Local film chosen for competition in French film festival

Local film chosen for competition in French film festival

By Kunang Helmi-Picard

NANTES, France (JP): The 22nd edition of the Festival of 3
Continents took place in Nantes, France in the last week of
November.

The French brothers Philippe and Alain Jalladeau founded this
unique festival in Nantes in 1979. Unique, because it is the only
film festival which concentrates on film production from Africa,
Asia and Latin America. It has already brought over 1,000 films
to the attention of the European public. The selection reflects
the social, historical and cultural realities of these
continents.

Alain Jalladeau underlined the importance of Asian films in
contemporary film development: "Asia occupies a preeminent place
in this movement and the quality of the films which come to us
from this immense region is in continual progress. New talents
from Asia stand out, even in the face of competition from
American and European film makers."

Jean Neveu, president of the film festival, explained to
foreign visitors: "What also makes this festival different from
the other 500 film festivals in France, is the fact that the
overwhelming majority of the 30,000 strong public comes from the
younger generation." The public is not separated from the
directors, cameramen and actors by stiff protocol and heated
discussions often take place after the films are shown.

More than 70 feature films were shown from Nov. 21 to 28,
while 10 films had already been selected to participate in the
competition, including Indonesian Slamet Raharjo Djarot's latest
film Telegram. This year's choice was overwhelmingly Asian.
Djarot's film competed with two films from Latin America, two
films from Iran, one from India, two from Japan, one from
Kazakhstan and one from the People's Republic of China. The five
member jury was presided by noted French film director Pascal
Thomas.

The work of famous Indonesian filmmaker Slamet Raharjo Djarot
had already been selected in four previous festivals in Nantes.
He has always won a prize. But this time, his film Telegram based
on an adaptation of Putu Widjaja's 1970s novel by the same name,
did not gain the favor of the jury. The current fascination of
French cinephiles with Iranian and Chinese films surely detracted
the jury's attention from Djarot's latest film, a French-
Indonesian co-production. Despite being a co-production, the
Indonesian film could only be completed in June after three years
intensive struggle against the vagaries of a battered Indonesian
economy.

"It is not necessary, and indeed it is impossible to always
win a prize," stated the Indonesian filmmaker: "However, for me
it is primordial to take part in international film festivals and
learn from others. This time, for example, I learnt a lot from
the lyrical, and deceptively simple, Iranian film The Boy and the
Soldier by Seyyed Reza Mir-Karimi. It is clear that Iranian film
directors enjoy immense support in their own country because
their films are distributed without having to compete
commercially with foreign films."

The story-line of the 100-minute long film Telegram was not
fully comprehensible to most of the young French spectators,
unfamiliar with Putu Widjaja's fragmented, and often complex
style of writing. Despite this handicap, the sensual and poetic
impressionism of Djarot's film was highly appreciated, as was the
role of the young adopted daughter of the chief protagonist.
However, the relevance of Balinese reporter Daku's personal
conflict, torn by the implications of the impending death of his
mother in Bali -- played by Sujiwo Tejo -- was not clear to the
French public.

The telegrams sent from Bali were never really opened by Daku.
Throughout the film he lies and avoids making a clear decision
about his life in the modern metropolis of Jakarta. He is
confronted by three women of different ages: his dying mother,
his imaginary lover and his adopted daughter. It is Sinta, his
adopted daughter, on the verge of becoming a young adolescent,
who gently reminds him of reality.

Slamet Raharjo Djarot's film Telegram will again be presented
to an European audience at the Rotterdam film festival in January
next year.

The Dutch venue provides the advantage of an environment more
familiar with Indonesian culture and contemporary history.
Nevertheless, the film festival in Nantes remains significant for
Indonesian film makers.

This year's main prize in Nantes went to the Chinese film The
Quay by Jia Zhang and the second prize to the above-mentioned
Iranian film The Boy and the Soldier. In addition, Mehdi Lafti,
who played the young boy in the Iranian film won a special
mention. Another Iranian film The Day When I Became a Woman by
Marzieh Meshkini, won the Prize of the Jury in ex-aequo with the
Kazakhstan film Three Brothers by Serik Aprymov. The best actress
and best actor were Kyoko Kazami and Tomio Aoki who played in the
Japanese film Not Forgotten by Makoro Shinozaki.