The World Cinema Awards 2010

World Cinema. A module that has popped up in my second year of university, and without a doubt is highly engaging. It has expanded my view on cinema, as I have watched a variety of films from Hong Kong to France, Spain and India. World Cinema has allowed us as an audience to gain an international perspective, and a lot more films have become available to us through DVD and mass distribution. It has often been found that American and European cinema is more familiar to us, and as Dudley Andrew has suggested in his article An Atlas of World Cinema (2004), we have become accustomed to the Euro-American narrative and ideologies that we don't tend to travel or become aware of other cultures and their films.

Presented by Jonathan Ross, with some shockingly bold facial hair and who I personally have missed since the Friday Night with Jonathan Ross days, the programme is hosted from the BFI and shows a number of films contending for the film of the year award. There is also a World Cinema Achievement Award given to a worthy director. I am going to be having a look through the nominated films on the show, and discussing the show itself.


I am Love

Scottish actress Tilda Swinton (The White Witch from Narnia) takes on the leading role as Emma Recchi, a mother of three and part of a wealthy family who are going through changing times. The themes of the film focus around passion and desire as you can see in the poster, Swinton's stunning red dress parts her from the rest of the cast and reflects her dangerous nature. As director Luca Guadagnino says in the show, "the idea of the film came from the idea of a lonely woman in a beautiful house". The film reflects the complexity of affairs, and revolves around the themes of hands and food, the delicateness of making food and the love of it. Ross describes it as intoxicating, and with such an exhilarating soundtrack to heighten the tense and romantic mood, I am Love seems to be a charming and sophisticated romantic drama.


Let The Right One In

From director Tomas Alfredson comes the Swedish original of Let Me In (2010) about a young boy who finds friendship in a strange girl named Eli who turns out to be a vampire. The film is unlike some of the vampire films we have had recently has such as The Twilight Saga, because it follows typical vampire traditions, such as inviting a vampire into your home. This act also relates to another theme in the film of letting someone into your life, and the companionship that grows. Young Oskar dreams of hurting his tormentors, and in one scene during the show, he is seen stabbing a tree to release his anger and illustrates his solitary lifestyle. Oskar is soon faced with a choice as he discovers Eli's killing nature, and the film is truly a love story focusing on the two main characters. Alfredson has described the character of Eli as the 'dark side' of Oskar as he overcomes his fears and gains strength over the bullies.

Waltz With Bashir

Israeli film director Ari Folman uses this almost comic animated style film to interview veterans of the 1982 invasion of Lebanon to reconstruct his memories of the time he served in that conflict. There are images of massacre and the story indicates the suppressed memories of the violence at the time. Folman argues in person that the massacre could have been prevented if the government and generals had not hesitated in acting to stop it. Ross says that the images in the film caused an uproar due to the refrences related to the Holocaust, and that the animation gives the film it's uniqueness. The interviews were either first hand accounts, or given to actors to read. It is the first animated documentary, and I personally love the visual style Folman has incorporated as it makes it more appealing to a wider audience.



The White Ribbon

"When you were little, your mother sometimes tied a ribbon in your hair or around your arm. Its white colour was to remind you of innocence and purity."
A series of accidents and disturbing attacks begin to arise in a small village in the North of Germany in the years before World War I. It is believed that the children are possibly responsible for the mysteries going on in the village, and through the character of Anni we get closer to the children of the film and become surrounded by the motifs of morality and death. The film is narrated by the local school teacher who reflects on those times, and director Michael Haneke says that he wants to "question that claim of truth" which is the reason for using commentary. Similar to Waltz With Bashir, this is a film about someone's memory and how things may have been. Haneke did not want this to be a film about Germany, and says that a British audience can relate it to England, and so on.


A Prophet

Jacques Audiard's A Prophet is a film about finding your identity and making your story. Malik El Djebena is sent to a French prison where everyone is divided into groups, but he stands alone, making him vulnerable to everyone in the prison. The Corsicans are the most influential group in the prison, and Malik soon becomes accustomed to their vulgar and brutal orders. When Malik leaves prison, he is faced with the guilt and company of his murdered victims, despite this he carries on serving the mafia and carrying out orders. The film providea a unique emotional experience of a nobody becoming someone, and the tense environment often found in prisons.

The World Cinema Achievement Award was given to Bernardo Bertolucci who began writing poems when he was younger to be like his father, but at the age of sixteen decided that he liked movies. Writer of The Conformist (1970) and Last Tango In Paris (1972), after which he felt like he could write any kind of film, he then wrote 1900 (1976), The Last Emperor (1987), The Sheltering Sky (1990) and The Dreamers (2003).

I won't tell you the winner of the Film of the Year award, you can find out for yourself here http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00v9g9b/BBC_Four_World_Cinema_Award_2010/ and I hope you find the films mentioned interesting if you get the chance to watch them!