Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Beat est de retour! - Partie deux / My Tomodachi: Colin Geddes
There wasn't any Beat Takeshi news for a while until recently (see my February 8th entry) but now there are even more developments on the Office Kitano front. 
If you follow news about Cannes, you know this year is the festival's 60th anniversary. To celebrate, the organisers have commissioned famous filmmakers from around the world to shoot short films commemorating the event
33 directors from 25 countries in 5 continents have 3 minutes to depict how that magic place known as the cinema inspires them. The project is entitled Chacun Son Cinema (To Each His Own Cinema). None of the creators were aware of the others' films. "Wenders filmed in the Congo, Tsai Ming Liang in Kuala Lumpur and Cronenberg in the... toilets!" says the press release. The films will be screened both at Cannes and broadcast on France's Canal+ on May 20th. Read the official press release, including the complete list of directors: French and English.
Beat Takeshi, who himself celebrated his 60th birthday last month, will of course represent Japan. During the 2005 edition of TOKYO FILMeX, a letter from Cannes head Gilles Jacob was passed to Kitano, requesting him to participate in the project. During a break in the filming of Kantoku - Banzai! last September, Kitano completed the short. The details of his entry are secret, as are the contents of each of the 33 directors' films from each other. "If other directors are thinking the same things as me, there might be some overlap. I wonder what kind of films everyone made," said Kitano.
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My good friend Colin Geddes is like a brother. We bonded in the late 80s over Hong Kong movies and it's been a romance ever since. If you don't know already, he's been the head programmer of the Toronto International Film Festival's Midnight Madness section since 1998. He scours all the major fests around the globe and counts most of the world's famous cult directors among his friends. Watch Colin introduce Boon Jong-ho's The Host here. And there's this already legendary selection of footage from Borat's world premiere screening, also programmed by Colin. 
He's also established up and coming distributor Ultra 8 Pictures (where you can find links to his dueling blogs). CG's also famous in Toronto for his countless screenings of classic kung fu movies and other delights from Asia over the years.
Now he's about to get on a plane to Europe as a member of the jury at Portugal's famous fantasporto fantastic film festival, which is in its 27th edition.
Hope you're not embarassed by all the praise -- I'm just proud, that's all.
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