after suffering string after string of mediocre Hollywood films by John Woo, with the bad taste of PAYCHECK still fresh in my mouth, my expectations were low. So without any expectations, I enjoyed RED CLIFF 1. The manly (and somewhat homoerotic) bonding between Zhou Yu (Tony Leung) and Zhuge Liang (Takeshi Kaneshiro), a John Woo trademark, remains quite amusing, Zhang Fengyi's turn as the charismatic baddie Cao Cao is the best performance in the film, the action scenes are big-scale and rather fun. In the end, RED CLIFF 1 was entertaining enough for me to not give RED CLIFF 2 a pass.

'kingyo' shoot ended, I returned to Malaysia. Chinese New Year came.

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR! GONG XI FA CAI!

The shoot for KINGYO (my new film, some screenshots here, you can even read about its write-up on Toronto J-Film Pow-Wow, Edmund Yeo reworks Yasunari Kawabata in his latest short film "kingyo") ended on last Thursday night, amidst a heavy rain in Akihabara. As I was drenched in the rain, I was reminded of my CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY shoot nearly a year ago, when the end of a shoot was signaled by a heavy rain as well.

After 4 hectic days of shoot, I felt relieved that everything progressed so smoothly. While I've always seemed optimistic to most people, previous experiences in student productions had taught me to always expect the worst but hope for the best during shoots. When a shoot ends, I always feel relieved, and giddy with joy that I managed to survive. And then there's always a feeling of gratitude towards my cast and crew, for enduring that journey with me.


The cast and crew of kingyo had seen some crazy stuff during the shoot


Maiko the Producer handled this perfectly. We huddled together, the cast and crew, with Maiko thanking our main actor Takao and main actress Rukino, and I was given two bouquet of flowers to present to them. Then Takao and Rukino spoke about how they felt regarding the shoot, and I also gave a speech (with assistant director, Lia the Artist, translating) about how I genuinely enjoyed the shoot and how I would love to work with them again. Josha the Cinematographer was then asked to lead this ritual, where he made a solemn announcement about how the kingyo shoot has officially ended, and then, all of us clapped our hands once, in unison. I've never seen anything like this before, but this ritual definitely brought a feeling of unity between us all. I would definitely 'import' this to my next productions in Malaysia.

I rushed to the airport the next morning, bringing the raw footage with me in a 1TB hard disk (while Maiko the Producer keeps another one with her in Tokyo). I would've wanted to edit the film immediately, unfortunately the digitizing was done via Final Cut Pro, and the hard disk was formatted only for Mac. I ended up not being able to edit the film because I use a laptop, and because I normally edit using the Adobe Premiere Pro (yes, all my short films, and Ming Jin's telemovie CINTA TIGA SEGI, the entire THE ELEPHANT AND THE SEA, were done with Premiere Pro). Quite a hassle.

I returned to Malaysia on the 23rd (Friday night). A couple of days have passed, I've seen numerous films since then. RED CLIFF 2, SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, IP MAN, BEAST STALKER etc. Perhaps I'll review them soon.

Chinese New Year arrived three days ago, and I am now in Ipoh, my mother's hometown. I even met up with Ming Jin just now, because Ipoh is his hometown too. We spoke about his feature film we are about to shoot (I'm producing), I also spoke about my surreal misadventures during the kingyo shoot, a project I've first expected to be small and simple, but ended up becoming the biggest project I've ever done, with a massive crew of such unbelievable professionalism that I thought I was doing a commercial film instead of an 'indie' film. Now that I'll be in Malaysia for quite a while, I'm eager to do another short film, something simple and small, can be finished in a day or two. Funny how I'm already thinking of another project before I even started editing this one!

Well, that's what I've been going through in the past few days.

Sneak peek of my new Japanese film, KINGYO

Today's going to be the last day of my shoot for kingyo. It's 3:48 am right now, and I'm off to bed soon. But while I was digitizing the footage I've shot onto a newly bought external hard disk just now, I did some screen captures of them, just to share with you all an early look of my new film. The following pics are of the three primary characters in my film, I haven't done any colour correction at all though.













What do you guys think?

Got a crew, had a rehearsal. Thoughts on filmmaking as a collaborative effort.

After finding all our primary cast members, I wondered how to put together the production crew. Maiko The Producer said that she will recruit help from people of the Tokyo University of the Arts (the place where Kiyoshi Kurosawa and Beat Takeshi are teaching), she then rented a DVD to show me, an omnibus with four segments, each an adaptation of a Kawabata Yasunari short story. I was impressed by the technical skills and production values displayed throughout the film. I agreed, it would be quite wonderful to have such experienced people helping us out.

One day later, Maiko told me that she had recruited their help. Two directors of photography, a gaffer and a sound mixer. Aside from the sound mixer, they were not students, but alumni from the university, some are actually teaching there.

How I found the main cast for my Japanese film, kingyo

kingyo is the title of my upcoming Japanese project. I haven't been posting that much lately because I've gotten so busy preparing for the film. Constantly revising the script, drawing storyboards and deciding on the locations. Shoot begins next Monday.

Just to recap, kingyo is the split-screen project I mentioned about. For the script, I had gone off to even conduct a comically serious research with Akihabara maids.

I've actually been busy with kingyo even before I headed off to the Dubai International Film Fest, but then, things just started accelerating after I came back. Audition sessions were held for the three main roles: I needed a young woman in her late 20s, a middle-aged man past 45, a middle-aged woman around the same age as the middle-aged man. Audition went on for nearly a week, having not held an audition since January and February last year for CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY, I forgot how amusingly deflating they can be at times. Most who came were interested in the role of the young woman Chiri the Akihabara Maid, and I couldn't find myself satisfied with any. One was too young, one didn't look right as an Akihabara maid, one had trouble acting sad, one was too hot (I wanted a girl-next-door type, not a model!) Who could be my Chiri? Chiri is the main character in a film, someone who can carry the film is necessary!

Retiring my old camcorder (2005-2009)

During my New Year trip at the Kansai region, I became very sure that I have to retire my old camcorder. It's a Sony Handycam DCR HC32E which I've been using since my early days in Perth (sometime early 2005). I would say that this camcorder's existence had been crucial in my becoming a filmmaker.

Beautiful Sunset at Inokashira Pond

Today is a public holiday in Japan. It's called the Seijin No Hi, which is translated in English as the Coming Of Age Day. On this day, anyone turning 20 will be invited to attend a ceremony celebrating their adulthood. And then most of them will take this long-awaited opportunity to get drunk (it's also the minimum legal age to smoke and vote). I wasn't aware of this (I knew it was a holiday, but I didn't know why) until I received this tweet from Neil Duckett.

So when I went out, there were indeed some young women wearing kimono, and the guys were wearing suits, but because most males in Tokyo wear suits, I couldn't tell which ones were the ones celebrating Seijin No Hi.

Unfortunately, there will not be any photos of cute young women in kimono because I was resuming my location hunt today with my Maiko the Producer and Jo the Cinematographer after our failure to find a good park yesterday. I was excitedly leading everyone to Ueno Park after seeing how beautiful it was during the end of autumn. Unfortunately, winter had actually turned this place into a pale shadow of itself. So I decided to leave the location hunting to the other folks, since... well, they're Japanese and they probably know the place much better than I do. And so Maiko the Producer recommended the Inokashira Park.

[VIDEO] Catching the Kobe Sunrise

I slept at 8 something last night after location hunting for my film (more on that later), and woke up at 12 in the midnight. Haven't slept since then, was editing the second (and concluding) video of my new year trip at the Kansai Region. After I've uploaded part 1 (you MUST watch it!) a few days ago, I had some problems figuring out how to edit this video.

Watch LOVE SUICIDES at next Monday's MALAYSIAN SHORTS!

My newest short film, LOVE SUICIDES, will be one of the 10 shorts screening at the latest edition of Malaysian Shorts held next Monday. So if you want to catch my film on big screen, here's your chance! Even I myself haven't seen it on the big screen before!

Unfortunately, since I'm still in Tokyo until end of this month, I won't be around for the Q and A session. But Ming Jin (who is the producer of the film) will be representing me!

Some stills from the film:

[VIDEO] My New Year Trip at the Kansai Region Part 1

Phew. Been spending the past two days editing the video of my trip at the Kansai region during the new year period. Due to rustiness (the last time I actually edited something was for my short film, LOVE SUICIDES, and that was back in last October), I was slower than usual, and needed a bit more time to get into a groove again.

Anyway, I've decided to separate the videos into two parts because it's quite long, and I'm also doing this for, ah, narrative and dramatic purposes.

Passions for times ahead - Interview with the Malay Mail

After returning from my quick Kansai region trip to welcome the dawn of 2009 (no photos, but videos coming up), I was pleasantly surprised to learn from a Facebook friend that I was on this Malay Mail article, PASSION FOR TIMES AHEAD. To be on the papers during New Year, what better way is there for me to start 2009? Thank you for the honour!

In this article, Gabey Goh asked Noel Boyd of A Tattooed Blog, Michael Hartley of Dr Mike's Math Games for Kids, Ng Eng Kuan of Driving Malaysia, and I about 2008 web discoveries and hopes for 2009.

My original rambling answer is quite lengthy, so Gabey made the right choice by cutting it down to the final version, but for those who are curious, here's the unnecessarily long, stream-of-consciousness-esque original answer:

Happy New Year 2009! Some thoughts on 2008.

Happy new year, my dear readers! By the time you are reading this, I've already taken a train to Kyoto, and probably doing my New Year Countdown at Nara. This trip to the Kansai region came about just two nights ago. A sudden urge to go somewhere, see some sights, a brief break for myself since most of my Japanese friends had gone back to their hometowns.

Kimmy Kiew is Zoey, a Dawson's Creek character with ice powers

Kimmy Kiew in Chicken Rice Mystery
You know that the main actress of your short film had turned into a star when, aside from scooping up the Best Acting honours from BMW Shorties, she was chosen as the 'face' of the film by the Dubai Film Fest in their film catalogue. (I sent them two photos: a above photo of Kimmy, and a photo of the kid, Ming Wei, they ended up choosing Kimmy's photo... sorry Ming Wei)

I DO have a clearer photo of Brigitte Lin from Dubai Film Fest!

Looking for photos to use in an email interview, I sifted through some remaining photos of the Dubai Film Fest closing ceremony that I haven't uploaded in my earlier post.

And I found a photo with Taiwanese filmmaker Chang Rong-Ji, who made the short film '天黑 The End Of The Tunnel', also in the same category as I was. His film is a mixture of fact and documentary, focusing on a real-life blind pianist and his (fictional) relationship with a pretty schoolmate who is healing a broken heart. The short film was his first attempt at narrative fiction as his previous works were all documentaries (one won the Golden Horse two years ago)

Thomas Alfredson's 'Låt den rätte komma in (Let The Right One In) is hauntingly sweet

Not that many people I know (non-film buffs who don't keep track on foreign film news) have heard of this beautiful Swedish film directed by Thomas Alfredson, LET THE RIGHT ONE IN. When I was asked to explain the premise of the film, I was a little hard-pressed, the best I could come up with was...

Shimaka Sato's K-20: Legend of the Mask K-20 怪人二十面相・伝 starring Takeshi Kaneshiro and Takako Matsu

I didn't even know that this film is already playing in the cinemas until I saw the trailer on TV yesterday (or rather, early this morning, 4am), and I immediately decided to see it because, aside from the film festivals I attended, I haven't been to the cinemas in Tokyo for a long time.

K-20: LEGEND OF THE MASK (also known as K-20: THE FIEND WITH TWENTY FACES) is, in my opinion, Japan's attempt at the superhero genre, or to be more precise, the HOLLYWOOD superhero genre, because when I was seeing this film, I can't help but noticed many similarities between the film and the many superhero films that came out in Hollywood this year, especially with its admirably high production values.

Senso-ji (Asakusa Temple) does not celebrate Christmas

I don't celebrate Christmas, but I decided to do something for the day. The plan was simple. Meet up with my friend Sen-san (she's from China, her surname's Sen, and somehow 'Sen-san' is more catchy than her actual Chinese name, so that's what I always call her), have sushi at Ueno, and then go to cool places with Christmas decorations where I can snap some photos, and she can test her Nikon D70.

The many faces of Dubai

[Warning: this post has crapload of photos that might take some time to load]

More photos that I took from Dubai. By now, you might have some misconception that Dubai is this really huge extravagant city with new construction projects everyday, one colossal skyscraper threatening to outdo the other. I was curious about the place, I wanted to explore more. What is the real Dubai? Or rather, is there a different Dubai aside from the luxurious hotels, beautiful private beaches, huge malls I've seen during the first few days of the film festival?

Seeing Tsui Hark and Brigitte Lin during my last day at the Dubai International Film Fest 2008!

Heya, I've already returned to Tokyo for two nights, but still, I think, a little jet laggy. Even so, that didn't stop me from immediately conducting audition sessions for my new film yesterday morning, and later today! (I'm such a workaholic!)

I'll post the photos from my last day at the Dubai Film Fest. But I'll still be posting many Dubai-related stuff in the next few days, like the numerous films I've seen etc.

The CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY screenings at the Dubai International Film Fest

The screening for CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY was on the 13th and 14th. Evening on the first day, early afternoon on the second day. It's in competition under the AsiaAfrica Short Films category, and it was screened with 4 other short films of the same category.



Aside from CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY, the other short films screened in the same programme were:

1) Ambulance, by Richard Legaspi of Philippines
2) Young Blood, by Haolun Shu of China
3) Everything Is Okay, by Akjoltoy Bekbolotov of Kyrgyzstan
4) Bakhytzhamal, by Adilkhan Yerzhanov of Kazakhstan

All directors were there to introduce the films, and then come back for the Q and A session after screening. Unfortunately, I only have photos of the first screening, and not the second. The following photos are from the Q and A session. Far left is Philip Cheah, programming consultant and moderator of the sessions. The first on the right was Haolun Shu, and then there's Richard standing beside me.








A photo of us having dinner after the screening. My dad was there too, of course. Dressed in red is Adilkhan Yerzhanov of Kazakhstan, in black is Akjoltoy Bekbolotov of Kyrgyzstan. Adilkhan is a major film buff who likes Johnnie To, Alexander Payne and Paul Thomas Anderson too. We have similar film tastes :D




I had more questions to answer during my second day, where I was there to describe the creative process of the film, and also explain about the Malaysian Censorship in general to an audience member. I cheerily brought up the censorship issues faced by Flower In The Pocket, which I believe had been very helpful in encouraging the creativity of local filmmakers (in finding methods to avoid censors).

Overall, I have to say that this had been a fun experience. It's the first time I've ever seen my own directed film being screened in a multiplex, the sense of pride is a little different from, say, when I represented Ming Jin to present ELEPHANT AND THE SEA at its screening and Q and A session as producer during last year's Santiago Film Fest.

A few days later, dad and I had a conversation about Perth. It's only been two years since I've left the place, yet it felt so much longer. But then, maybe two years is a long time, it's just that two is such a small number, I should've just used '730 days' instead of '2 years' because it sounds longer. More than 730 days ago, my dad was also present during the screening of my student short film GIRL DISCONNECTED in my university. And now, more than 730 days later, I was given the privilege of having my short film screened at this Dubai Film Fest. It's almost as if we've gone full circle!

Photos from my first day at the Dubai International Film Festival 2008

Heya folks, been in Dubai since the 11th. Haven't had the time to go online until now. Saw lots of films, went through both screenings of CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY. So let me post some photos, I'll write more about my thoughts later.

Anyway, my dad came to Dubai too, and we're now staying at the Jumeirah Beach Hotel, which is one hell of a hotel.

The Curious Incident Of The Vanishing Sunglasses

It's not that I'm imitating Wong Kar Wai or Takashi Miike, but I REALLY like to wear my sunglasses. I only choose not to wear it when I can't wear it, like during classes, or when the sky's too dark, or when I need women to see my soulful eyes... but that's it.

The golden leaves of Yoyogi Park

For four consecutive days, my intended trip to Yoyogi Park (decided to go there after snapping photos of Ueno Park) was canceled by some unexpected event. Like stumbling into a role as an extra during a film shoot on Wednesday, and yesterday, I was suddenly issuing orders to kick start the pre-production of my new short film project.

When I woke up today, I saw lots of red leaves flying past my window, and the ground outside was covered completely with leaves. Winter had started five days ago, and I assumed that the red leaves of autumn will not last long on the trees. I was unaware of the transition until then. The sky was pale and gray, a gloominess that reflected my own melancholy. Melancholy? Or was it just the lingering effects of the flu pills I've taken?

The weather forecast on my Firefox said that it would rain later in the afternoon. Circumstances were forcing me into another race against time. Grabbing hold of my camera and my tripod, I decided to make my way to Yoyogi Park. I've been there a few times, mostly when I was walking to the NHK station at night for the Refugee Film Festival earlier this year, and once during a Thai carnival where many food stalls and tents were erected, so I never had a good look of the park.

I stumbled into a role as an extra in a new film with Love Exposure's Mitsushima Hikari

More incidents of stunning coincidence. More insane synchronicity.

On Monday, during a lab meeting (held every two weeks between film students in uni), my professor announced that two events will be happening in Waseda University on Wednesday (today):

Synchronicity

I was on my way to the Takadanobaba station when I saw a large flock of birds flying around. So I took out my camera and snapped some photos.