Chris Fujiwara
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EIFF 2012: ONWARDS & UPWARDS
Scotland looks magnificent in EIFF closing night film Brave — lots of mountains, mystical spaces and torrential waterfalls. Strangely though, it doesn’t rain in the movie. Not once. This decision must have been overseen by the Scottish tourist board, for there are few places as rainy as Scotland. When it rained in Cannes this year, it was all the trades could talk about — but it’s just not news when it happens in Edinburgh. The last two weeks in Edinburgh we have all been dashing from cinema to cinema in raincoats, umbrellas up, wavy hair getting frizzier by the minute. […]
by Hope Dickson Leach on Jul 2, 2012 -
EIFF 2012: IN DEVELOPMENT
We’re over half way through now and I’m starting to panic. I keep hearing about great films that I’ve missed (The Mirror Never Lies is spoken of only in superlatives, and The Unspeakable Act is another one I’m late to the table for, Tabu, Kid-Thing and more) and rocking events that slipped by while I was elsewhere. Chris Fujiwara told me about an event where he and some of the Filipino filmmakers who are in town did a live musical accompaniment to a film, and I don’t know where I was for Thelma Schoonmaker‘s Q&A after a screening of a […]
by Hope Dickson Leach on Jun 28, 2012 -
EIFF 2012: NEW BEGINNINGS
Walking around the opening party you couldn’t help but hear the word “rebirth” a lot. As the most heavily pregnant person in the room, this made me jump, but I soon joined in the celebration. The 66th Edinburgh International Film Festival had just opened with William Friedkin‘s Killer Joe, and the evening was a definite success. Not everyone liked the film — there were questions about on-screen violence towards women in particular — but everyone agreed that as an opener, new festival director Chris Fujiwara had hit the right note. Smacked it right on the kisser, you might say. There […]
by Hope Dickson Leach on Jun 24, 2012 -
A Pregnant Pause Before the Reborn Edinburgh Film Festival
When it comes to Edinburgh, I’m no festival virgin. However, this is the first festival in the 15 years I’ve been attending either as staff, filmmaker or delegate, when I will be seven-and-a-half months pregnant. I will be waddling, Marge Gunderson style, from cinema to cinema, hopefully securing seats on the end of the row (leaving me with the perfect excuse to pop out early). I will NOT be quaffing vats of dry white wine, or even whiskey (sob) but that means I will hopefully remember the names of everyone I meet and won’t be dozing off during the more […]
by Hope Dickson Leach on May 31, 2012
