British film festival features contemporary and comedy
By Marselli Sumarno
JAKARTA (JP): The young man's name is Comsack. A young poet with an exploding nature, a little bit eccentric perhaps. On one hand he feels awkward in the midst of middle class society, on the other hand he is unemployed yet loves to dine in expensive restaurants.
The young woman is Comsack's lover. A very talented illustrator with an established career. But she has been suffering for a long time.
The two of them meet in Keep the Aspidistra Flying directed by Robert Bierman. With the old London town as the setting, their love affair seems awkward, funny yet touching. "You are a poet, a free man," sighs Comsack's lover.
Keep the Aspidistra Flying is one of seven films to be screened at The British Film Festival, held to commemorate the 50th anniversary of The British Council in Indonesia.
The event will take place at H. Usmar Ismail Film Center on Jl. HR Rasuna Said, South Jakarta, June 19 to June 26.
In addition to feature movies there will be some animated movies screened.
Tickets may be obtained free of charge from the British Council or at the screening location, according to Gill Westway, The British Council's English Language and Arts manager.
Movies to be shown are mostly contemporary and some, similar to the story of the eccentric poet previously mentioned, carry the traditional color of English comedy. Fever Pitch directed by Nick Horby for example, is a story of an English teacher who is too busy with himself. He falls in love with a fellow teacher. Their love affair successfully intertwines with the success of Arsenal soccer team throughout the competition season.
A different touch of comedy appears in The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill and Come Down a Mountain. The entire population of a small village near the only mountain on the boarder of Wales has a peculiar but understandable desire. The mountain they are supposed to be proud of can not be incorporated into the map, due to a lack of being 15 feet from the height regulation. Working side by side, they are determined to place their mountain on the map.
Hamlet is the obsession of actor/director Kenneth Branagh, the filmmaker. Branagh directed the most famous of Shakespeare's dramas in the four-hour film. He plays Hamlet, while Kate Winslet is Ophelia.
Regardless of its devotion to the script, Hamlet may have a chance to enter the commercial market. This is very important since the revival of the British movie industry carries a heavy predicament from within.
The revival of British movies is marked by the increasing quantity of films and the escalating number of good quality movies produced. In 1995 for example, 73 titles were produced. In the following year, production jumped to 121 titles, the highest record in the past 40 years. Last year, about 80 titles were produced.
Recent films worth mentioning are The Crying Game, Four Weddings and a Funeral, Welcome to Sarajevo, Evita, In Love and War, and The English Patient. There is a need to realize that this revival is also assisted by offshore funding, such as with The English Patient which was funded by the American producer.
However, funding for films is not the real problem, as the British government donates millions of pound sterling which comes from the national lottery program. The real problem is the regulation on British national films' circulation and distribution.
Similar to the movie industry in Indonesia, the distribution of movies in England is regulated through a small yet powerful cartel which maintains a close relationship with Hollywood movie studios.
As a result, low to medium budget movies have to compete with independent American films in second-run cinemas. According to the yearly International Film Guide, 50 percent of new films never have the chance to appear on the big screen, but go straight to television or videotape.
The rest have to patiently wait, maybe for months before they have a chance at the big screen. Without exception is Secret and Lies which will also be screened in this movie festival.
Secret and Lies is a black comedy about humanities. It begins with Hurtense, a young optometrist of African descent who is looking for her biological mother, Cynthia. It turns out that Cynthia is a white female and the presence of her abandoned child creates a big commotion within Cynthia's family.
The most moving scene is Hurtense's meeting with Cynthia in a restaurant. The static camera uninterruptedly recorded their eight minutes of touching conversation.
Actress Brend Blethyn impressively brings Cynthia's character to life. Cynthia appears to have a lively humor and can sometimes be vulgar, but never turns caricatural. Mike Leigh's direction keeps this 140-minute film from become monotonous dialog.
Secret and Lies was inaugurated as the best British film and won an award at Cannes Film Festival in 1997. At the end, watching Secret and Lies makes a person feel as though they have just swallowed bitter, though healing, medicine.
The writer is a cinematologist and lecturer at the School of Films and Television, Jakarta Arts Institute.