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 New films from Werner Herzog, Wes Anderson and the Coen Brothers pepper the programme for the UK's biggest film festival outside London and Edinburgh.
The Leeds International Film Festival, now in its 21st year, opens on 7th November with the acclaimed Cannes Jury Prize winning French/Iranian animation Persepolis. Based on the inspirational, best selling, autobiographical graphic
novel by Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis is the poignant and beautifully
animated story of an inquisitive and outspoken young girl coming-of-age
during the Islamic Revolution. Outwitting the prying questions and
suspicious looks of the new social and moral guardians Marjane delights
in the discovery of punk, ABBA and Iron Maiden. Other treats include a retrospective of Japan's Michael Moore, Kazuo Hara; a new strand, Nexus, looking at the bridge of film, live music and art; and a collaboration with the Leeds Peace Festival within the Cinema Versa documentary strand.
Official Selection
 For 2007 the Film
Festival Official Selection presents its most extensive Golden Owl
Competition programme yet, with 15 outstanding feature films
representing the best of worldwide independent cinema this year. All UK
Premieres, the competition films offer an incredible variety, from
astonishing Australian drama Noise and hilarious Chinese comedy Getting Home, to the beautiful imagery of La Marea
from Argentina and the surreal Viking fantasy from America, Severed
Ways. The Official Selection also includes competitions for short
films, with three remarkable programmes of International Shorts and the
World Animation Award.
Alongside the competitions, the Film
Festival previews some of the most anticipated and acclaimed films of
the year. Highlights from established filmmakers include the Coen
Brothers' No Country for Old Men, Wes Anderson's The Darjeeling Limited, Werner Herzog's Rescue Dawn and Carlos Reygadas' Silent Light.
Also highly recommended are UK Premieres of features from new
international talent including Andrea Molaioli's acclaimed thriller and
Venice hit The Girl by the Lake, the bold satirical drama AFR by Morten Hartz Kaplers, and Pablo Fendrik's powerful character portrait The Mugger and delightful black comedy The Cream.
The
Film Festival has built a strong reputation amongst filmmakers and
audiences as a natural and fitting platform to nurture, showcase and
celebrate the vast diversity reflected in the art form of the short
film. In 2007 we feature no less than ten short film packages that
reflect imagination, originality and astonishing artistic flair. The
International Short Film Competition is spread across 3 programmes,
with no less than 15 UK premieres. Included are the award-winning
sensation Milan, set in war-torn Serbia, the Polish Dragon Flies, with
its mesmerising photography, and the French Like Father Like Daughter,
a beautifully daring film about the complexities of human interaction.
Completing the programmes is a selection of exceptional films from the
UK, Scandinavia, Latin America, USA, Germany, displaying a variety of
styles and genres. There are more exceptional shorts presented in the World Animation Competition, World Student Shorts, two Best of British Shorts selections, and the Yorkshire Short Film Competition sponsored by ITV Local, showcasing the talents of local filmmakers.
View Official Selection
Fanomenon
 'You're
travelling through another dimension - a dimension not only of sight
and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries
are that of imagination. That's a signpost up ahead: your next stop:
the Twilight Zone!'
Rod Serling's classic introduction to the
groundbreaking US TV show of the 60's is a perfect description for
Fanomenon, the UK's only genre event that brings together and
celebrates the full diversity of that weird and wonderful cinematic
universe.
How else can we explain an unbelievable line up of
films that includes crime-fighting toupees and penis lightsabers in
Minoru Kawasaki's deadpan comic parody The Rug Cop; useless detectives and ultra violence in No Mercy for the Rude; faeces fuelling Shit City in the anarchic Aachi & Ssipak; dreaded locks on a killing rampage in Exte - Hair Extensions and a washed up super hero who can't cope with modern life in the hilarious Dai Nipponjin.
That's just for starters!
Spain,
Poland, Ireland, Norway and the UK all feature in an explosive and mind
blowing line up for our Silver Melies competition our third and best to
date. The unique and stunning world of Anime ignite the big screen once
again as we bring you Vexille and Tekkonkinkreet – two incredible, and visually enthralling fantasy films that will delight fans new and old.
We
haven't even got to the two horror extravaganzas! We weren't satisfied
with one night of gory terror so on top of the infamous Night of the Dead VII at the Hyde Park Picture House we bring you Day of the Dead at the City Varieties theatre climaxing with the terrifying and haunting The Orphanage.
This
is just a taste of the huge range of films on offer, so come and join
us on an unforgettable journey, we promise you won't want this
fantastic rollercoaster ride to stop!
View Fanomenon
Cinema Versa
 Cinema
Versa is dedicated to documentaries and is the home of alternative
voices, mavericks, activists and outsiders. Comprehensive programmes of
the most exciting new music and human rights documentaries screen
alongside biographies of obsessives and nonconformists, stories of
unusual communities and social phenomena. Priority is always given to
the genuinely independent, grass roots filmmakers working on small
budgets driven by the passion to tell a particular story, champion an
unsung individual or highlight a little known cause.
Sample a
range of films in the programme and you can experience the rock'n'roll
intensity of underground garage bands igniting grungy clubs in downtown
Tokyo, witness the triumph of Peruvian mango farmers over a predatory
transnational mining corporation and discover an oddball community
inventing their own mythology in a crumbling Western B movie set. There
are windows on a multitude of strange corners of the world providing a
refreshing alternative to the narrowly defined expectations of the
mainstream media.
This year Leeds International Film Festival
builds on its collaborations with partner organisations to provide
context and feedback on the screenings and broaden the experience for
interested audience members. In particular, several Cinema Versa events
are brought to you in partnership with the Together for Peace Festival.
Together for Peace (www.togetherforpeace.co.uk)
is a pioneering, Leeds-wide NGO, partnering with communities,
organisations and individuals to catalyse and develop creative
responses to tension and conflict. Since launching in 2003, it has
become a respected 'hub' and broker for diverse ongoing initiatives,
including: festivals, cross-community dialogue, corporate
responsibility programmes, and schools projects.
The Just Before screening on Friday 16th is in partnership with the 'Slave Britain' photo exhibition (www.slavebritain.org.uk ) at The Light, 15-25 November. It is being hosted by 'The Truth Isn't Sexy' campaign (www.thetruthisntsexy.com), which raises awareness about the harsh realities of sex trafficking.
Imaging
War is a day-long conference on Saturday 17th November, developed by
Leeds Met University, featuring film, workshops and exhibitions
questioning the role of Hollywood imagineers in paving the way for a
new generation of weapons procurement.
The Myth of Redemptive
Violence is a debate about the role of violence in cinema organized by
the Imprint Theatre Company on Sunday 18th November at the Royal
Armouries from 1.00 - 5.00.
There will also be a screening
of a selection of Leeds International Film Festival films at Armley
Prison exploring themes of constructive conflict resolution.
These events are all organised in partnership with the Leeds-wide 'Together for Peace' festival (15-25 November; www.togetherforpeace.co.uk )
View Cinema Versa
Nexus
 Nexus
is a brand new section devoted to exploring the borderlines between
cinema and other art forms. This year there are three categories under
scrutiny: the visual arts, live music and sequential art.
Artists'
experimental work in film and video represents some of the most
innovative approaches to the audiovisual medium as a means of artistic
expression, but it's too often overlooked in the context of mainstream
cinema. Because it's sometimes perceived as difficult and inaccessible,
the Dialogues Programme has been conceived to encourage artists to
present their own work and a curated programme of films that have
influenced and inspired them. The Dialogues programme has been
supported by Arts Council England.
Live music as an
accompaniment to film projection was the norm in the silent period but
has only recently developed again to provide a fascinating array of
unusual cinematic experiences. Maya The Bee is a magical fusion of
nature documentary and fairytale from 1926, the first feature ever to
star real insects! Live accompaniment is provided by top Leeds
improvisational musicians Inecto School and D Sojourn. John Foxx
returns with another audiovisual innovation and in an exclusive UK
performance, Marshall Allen of Sun Ra's Arkestra provides a live
soundtrack to the films of American maverick James Harrar.
Thought
Bubble is a brand new festival devoted to sequential art, the art of
comic books and graphic novels. Leeds International Film Festival has
collaborated with this new event to bring a series of new films
inspired or influenced by comic book arts alongside illuminating
documentaries about some of the great sequential artists like Will
Eisner and Moebius. Thought Bubble's films range across the sections:
Bomb It
Death Note
Death Note: The Last Name
Jeffrey Brown: Drawing Between the Lines
Moebius Redux
Persepolis
Princess
Strawberry Shortcakes
Tekkonkinkreet
The Tracey Fragments
Vexille
Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist
See www.thoughtbubblefestival.com for more details.
View Nexus
Retrospective: Kazuo Hara
 The
Film Festival presents an exclusive retrospective of the Japanese
documentary master Kazuo Hara, and is delighted to welcome the
filmmaker himself and his wife and producer, Sachiko Kobayashi to
introduce all their films. A notorious and controversial figure in
Japan, Hara is gradually attaining the international reputation he
deserves as a rigorous cinematic innovator, exploring the deceptive
borderlines between fiction and non-fiction.
The history of
documentary film has been dominated by the quest for authenticity.
Early pioneers like Dziga Vertov defined the form in opposition to the
bourgeois excesses of fictional cinema. Robert Flaherty was highly
influential in his depiction of indigenous cultures using genuine
locations and local people, but he was criticised for manipulating his
subjects to heighten the exoticism and melodrama. The modern standards
have been shaped by John Grierson's definition of the form as the
'creative treatment of actuality' and the 'fly on the wall' style of
cinema verit&eAcute;, both emphasising a strong sense of social
responsibility and an inobtrusive style. Even this approach has been
criticised because it fails to cater for the change in circumstances
and behaviour caused by the very presence of the camera and the
intentions of the filmmaker. Kazuo Hara makes films with this in mind:
I
haven't yet filmed, as someone 'objectively' looking in from the
outside…whenever there is a camera, people are conscious of it.(From:
Iris: A Journal of Theory on Image and Sound, no. 16 (Spring 1993),
Jeffrey and Kenneth Ruoff, Japan's Outlaw Filmmaker: An Interview with
Hara Kazuo.)
Hara's approach to filmmaking acknowledges the
authenticity problem but it takes the philosophy one step further. He
has suggested that people's ideas of themselves are removed from any
kind of objective reality, even without the presence of a camera. His
intention as a filmmaker is to explore the fiction people create of
their own lives:
Life is acting. There are two sides to people.
The person one wants to be, and the person one is. I want the people in
my movies to act the way they want to be..... I like to make dramatic
movies. I feel strongly about this, more than other directors. I love
Hollywood action films….. I want to make action documentary films.
(From: Iris: A Journal of Theory on Image and Sound, no. 16 (Spring
1993), Jeffrey and Kenneth Ruoff, Japan's Outlaw Filmmaker: An
Interview with Hara Kazuo.)
This idea is particularly well
illustrated in Dedicated Life (1994), a portrait of the writer
Mitsuharu Inoue, who has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. He is an
ebullient character and his adeptness at writing fiction mirrors what
is gradually revealed as a complete fabrication of his own past.
Although
Japan has a rich history of documentary filmmaking, some of which is
stylistically and politically challenging, Hara's films have had a huge
impact in his home country. He challenged taboos about attitudes to
disabled people in Goodbye CP
(1972) and sexuality, monogamy and motherhood in Extreme Private Eros
(1974), but made the most impact with the extraordinary The Emperor's
Naked Army Marches On (1987), aptly described as 'one of the least
polite documentaries ever made'. (From: A Foreigner's View of the
Japanese Documentary Scene by Scott Sinkler published in Imagining
Reality: The Faber Book of Documentary Ed: Kevin Macdonald and Mark
Cousins.)
The film shadows dogged war veteran Kenzo Okuzaki,
recently released from a prison sentence for throwing stones at the
Emperor. He ruthlessly pursues those implicated in a Second World War
cover up which resulted in the deaths of several of his fellow
soldiers. Hara captures every jaw-dropping confrontation, many of which
lead to actual physical violence, raising awkward questions about the
ethical responsibilities of documentary filmmakers. However, the film's
dedication to its subject matches Okuzaki's dedication to his moral
crusade and although he may be obsessive and unhinged, he is obviously
sincere and determined to bring to light an appalling injustice. It
makes incredible cinema and has attracted admirers like Michael Moore
who called it 'the most amazing piece of filmmaking'. Hara has been an
inspiration for a phenomenally successful form of confrontational
documentary filmmaking that challenges mainstream cinema in every
conceivable way.
Leeds Film Festival runs November 7th to 18th. More info from www.leedsfilm.com.
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(in any events) in your renowned & outstanding film fest.
thanks