JUST TALKING 20/11
The Just Talking session of Thursday, November 20 at the Old Pump Station was a particularly passionate one. The participants, who kept on talking well beyond the designated time, were: Brian Pera (The Way I See Things, Focus), Tom Shu-Yu Lin (Winds of September, International Competition), Alexander Avranas (Without, International Competition/Greek Films), Genna Terranova (senior programmer for Tribeca Film Festival) and Ronald Bergan (film critic, The Guardian).
‘My film is about loss, memory and relationships’, mentioned Brian Pera. ‘I made the film with very little money and that is why I was free to do what I wanted. Actually, some people think I had too much freedom. I published a book a month ago, and I came up against a way of perception that is very popular in the US at the moment and has to do with objectiveness in criticism. My opinion is that you cannot be subjective as a critic. I grew up reading Pauline Kael’s reviews for the New Yorker. Pauline Kael detested Woody Allen but I love his work. But I knew that it was her opinion, and that was ok. It’s all about communication’.
‘My film refers to contemporary human relationships. It’s the only thing we have. I get sad when I see that people have forgotten how to pay attention to people around them’, stressed Alexander Avranas and went on by saying: ‘Cinema has always been a personal thing, but this changes from the moment a film reaches its audience. I believe that the filmmaker has to keep an axis in what he does and then let the audience read what they wish into the film. You have to act as a mirror for your audience’.
‘I believe that a critic should be totally honest’ added Ronald Bergan. ‘My reaction to a film is the same as when I’m talking to a friend. I always start by the good points and finish with the bad - if there are any. That is why I disagree with some critics who are friends with directors. If I go out for lunch with a director or an actor I won’t write a review about their film’. Regarding the importance of the autobiographical elements of a film, the critic mentioned: ‘I don’t care if a film is autobiographical or not. The critic judges from what he sees on the screen. Roland Barthes has talked about the author’s death and has underlined the importance of the script - you must treat a film as only a film. Bergan made the audience laugh out loud when, while commenting on Tom Shu-Yu Lin’s film where the main characters are teenagers, he said: ’I hate teenagers, in life and cinema equally. I try my best to avoid them and I believe they should all be isolated on a desert island and return back to society when they are all grown up!’
‘In Taiwan, we appreciate critics a lot – perhaps because we are polite as a people and don’t like to express our opinion about others. However, this causes trouble’, answered Tom Shu-Yu Lin. ‘Our community is small and we know each. When a friend of yours makes a bad film you don’t know what to say to him. As a result, we all make bad films because we are being polite and don’t express what we really think! When a good critic expresses his opinion we can finally face the truth. Making a film in Taiwan is complicated. Directors of my age are trying to escape from our country’s history. Directors like Hou Hsiao-hsien, Edward Yang and Tsai Ming Liang set the example by participating in international festivals, but that was back in the 80’s. From the 90’ onwards, some directors who are in their 40’s now participated in festivals abroad but had no success, ended in debt and are working now for television under horrible circumstances. This scares us a lot’.
‘I am a senior programmer for the Tribeca Film Festival in New York’, said Genna Terranova and went on: ‘Our job is not that of the critic. However, we also judge films because we want the critics and our audience to like our program. You want to offer to the audience films that might have encountered difficulties in finding distribution; we try to offer something different. I used to work in acquisitions, which is a different thing. There you do care about critics and their opinion, but since you’re making an investment, you have to take into account the amount of money you’re going to use for marketing and publicity’.
