Asian Oscar© 2024 Submissions at the Asian World Film Festival in L.A.

 

The Asian World Film Festival, going on its 10th year, opens a window to the public to watch the films from the Asian world, the East and the MIddle East which have been chosen by their countries for Oscar and Golden Globe consideration in the U.S.

Asel Sherniyazova, Co-Founder and Managing Director of Asian World Film Festival

One of the tiniest (and happiest) countries Bhutan, next to Nepal on the map of South Asia, has submitted The Monk and the Gun, a film I guess will be shortlisted. (Read my blog on it here.) It premiered in Toronto before coming to AWFF. Pawo Choyning Dorj’s previous film, A Yak in the Classroom was nominated for the Oscar last year. Roadside Attractions will release The Monk and the Gun in the U.S. in February 2024 so the public can see it before the awards are announced. ISA: Films Boutique*

Other films I caught there were Georgia’s Citizen Saint (Read my blog and interview), Turkey’s About Dry Grasses (read my blog), India’s 2018: Everyone is a Hero (read my blog), Taiwan’s Marry My Dead Body (read my blog), So. Korea’s Concrete Utopia intriguing but a little over done, Bangladesh’s No Ground Beneath the Feet (blog) too raw of a treatment about a most troubled land, Iran’s The Night Guardian, a sweetly innocent and surprisingly happy film, Kyrgyzstan’s This is What I Remember which was very good and unfortunately was disqualified. In a tiny provincial settlement somewhere in Kyrgizstan, a man gone 20 years as a guest worker in Russia but long considered dead, returns home. His son has two kids, his wife has remarried and he cannot relate to any of it because he has lost his memory. Fortunately I have the card of one of the screenwriters, Dalmira Tilepbergenova, who has also just directed her first feature.

Films I missed there and which I have not seen playing anywhere else are Hong Kong’s entry, A Light Never Goes Out, Armenia’s Amerikatsi, Indonesia’s Autobiography, Vietnam’s Glorious Ashes, Nepal’s Halkara, Iraq’s Hanging Gardens, Mongolia’s City of Wind which played in Venice and Toronto, Singapore’s The Breaking Ice, Yemen’ The Burdened, and Pakistan’s In Flames.

Others I missed but which seem to have publicists attached and are therefore screened around town are Japan’s Perfect Days by Wim Wenders whose great documentary Anselm is in the Documentary category, Jordan’s Inshallah a Boy, Malaysia’s Tiger Stripes, and Israel’s Seven Blessings,

Next year will require greater stamina so as not to miss the great films which represent their countries in Asia, the East and even the Middle East. Put Asian World Film Festival on your calendar, held just after the AFI Fest in L.A.

A surprise in how quickly it disappeared, the film About Dry Grasses by the renowned Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan which debuted in Cannes Competition and went on to play Toronto and other top fests commands attention. At 197 minutes, it caters to the most cinephilic among us. Centering on a handful of teachers in a snow-covered village in Anatolia, a teacher who longs to escape the system and go to Istanbul has his career endangered by a sexual abuse accusation from his student. The film goes to the heart of the complexity of its characters. It is notable as one of several films dealing with school systems and their inability to serve the needs of special students or of its teachers or of the parents. Japan’s non-Oscar entry, Kore-Eda’s Monster (Read my blog here.) and Germany’s The Teachers’ Lounge (Read my blog here.) deal with the same issue, as does The Holdovers to some extent. All are good, though I had problems agreeing with the choices of the new teacher in The Teachers Lounge, still the dramatization of the precarious position of teachers today in all films hits the bulleye. A co-production of Turkey, France, Germany and Sweden, its ISA is Playtime whose sales are good.**

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*Films Boutique has licensed The Monk and the Gun to Rialto for Australia, N.Z.; MFA+ for Austria and Germany; September for Benelux, Pyramide for France; EDKO for Hong Kong and Macao; India to Impact; Israel to Lev, Italy to Officine UBU; Japan-Maxam I; No. America — Roadside Attractions; Poland — Aurora; Portugal-Alambique; Spain-A Contracorriente, Sweden-Future Films; Switzerland-trigon.

**Playtime licensed About Dry Grasses to Austria-Filmladen; Baltics — A-One Films; Benelux, Surinam, Dutch Antilles-September; Canada-Sphere; France-Memento; Italy-Movies Inspired; Norway-Arthaus; Switzerland-trigon; Taiwan-Swallow Wings; U.K. and Ireland-Picturehouse