Report

SF International's Golden Gate Awards: Alive and cooking

Food scents and film sensibilities mingled at a Golden Gate Awards evening that saw the San Francisco International moving away from a stage-presentation format into a pungent party atmosphere at the California Culinary Academy Wednesday night. With kitchen scenes as backdrop, filmmakers received and celebrated awards in a variety of categories while taste-testing from a broad buffet.

Yung Chang, with Up the Yangtze, won the Golden Gate Award for Best Documentary Feature, presented by storied documentarian Rob Epstein (The Times of Harvey Milk). He got the opportunity to thank two of his uncles, Wilson and Howard, who were present at the party, and asked the audience to not forget the 4 million people who’ve been relocated by the Three Gorges Dam Project. His involvement with the people he filmed has continued after shooting, and he told SF360.org that, after showing the film to one of his subjects, she said she "saw her fate" and decided to leave the quite possibly dead-end cruise-boat job she’d been working and go back to high school. The filmmakers are now helping her family financially.

topics: animation, awards, bay area, directors, documentary, features, san francisco international film festival, shorts

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SF filmgoers animate over the weekend

With the tragedy of an oil spill in the San Francisco Bay and the mundanity of seasonal rain dampening spirits, views of the brighter side of life may have become occluded this past weekend. And perhaps that’s why filmgoers flocked to the darkness of movie theaters to experience the pleasures of irreality. The SF International Animation Festival — in its second year — experienced a major bounce, with a number of sold-out shows in its venue at the Embarcadero Center Cinema. Said SFIAF/SFFS programmer Sean Uyehara, “I am so grateful that people came out to support the fest, because then we can continue to present this kind of work.” Newly joined-at-the-hip The Fifth 2007 San Francisco Korean American Film Festival and the 10th 2007 San Francisco Asian Film Festival opened at the Castro Theatre and continued at the 4 Star. And while the Latino International Film Festival and American Indian Film Festival entered their second weeks, the San Francisco Film Society brought out its New Italian Cinema showcase, with filmmakers and producers live and in-person from across the Atlantic. Look for more coverage of the weekend festivals in SF360.org’s “SEEN” section as the week continues.

“The Pixar Story” director Leslie Iwerks, here with animator Pete Docter — featured in the film — and SF International Animation programmer Sean Uyehara, take in the scene, crowds, and love at Gallery One post-screening at the Embarcadero.

The legendary Saul Zaentz, supporter of so many fantasies, enjoyed the SFIAF opening night scene with Chika Kujiraoka and SFFS Board energizer Melanie Blum.

The audience Q&A post-screening brought many questions from would-be/could-be animators, and an interesting question from a veteran animator, Steve Segal (“Toy Story”) about the WGA strike, which apparently does not affect animation writers, who are exempt….

topics: animation, asian cinema, film festivals, san francisco film society

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International Latino Film Festival and SF International Animation Festival

Three to see at ILFF with Eve O’Neill’s take on where to go for more animation when SFIAF closes below.

Could there be a livelier night for an opening than the Day of the Dead? Not according to the International Latino Film Festival, which chose the largely Mexican holiday to launch its 11th International Latino Film Festival at the Castro Theater last Friday. As the party continues nonstop through next week on more than a dozen screens throughout the Bay Area, it’s worth drawing attention to two other offerings from next-door neighbor Mexico, as well as one bridging the ganglands of Los Angeles and war-ravaged El Salvador, as the fest unfurls its 16-day exhibition of nearly 100 feature films, documentaries, and shorts from far-flung corners of Latin culture worldwide. In the wake of Mexican cinema’s triumphant showing at the 2007 Oscars, the following three films serve to confirm how some of the biggest surprises can come from the shortest of distances.

1. “JC Chávez” — Mexican actor and ILFF guest of honor Diego Luna (“Before Night Falls”; “Y Tu Mama Tambien”) makes his directorial debut with this engrossing 2006 biography of Mexican boxing champ Julio César Ch´vez, whose extraordinary rise from humble circumstances to unrivalled mastery in the ring made him a popular hero, while also leaving him prey to powerful figures in sports and politics — from Don King in the U.S. to Carlos Salinas in Mexico — looking to tap his fame for their own ends. Chavez’s skillful use of brute force on the road to fame and fortune finds its metaphorical match in power games beyond the capacity of any single pair of fists to confront, let alone defeat. But there’s a transcendent power too evinced by the iconic image of the fighter, one that Luna’s film expertly evokes.

2. “Malos hábitos (Bad Habits) — The pun is old, where nuns are concerned, but Mexican director Simón Bross’s stylishly atmospheric 2007 debut feels fresh, even amid its millenarian gloom. The story follows the unhappy household of an anorexic wife and mother; her husband, a frustrated architecture professor who turns his attentions to a voluptuous student; their plump daughter, banished to a diet clinic; and the girl’s teacher, a medical school graduate turned Franciscan nun with her own special relationship to food. Turning nourishment and the body into central problems and metaphors, “Malos Hábitos” intriguingly balances science and faith, eros and thanatos, in a seemingly small, intimate tale set in Mexico City during a haunting, bible-worthy downpour.

3. “Hijos de la guerra” (Children of the War) — Alexandre Fuchs’s 80-minute look into the world of MS-13, or Mara Salvatrucha Trece, the international gang dubbed the most dangerous in the world by the likes of the FBI, is riveting filmmaking from start to finish. But that it comes bracketed by a foreign policy address by Ronald Reagan signals its determination to be much more than a sensationalist treatment of urban gang life per se. Born on the streets of Los Angeles amid children fleeing the catastrophic violence of El Salvador, MS-13 is ultimately the child of many forces, not least the U.S.-fueled civil war and an episode in American foreign-policy backlash reminiscent of other, more attention-grabbing ones of the moment. Constructed of amazing, often disturbing footage as well as candid interviews with present and former gang members, law enforcement officials, sociologists, and others, Hijos de la Guerra is as complex in the emotions it stirs as in its rigorous dissection of the international and inter-generational consequences of war.

Staying animated

Attendees at the second San Francisco International Animation Festival will be lucky enough to catch movies from across the globe, in styles ranging from the traditional to cutting edge, from the family-friendly to the sexually explicit, including features, shorts, music videos, and everything in between. Still haven’t gotten your fill? Jump online and head to any one of these sites where you can find more work by some of the artists featured in the festival.

5. StudioAKA is a London-based company will loads of talent and almost all of their content available on their website.

4. A. Film A/S is Scandinavia’s largest animation company. Better brush up on your Dutch before the jump the website is in English, the films are not!

3. Ardmann Studiosdo more than Wallace and Grommit, as anyone who saw “The Pearce Sisters” can attest to. Check out the site for a great animation reel, or jump over to Shaun The Sheep’s new home to see clips from all of the shorts on the full-length DVD.

2. Partizan is an international community of directors that collaborate to produce music videos and commercials. While not under a strict policy of animation only, there’s plenty of innovative animated and graphic content.

1. The National Film Board of Canada is Canada’s major public film producer and distributor, and the NFB has been around for over 65 years. It specializes in documentary, animation, and drama. There are over 70 animated films available for viewing at their website.

topics: animation, film festivals, latin cinema, lists

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Sean Uyehara, SF International Animation Festival

It’s very easy to observe the deep creative influence that animation holds over a part of the country as artistically active and diverse as the Bay Area. A vibrant street art community, rivaled in scope only by urban areas such as New York and Los Angeles, pulls heavily from the aesthetic of animated graphics. Asian American heritage ties us to the exploding popularity of anime and the truly unique visions of directors such as Hayao Miyazaki. And of course who could forget Pixar, an industry giant that, for years, no one could quite understand until they succeed in tying animation to digital filmmaking for the first time. SF360 caught up with Sean Uyehara, who has programmed the San Francisco International Animation Film Festival for both years it has been running, to talk about his personal influences, upcoming trends in animation, and what to look forward to when the festival opens this November 8th.

SF360: Is there any specific film that you got you interested personally in animation?

Uyehara: Not really. I just like movies. I always was into the Looney Tunes, and then when I went to college I saw Norman McClaren and FRANK FILM and stuff like that and was just blown away. I feel so lucky to be doing this now.

SF360: So, how many different films did you end up watching before deciding what was going to be screened as part of the festival?

Uyehara: 200? 300? I am not sure.

SF360:When you begin planning something like this, where do you start looking for content?

Uyehara: There are tons of places to look. Other festivals, TV, Internet definitely, simple research, and then there is work that comes in unsolicited that surprises. Basically, any way that you can imagine finding work is how we find it.

SF360: After watching so much material, do you see any trends (storywise, technique wise) emerging with current animation?

Uyehara: My favorite current trend has to do with history, both personal and political, in animation. We have a number of nonfiction animated films like ‘Teat Beat of Sex,’ ‘I Met the Walrus,’ and ‘Magnetic Movie, in the festival. There are also feature length films out there like ‘Persepolis,’ ‘Chicago 10,’ and ‘Waltz with Bashir that integrate animation with nonfiction. It’s great mind-candy to contemplate the layers of representation involved in this kind of animated work. Because of the nature of animation, it already sort of points towards an artist — ‘Someone drew this!’ Do you know what I mean? When you add more layers of nonfiction in there, it creates a pretty robust and complicated document.

SF360: Can you give me your thoughts on animation as a means of producing a film without (or with a reduced) budget? I watch a picture like ‘Film Noir,’ with tons of action, expensive locations, several actors, and an international crew, and can’t help but think that as a live action film it would’ve taken millions to produce.

Uyehara: Frankly, I don’t know how much money these things cost. I can’t imagine a feature-length fiction film costing just a ‘little.’ But, to be certain, there are modes of practice represented in the shorts programs that could inspire one to think, ‘Hey, I could make a short animation all by myself.’

SF360: ‘Komaneko’ is the first Japanese stop motion animation released by a major studio. Do any of the other pieces present a specific milestone culturally or artistically?

Uyehara: Not to harp on ‘Magnetic Movie,’ but its director team, Semiconductor, is working in a specific cultural context that is pretty unique. They look to reveal the artistic outlines of the world of science. We showed their documentary about the sun, ‘Brilliant Noise,’ a little while ago, which was incredible, and they are continuing on that path with this new film. ‘Film Noir’ may not achieve a milestone, but it certainly is the product of a specific production practice that is possible today. It is an English-language Croatian/Bay Area/French film.

SF360: I remember when no one had any idea what rotoscoping was and then ‘Waking Life’ came out. Now everyone is familiar with that aesthetic. Are there any new techniques that you’ve noticed recently emerging?

Uyehara: Rotoscoping is as old as the hills. Maybe not that old, but it isn’t new by any stretch. Animation techniques are great and varied, and we have a lot of them in the fest, but what really matters is how technique and style communicates effect, aesthetic, or feeling in a film.

SF360: Do you ever think video game animation will have a place in a film festival?

Uyehara: Definitely. We presented Rooster Teeth, the makers of the machinima ‘Red vs. Blue’ and ‘The Strangerhood, in SFIFF a few years back. We haven’t quite stretched out to show commercials in SFIAF or SFIFF yet, but if we did, I would love to show the ‘Warhammer — Mark of Chaos’ trailer. It’s not video game animation per se, but I was blown away by this piece.

SF360: Are there any animators/directors/companies we should be keeping our eye on in the coming year?

Uyehara: One of my favorite animators, David Russo, has been working on a feature-length film about male anal birth. But, I hear that it is live-action. I mean, what?

SF360: What are your favorite animated movies of all time?

Uyehara: There are so many, but the Popeye films from the ’30s and ’40s rule! Mainly, because of the all the mumbling sound.

topics: animation, film festivals, q&a

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Rodents we love

Most of us talk to our pets, but very few of us tell our Camrys or toasters about our days. That’s where animation fills an important niche, our need to fantasize about our interactions with animals. Of course, for 2006’s “Cars,” the SF Bay Area’s very own Pixar Animation Studios decided to take the least warm and fuzzy movers on the planet (for which our affection was already waning thanks to global warming) and tried to make a relatable film…. Perhaps they went too far. Thankfully, this time around, Pixar has returned to the animal realm for anthropomorphizing fun, and returned to form, with the delectable “Ratatouille,” a film about a rat who happens to be a culinary genius. As we here at SF360.org breathe a collective sigh of relief, we feel obligated to pay tribute to the great stars that came before Remy and his kin, characters that taught us that rodents can be humans, too.

5. Luke and Bruno, “The Witches” (1990)
Head itch turned mad scientist Anjelica Huston wishes to transform the world’s children into mice. Thanks to some Jim Henson puppetry, she gets one step closer when she feeds two unsuspecting boys potion-tainted chocolate. Luke and Bruno must maneuver as mice through the human world, giving us a rodent-eye view at the adversity these brave little creatures must face on a daily basis (cats, traps, and horrified screaming).

4. Algernon, “Charly” (1968)
Algernon got a rough deal in this adaptation, even taken out of the title between short-story/novel (Flowers for Algernon) and film. Algie never said a word, but I’m sure if he had he would have been just as tragic a figure as Charlie Gordon. Humans get all the best roles.

3. The Rats of NIMH, “The Secret of NIMH (1982)
Genetic testing can’t be all bad; these rats got injected with some brain power. Tired of “living as rats,” they’ve not only harnessed an understanding of electricity, they’ve developed social ethics that drive them to abandon their thieving ways. Too bad some have also developed the same human tendency toward dictatorship.

2. Ben, “Willard” (1971)
Only an ostracized mama’s boy can get excited over befriending an army of basement rats. Willard’s that guy. When the man-boy realizes that these new friends might be inhibiting his social normalization (particularly when he uses them as assassins), Willard forgoes the exterminator and kills them himself. It’s the feisty Ben who fights for his life, stalking Willard through the house like a Tell-Tale Heart with sharp teeth. Ben’s star power was so strong that he even went on to headline in the self-titled sequel.

1. Mickey Mouse (1928-probably forever)
The Disney icon, he paved the way for rodents both live and animated. Friendly and high-pitched, he and his girlfriend sacrificed their primal edge to bring some much-needed glamour to the animal kingdom. A little outdated but always recognizable.

topics: animation, lists

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