Ka Leo O Hawaii

Issue date: 10/19/07 Section: Mixed Plate

The Still Life. Directed by Jia Zhang Ke.

Atonement. Directed by UH Mānoa student Seong Whang, it will be showing on Sunday at the HIFF UH Mānoa screening night along with seven other UH ACM student films.

Hawai‘i is known for its beautiful scenery and climate, but for the next 11 days, the Louis Vuitton Hawai‘i International Film Festival will bring the focus to its film scene.

The festival, which begins today and runs through Oct. 28, will screen roughly 190 films with a catalog as big as major festivals like Sundance or Cannes. Since the festival's birth in 1981, one of its central focuses has been to facilitate exchange between Eastern and Western cultures. This year's festival has dedicated categories to Japanese and Korean films, as well as more general categories like "Pacific Panorama" and "Asian Showcase" to launch Asian films into the North American market.

Notable among these films is "Still Life," written and directed by Jia Zhang Ke. Like Ke's earlier film "The World," "Still Life" uses its physical setting as a visual metaphor for its main interpersonal conflicts.

"The World" used a kitschy Epcot-Centerlike theme park to illustrate its characters' longing to be cosmopolitan and modernized; but the setting in "Still Life" is a decaying city that's about to be replaced by a massive dam. Like the city, the characters search for renewal as they try to mend damaged relationships.

"Still Life" also explores a common theme featured in many of the festival's Asian films: the tension between traditional rural life and rapid urbanization. In some ways, it is an analog of the frontier theme in the American western, and can be found in films as disparate as Japan's "Pulse," South Korea's "The Host" and this year's festival film, "One Foot off the Ground."

The festival also features a number of films from the West and provides one of the few opportunities for people in Hawai‘i to keep up with the mainland's film scene. "Dark Matter," a story about a revenge-seeking astrophysics graduate student, was an audience favorite at this year's Sundance.

Also at the festival is the adaptation of Khaled Hosseini's best seller "The Kite Runner," a fictional drama that illustrates the fall of Afghanistan over the past three decades, and "Control," a biopic about Joy Division frontman Ian Curtis. The festival will be Hawai‘i's first and only opportunity to see some of the movies that are generating such critical buzz.

Finally, there are myriad films at the festival with little or no reputation. The anticipation of discovering a gem in one of the lesser-known films is what makes festivals fun to attend. "American Zombie" is intriguing - a sort of mockumentary about the civil rights struggle of zombies.

The majority of the festival films are playing at Dole Cannery Theatre.

Hawai‘i Film Festival:

• Vietnam Film Symposium, Garden Level, Friday. Sponsored by the Center and NETPAC will bring together filmmakers and scholars for this historic, international first, noon to 1:30 p.m. at the East-West Center's Imin Conference Center.


• Professor Wimal Dissanayake will moderate a conversation with Vietnam film experts at the new HIFF Café (second floor) following the 4:15 p.m. screening of the award-winning film "The Deserted Valley" at the Regal Dole Cannery Cinemas.


• Student film showcase, Sunday. Talented elementary, middle and high school students from around the world, Regal Dole Cannery, 10 a.m.


• Shanghai University student films. Six films by our student filmmaking partners in the SMART (Student Media Art) Exchange program with Shanghai University and the Shanghai International Film Festival. 3 p.m., Regal Dole Cannery. Free.


• "Books to Film - Crossing Boundaries, Creating Worlds." A seminar including filmmakers Wayne Wang (with new film "A Thousand Years of Good Prayers") and
  UH professor and playwright Vilsoni Hereniko ("The Land Has Eyes"), 5 p.m. at Regal
  Dole Cannery.

TICKETING:

• General admission: $10


• Military, student and senior (62+) with valid ID: $9


• 550-8457 from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily (Oct. 8 to 28)


• Phone orders are available the next day at will call or choose the e-ticket and print out your tickets instantly

LOCATIONS:

• Regal Dole Cannery Stadium 18


• 735B Iwilei Road


• Parking: Validated parking in Dole Cannery Garage (enter on Pacific Street)


• Hawai'i Theatre Center


• 1130 N Bethel St.


• Parking: There are quite a few garages in the area that offer good rates after 5 p.m.

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