FRED Film Radio - English Channel

Naomi Kawase – Filmmaker – An (Sweet red bean paste)

FRED’s Matt Micucci interviews filmmaker Naomi Kawase, who presented her latest work An (Sweet Red Bean Paste) in the Un Certain Regard section of the 68th Cannes Film Festival.

Cannes Film Festival regular Naomi Kawase is also regarded as one of the main female exponents of Japanese cinema in the world. This year, she has perhaps presented her most sentimental and sweetest work to date.

Naomi Kavase talks with us about what it was about the original Tetsuya Akikawa that inspired her to make the movie version. She also shares with us her views on the rhythm of nature and how she believes that nature symbolizes the impact humanity had on history. On top of that, she gives us a little insight in why she believes this type of film is becoming so prominent in Japan, and how much creative freedom she is allowed in her filmmaking projects.

AN (SWEET RED BEAN PASTE): Sentaro runs a small bakery that serves dorayakis – pastries filled with sweet red bean paste (“an”). When an old lady, Tokue, offers to help in the kitchen he reluctantly accepts. But Tokue proves to have magic in her hands when it comes to making “an”.

Thanks to her secret recipe, the little business soon flourishes… And with time, Sentaro and Tokue will open their hearts to reveal old wounds.

An – Sweet Red Bean Paste (2015) (Trailer) (HD) from FILMARTI Film on Vimeo.

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Nancy Buirski – Director and Producer – By Sidney Lumet

Nancy Buirski tells FRED about the journey in Sidney Lumet’s life and accomplishments. Lumet’s need of expression, and his joy of doing it through Moviemaking, are still an invaluable source of inspiration for today’s filmmakers.

Plot: By Sidney Lumet, the documentary film, is a portrait of the work and life of one of the most accomplished and influential directors in the history of cinema. His strongly moral tales captured the dilemmas and concerns of a society struggling with essentials – how does one behave to others and to oneself? Though spiritual and ethical lessons are at the core of his work, they are not didactic. His films are both powerfully dramatic and wildly entertaining for Mr. Lumet was first and foremost a storyteller. In a rare never-before-seen interview, we are privileged to have Sidney Lumet tell his own story just a few years before his death. With candor, humor and grace, he reveals what matters to him as an artist and as a human being.

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Sarah Forestier, Actress, Standing Tall.

Sarah Forestier reveals what being a troubled mother meant for her on set of Standing Tall, Emmanuelle Bercot’s last film.

STANDING TALL (LA TETE HAUTE): The itinerary of Malony, from age six to eighteen, through the juvenile justice system, and the tireless efforts of a judge and a counselor to save him.

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Cesar Espada / Eulalia Ramon – director / actress – Spot

FRED’s Cristiana Palmieri interviews Cesar Espada and Eulaia Ramon, respectively director and actress of the film Spot, which they presented at the Spanish Film Festival in Australia.

SPOT: Daniel (Daniel Levitt), is a young American actor who is hopelessly in love and hopelessly manipulated by his girlfriend Natalia (a captivating Natalia Miranda).

Their break-up pushes Daniel to the edge, and he performs the unthinkable with a bottle of Vanish stain remover in a youtube video for all the world to see, including two young Korean girls dealing with their own relationship problems.

A flashback reveals the circumstances that took Daniel to breaking point via what is all at once an engrossing, disturbing and twistedly comedic story of deliberate cruelty that leaves an indelible stain behind.

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Lou McLoughlan – filmmaker – 16 Years Till Summer

FRED’s Matt Micucci interviews Lou McLoughlan, who made her feature directorial debut with the documentary 16 Years Till Summer, which is screened at the 30th Dok.fest – International Documentary Film Festival Munich in the DOK.international section.

Lou tells us about making that transition between short filmmaking and feature filmmaking. She also tells us about how the project began and what interested her about it.

We discuss with her the importance of building the right atmosphere and having a certain balance of realism and aesthetic to take 16 Years Till Summer to the big screen the right sensibility, especially considering the delicate nature of its story.

16 YEARS TILL SUMMER: After spending 16 years in prison for murder, Uisdean comes home to nurse his father, bringing a dangerous mix of troubled past and big ambition into the lives of those who love him.

Set in a church-going village in the Scottish Highlands, the film follows the redeeming relationships Uisdean builds with the people that need him; his father and his lover, both drawn to the good intentions and ‘new start’ Uisdean promises to bring into their lives.

This achingly beautiful film looks at the scope we have to re-invent ourselves and the stories we develop to make sense of our mistakes. As Uisdean earns the trust of his father, Calum, and lover, Audrey, the film shows how society puts those stories on trial and, far more painfully, how it causes us to question those we love.

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Film: Eat Sleep Die (2012)

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After being presented at the Venice Days event of the 68th Venice International Film Festival, Io Sono Li, written and directed by Andrea Segre, was distributed in Italian cinema theatres in September 2011 and, thereafter, in a number of European countries, including France and Spain.

It is the story of a female Chinese immigrant in Italy called Shun Li, who has to work hard in a textile workshop in order to obtain the documents she needs to bring her son to Italy.

It won three prizes at the Venice Film Festival, including the Fedic Award (awarded by the Italian Cineclub Federation), “for the originality of a story that skilfully weaves fiction and documentary and gives us an effective and convincing portrait of today’s reality”.

Often in the Venice spotlight, starting with presentation of Dio era un musicista (God was a musician, 2005) dedicated to African culture, Andrea Segre’s work has revolved from the outset around the issue of the marginalisation of certain peoples and the search for their specific ethnicity, attempting to bring into focus their encounters with different social forms.

This was true of his first documentary, Lo sterminio dei popoli zingari (Extermination of the gypsy peoples), in 1998, or the later Come un uomo sulla terra (As a man on earth), of 2008, centred of the experiences and suffering of migrants en route to Europe. Not forgetting Il sangue verde (Green blood), which reconstructs the events and violent clashes in Rosarno in the Reggio Calabria province, where several hundred migrants demonstrated in the streets of the city in January 2010 to protest against discrimination and wretched living conditions, setting vehicles alight and battling with the police.

Io sono Li marked Segre’s first outing as the director of a “feature film” in which, however, the filmmaker’s documentary sensibilities emerge with great intensity, in particular through a photographic style that was very careful to exploit the depth and complexity of real settings. This striving to stick to the social reality is apparent in the fact that the bar where the main character Shun Li works actually exists in real life: it is the Osteria Paradiso in Chioggia in the Venetian lagoon, a haunt for the fishermen who inspired the most important encounter in the film. This establishment is actually run by Chinese immigrants. As Segre himself emphasises: “The film is based on a true story, a real encounter with a Chinese girl who worked behind the bar of a tavern frequented by Chioggia fishermen. Watching her provided ideas for the story. What sort of relationships would she be able to establish in a region like mine, so unaccustomed to change? From that real encounter, the idea arose to fictionalise the story.”

Among the director’s most recent works, very much in line with his interests and his poetry, the documentary Indebito (Undue Debt) in 2013 should be noted, in which an artistic tour of the Italian musician Vinicio Capossela become the opportunity for a passionate analysis of Greek culture and society in the years of the financial crisis. La prima neve (The first snow), also released in 2013, is the story of a citizen of Togo who emigrates to Italy and goes to live in a mountain valley where he establishes a strong bond with the local inhabitants. Come il peso dell’acqua (Like the weight of water) was produced to mark the anniversary of the 2013 tragedy in Lampedusa in which 366 migrants were drowned.

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Michael Stabile – director – Seed Money: The Chuck Holmes Story

FRED’s Francesco Belais interviews Michael Stabile, director of the feature documentary Seed Money: The Chuck Holmes Story from the 30th Torino Gay and Lesbian Film Festival.

Seed Money: The Chuck Holmes Story is the story of gay culture and fashion, changing of habits, from the ’70s to the ’90s through the story of the life of Chuck Holmes, teh creator of Falcon, the first gay porno production.

SEED MONEY: THE CHUCK HOLMES STORY: Seed Money is the story of Chuck Holmes, a San Francisco pornographer turned philanthropist.

Holmes helped shaped and create gay identity in the years after Stonewall, and became a founder of gay advocacy groups like the Human Rights Campaign and the LGBT Victory Fund, only to find later in life that while his money was welcome in philanthropic circles, he wasn’t.

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Antony Hickling – director – One Deep Breath

FRED’s Francesco Belais interviews Antony Hickling, director of One Deep Breath, screened at the 30th edition of the Torino Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. Anthony also attended the festival as the coordinator of the jury of the short film competition.

ONE DEEP BREATH: Eros and Thanatos. One deep breath: this is what Maël might need to cope with his partner Adam’s suicide, a tragic event that, apart from great sorrow, has caused him to have a physical breakdown.

He is troubled by his doubts about his lover’s last drastic act, by how he put an end to his life and to their difficult relationship. But his grief turns into anger when he discovers that Adam had a secret long-term relationship with a woman called Patricia: he digs deep into his own memories, recollecting past events and eventually meeting his rival.

On her part, Patricia will have to face unexpected dangers. A claustrophobic melodrama, with an unstructured and evocative narrative style.

Here, South African director Antony Hickling, 34, confirms his visionary talent and ability to adopt a fresh point of view on queer cinema. All the performers are strictly gay and transgender, including Manuel Blanc, who was once André Téchiné’s muse.

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Dean Francis – director – Drown

FRED’s Chiara Nicoletti meets Dean Francis, in Torino to participate with his new film Drown to the feature Film competition of the 30th Torino Gay & Lesbian film festival.

After the 2005 short film Boys Grammar, Dean Francis goes back to dealing with themes such as homophobia and bullying in this entertaining drama, set in the tanned and sexist world of Australian Lifeguards. When Len, the perfect lifeguard and surfing champion, is forced to face his own inability to accept his true self, he inevitably responds with violence, as this is the only element he has known his whole life.

DROWN: Gaywatch. Lifeguard Len is a surfing champion and a typical alpha male with a perfect body. His team worships him and considers him a god. But when the team hires wildly attractive and openly gay Phil, all of his certainties begin to crumble. The newcomer is soon liked and admired by everyone except Len, who is envious of him and seems to mistrust him because of his sexual orientation.

During the annual surf lifesaving competition, mistrust turns into contempt. Hate makes people monsters, especially those like Len, who refuse to admit that true strength is measured not by physical prowess, but by the ability to show one’s true self.

A brutal, lyrical and muscular film, an overview of manliness and male camaraderie, taken to the extreme. Despite its low budget, it is a spectacular film with fast-paced editing. Point Break meets Brotherhood.

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