The Lost Thing short film

This film's floating about in various festivals but if you haven't heard about it, you can check out the trailer here at the official website or below.  It's based on a book by Shaun Tan.  It will be released by Madman on DVD on the 10th of November.

14th Japanese Film Festival @JapanFilmFest

Just a heads up for those in Melbs and Sydney, the Japanese Film Festival will be held in November and December.  They're still updating their site with film and other details.  Japanese Film Festival on twitter. More info soon.

Bringing to you an abundance of Australian premieres, special guests and fantastic prizes to be won, the 14th Japanese Film Festival promises to be nothing short of spectacular.

Plan ahead! 2010’s Japanese Film Festival dates are:

SYDNEY
22 – 28 November Event Cinemas, George Street

MELBOURNE
2 – 7 December ACMI Cinemas, Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Federation Square

Korean Film Festival in Australia opens tonight

To Celebrate the arrival of Korean cinema on Australian shores and to launch the
inaugural Korean Film Festival in Australia, KOFFIA will be hosting an opening night
event that is much more than just watching a movie in a silent dark theatre.

Our opening night GALA will feature drinks and canapes for all guests while live music
will help generate a celebratory mood as we officially open KOFFIA 2010. Everyone who
books for the opening night film is welcome to come along and enjoy the festivities,
meet the organising team, mingle with our guests and be a part of an important day
for Korean and Australian relations. Our MC and Special Guests will then introduce the
film and declare the goals of KOFFIA as well as give out prizes and festival passes. This
will also feature a short forum to discuss the significance of KOFFIA and to talk about
our opening night film.

This will be an important event that marks the start of 5 days of entertainment,
education and drama, and we invite you to be a part of it!

I was taking a quick look at the guests and schedule for the event when I noticed something about the Sunday lineup.  Hany Lee will be singing, twice.  Wait a sec, is that the same Hany Lee from Neighbours?  Yep, sure is.  Although Korean OZs are a small minority, they seem to be a lot more organised (for this event anyway).  It will be interesting to see how future film festivals pan out, and whether other groups (I'm looking at you, Chinese Australians) will promote their own, more effectively.

For more info see KOFFIA - they've updated the site.

Tomorrow, When the War Began (2)

I wrote some stuff about it here and stephiepenguin wrote something here.  The movie doesn't seem too bad at the moment.

Below are the trailer and various other bits, be sure to check out the interview with Chris Pang (first vid). Chris Pang's Performance4a profile.

From SMH Asian invasion for film of Marsden classic

And don't forget some other Asian Australians who play a part in the movie, namely the bad guys.

Shout out goes to Masa Yamaguchi and Andy Minh Trieu. Well done fellas. You can follow Andy's blog here.

Andy Minh Trieu

Masa Yamaguchi

Film shows plight of boat people

From WentworthCourier

As political rhetoric on asylum seekers reaches new heights in the lead-up to the Federal Election, one filmmaker is trying to remind the nation of the faces behind the headlines.

Award-winning writer, director and Young Australian of the Year 2005 Khoa Do will introduce Mother Fish, a cinematic tribute to the plight of boat people, at Paddington’s Chauvel Cinema on August the 5th, followed by a question-and-answer session.

“The fear and hysteria surrounding refugees and asylum seekers is at an all-time high and we forget that each of these people has a personal story and a reason they’ve had to risk their lives like this,” Khoa said.

Khoa said he came from a refugee background and that stories of perilous sea voyages from Vietnam were all too familiar.

Although the film opens with a speech from former prime minister Kevin Rudd, Khoa said the focus of his work was human rather than political.

“We already have people speaking about the lower number of refugees we take in compared to other countries and the small number of asylum seekers compared to the intake of migrants,” he said. “We are a compassionate country, so I just wanted to show everyone what these people go through.”

Mr Do said he hoped his film would challenge the way some Australians felt about the issue and bring it back into perspective.

Mother Fish opening screening in Sydney on Thursday 5th - Meet the cast and crew

Saw this via Vico Thai and Mother Fish on facebook.

There will be a screening of Khoa Do's film Mother Fish this Thursday, at Chauvel Cinema in Sydney. There are still some seats available and you can call 02 9361 5398 to reserve your seats. Afterwards there will be a Q&A with the cast and crew of Mother Fish.

Also, tune in to 'At The Movies' on ABC1 & ABC2 at 6PM on Sat the 7th and Sun the 8th of August as Margaret & David review the film and get an insight into its making with an exclusive interview with the director Khoa Do.

For cinema screenings in other cities and states, check the events section on the Mother Fish website.

Saw movie franchise to get Guinness world record

Saw's James Wan, right, and Leigh Whannell.

From TheWest

The Saw horror movie franchise is getting a place in the Guiness World Records as the "Most Successful Horror Movie Series," one of the film's producers, Mark Burg, said on Thursday.

"I'm still in shock," Burg told Reuters. "The fact that we beat out (such horror franchises as) 'Friday the 13th,' 'Nightmare on Elm Street,' 'Halloween' and 'Texas Chain Saw Massacre' is a testament to our cast, crew and our partners at Lionsgate."

The franchise consists of six movies, each one having come out consecutively every Halloween since 2004. The seventh, and final, instalment is due out October 29th and will be featured in 3D.

Collectively, the "Saw" films have made over $73O million (�478 million) at the worldwide box-office and sold more than thirty million DVDs, according to distributors Lionsgate.

The films centre around a killer named Jigsaw who puts his victims through psychological torture before killing them.

Burg said it was during the production of "Saw 2," that the producers decided to "etch out" one long story spanning seven films. Therefore, after the seventh movie, called "Saw 3D", there will be no other movies, including spin-offs or prequels.

"We are done; this is it," he said. "We don't want to be that boxer who fought one too many fights."

Burg said the seventh chapter was always "anticipated" by fans as the final one.

Apparently Saw is the first horror franchise to have a roller coaster based on it.

When they say this will be the last film, they better mean it and not do a John Farnham.  I do recall James and Leigh saying the third film was to be the last...

James Wan was the director and writer for Saw I, producer for Saw II, producer and writer for Saw III, and producer for Saw IV to VI and Saw 3D (seems alll movies are coming out as 3d these days?).  He is currently working on thriller Insidious (starring Rose Byrne) and Castlevania.

It's quite interesting to read about their original short film called Saw, created by two friends on a low budget, and how it has progressed to become a massive franchise including video games.

'Inception' Trailer

Here is the trailer for the movie Inception. You might recognise some familliar landmarks in the trailer and that's because this trailer was made in Sydney, by a group of fans. AA fans I might add. See if you can figure out all 8 of the locations that they shot at. It's stuff like this I really like and I've watched it a couple of times already. Where on earth did they manage to find a white youtube beanie? Lols. Enjoy.

via Asian Australian facebook group

Chinese Australians angry at Gallipoli TV casting

From da BBC

Don't bother reading as it seems to be a repeat of one of the news.com.au articles

There has been an angry reaction in Australia after television producers cast a Caucasian man in the role of a Chinese-Australian war hero.

Billy Sing was a hero of the Gallipoli campaign in World War I, but a TV drama has him cast as a white man.

The producers say they could not find a 60-year-old Chinese actor to play Billy Sing's father, so both parts will be played by white actors.

They have been accused of re-writing Australian history.

Billy Sing was known as the "Gallipoli assassin", the son of a Chinese man and English woman, who became a hero of the Australian forces during World War I by killing more than 200 enemy troops.

The recipient of a Distinguished Conduct medal, his memory is cherished within the Chinese-Australian community.

That's why there's been such an angry reaction to the decision of the producers of the television mini-series, The Legend of Billy Sing, to cast a white man in the lead.

The director, Geoff Davis, actually picked his son, Josh, to play the role, and defended the decision by saying that he could not find a 60-year-old Chinese actor to play Billy Sing's father.

He therefore decided that both men should be Caucasian.

But Chinese-Australians have complained that young people will now grow up thinking that Billy Sing was white, and that is a betrayal of their heritage.

The head of a Chinese-Australian youth association said that "whiting out" Billy Sing was not only a gross historical misrepresentation but treading on the grave of a true Chinese-Australian hero.

My response to The Legend of Billy Sing Casting Controversy

Wow, it seems that many people are sitting up and taking note of the poor casting of this miniseries. Geoff Davis posted a reply to my original post months ago but I hadn't bothered to reply because I didn't want to give the series undue attention. Seeing that an article discussing the series was on the front page of news.com.au, I feel it is time that I took Geoff to task over his comments in defense of the series.   Geoff has actually deleted a lot of negative comments about the miniseries on the youtube movie trailer.

Note that Geoff has made his group The Legend of Billy Sing group private now, but I still have a copy of his reply.

Geoff writes:

"In actual fact I wrote this ... and your anger seems directed at a script that you have not read and a movie you haven't seen.

Can I at least give you some information to consider.

One purpose of the original script was to attack Australia's century old tendency to go off and fight foreign wars on behalf of foreign leaders who do not have Australia's interest at heart. We have done it in World War 1, we did it in Korea, in Vietnam and again in Iraq.

When Australia returns from these dubious wars the first people we seem to forget are our soldiers. These soldiers have historically been left to deal with their pain and injury with very little assistance or recognition. The typical complaint by returnees is that they have been abandoned.

It was my intention, with the original script, to make a commercial movie that highlighted the sadness I felt for these soldiers. It is not a script that was meant to criticize any other nation, neither Britain, Germany or Turkey and certainly not Asia. It is a script written by me, an Australian, that criticizes Australia's slavish devotion to other countries agendas. It was my opinion wrapped in a hopefully commercial story."

All OK up to here.
In researching the history of Australia in the years leading up to the war I found some very real characters, including Billy, who fit the story I wanted to tell.

The only problem in using parts of Billy's remarkable story was (as one of your posters correctly pointed out) finding a Chinese actor to play Billy's dad, John Sing.

Now it is interesting that you say we are no "Band of Brothers". I couldn't agree more. The budget for that wonderful show was $125 million US dollars ... that is over $US10,000,000 per episode.

When I said you were no Band of Brothers I was alluding to the fact that you disposed of historical accuracy, for what exactly?
We were a zero budget movie with no broadcaster and no government funding. We had a script and a world class cinematographer who had agreed to shoot our movie for us, probably because he wanted to help out a family member who was part of our team, and maybe because he liked the story we were trying to tell. He was available for five weeks in March 2008.

By then, as well as no money we still had no John Sing.

We advertised in all of the online film communities in this country for actors willing to participate for either no payment or at least a deferred payment contract. We received a response from over 250 actors who offered their services under those conditions. We did not receive any response from any Asian actor who would work under any condition.

In March 2008 we decided to defer the home scenes that would involve John Sing's character and went ahead with the war section of the movie. We had hoped that by showing what we could do with the action sequences we might attract some investment and enable us to shoot the home scenes later with some money to work with.

That worked to a small extent. We still have no broadcaster but we did attract some smaller (passionate) investors who contributed around $190,000 to allow us to continue.

In February 2009 our Cinematographer was available, again, for four weeks, we also had our little bit of money.

By February 2009 we had been looking for over 15 months for an Asian actor willing to play John on (at least) a deferred payment contract.
You had that much time and you couldn't find an Asian actor between the ages of 40-70?  Where were you looking and advertising? If after a few months your casting agency had put forward zero candidates, did you not think it would be good to think outside of the box and go looking at various Chinese organisations or at the very least other Asian organisations? Put an ad in Chinese newspapers?  There are quite a few Old Chinese families (as in 3rd/4th generation Australians) in the area where you were filming, did you ever think to ask them?

For this particular case, you didn't need a professional actor. I believe it would have been a minor role anyway. How many Australian films have we had where the actors weren't professional actors? Take a look at Samson and Delilah, top notch performances by people with no acting experience. The grandma acted quite well too hey? Oh and just like this series, the film had "zero budget".

When Tony Bonner, made himself available for two weeks, we gave up the search. Now asking Tony to play it as Chinese would not only have been racist and demeaning. It was also financially irrelevant, we could not have afforded the make-up.

How thoughful of you.  Wait a sec, first you say that you didn't want Tony playing as a Chinese because it was racist and demeaning, but then you mention that it would be too expensive?  So you did consider yellowface but decided against it because it was too expensive and not because it was racist and demeaning?
That is the history behind the decision on the role of John Sing. I believe if I had not accepted Tony's very generous offer to participate I would still be waiting for an actor for John. The fact is Tony was brilliant in the story and might help get us a broadcast deal.

Now we're getting somewhere closer to the truth.

Just a few more things I would like to point out

Firstly, with regards to Billy and the other dozen or so very real characters from that period whose stories we have borrowed, we have always tried to make it clear that this story is a combination of fact and fiction and is not a literal telling of Billy's life. This is a convention both legal and acceptable in literature and film. It has been employed by writers and film makers from the birth of Hollywood. How many "Legends of Wyatt Earp" has there been, how many "Legends of Robin Hood"? Not one of the last three Hollywood Robin Hoods was English born.
You sir are a douche.  A relic of the White Australia days.  Do you remember the White Australia days?  How was it for you, good/normal?  Now try to imagine, or if you have no imagination do some research on the real life experiences of Asians and half-Asians during those times.   The eurasians of those days were treated just as poorly as their Chinese fathers, so what if their mother was white.  Do you know that if Billy had tried to enlist in his hometown, where everyone knew of his heritage that he may have not have had the chance to fight in the war at all?  You seem to have no problems white-washing an Australian of Asian heritage, which luckily for you means you don't have to look at the implications of the White Australia Policy.  Cherrypick from history and make it white.

The example you have given above is crap.  All the actors playing Robin Hood are WHITE.  Are you saying that because you have a creative license you can take the character of Billy and do whatever you like?  You can, at the expense of historical accuracy and credibility.  But it means we as a community can criticise and give you shit about it.
Second with regards to the incredible man Billy Sing. I personally see him as first and foremost an Australian. He was no more English (as was his very English mother) than he was Chinese (as was his very Chinese father).
We (Asian Australians) all see ourselves as Australians.  When you say "Australian" you really mean "white Australian".   Go look up the White Australia Policy to see why we don't use terms like English-Australian, Irish-Australian, Welsh-Australian etc.  In fact John Simpson, the guy with the donkey, was born overseas and grew up overseas and had only lived in Australia for 4 years before signing up for the war because he HATED Australia and thought he'd get a free trip back to his beloved England.  Even Simpson would have been considered more Australian than Billy.
He was born in Clermont and raised around Proserpine, he played cricket and hunted kangaroo, he spoke only English with a very broad Australian accent. Whatever racism he may have confronted in his life he defeated with the resilience, the toughness and the tolerance he took to Gallipoli.
Conveniently omitted as a non-event from the series.
He was, like many of us whose predecessors arrived here in the last two hundred years, someone who only knew this country as his home. I would disagree with anyone who suggested that he saw himself as anything other than Australian.

Most importantly, I see Billy as a true hero that was abandoned, even betrayed. by his own country. I have done my best to honor him. He deserves it.

Thanks for reading.
Regards
Geoff"
Note also that Geoff Davis gave the role of Billy Sing to.....his own son Josh Davis!  Fair enough, his son's an actor but it does lead me to ask was this nepotism?  Did Geoff audition any other actors to play Billy?  Did Geoff audition any eurasian actors to play Billy?  Did Geoff give the role of Billy's father to Tony Bonner because of nepotism?

Below are my replies to various reader comments posted on the news.com.au article.

Weiry of Melbourne Posted at 11:30 AM Today

Have any of the people complaining about this ever seen a picture of Billy Sing? He didn't exactly look like he was of Chinese origin. He looked more caucasian than anything else. Had they cast an asian looking actor it would have been a misrepresentation as well.

Comment 5 of 235

I don't have a problem with a white actor playing Billy, though I would prefer an eurasian.  Regardless of whether he looked of Chinese origin, he is of Chinese origin.  No I don't think he  looks caucasian, he looks mixed.

I agree with this comment posted on another forum:

"The fact of that matter is if you want to highlight Australia's century long habit of sending troops to wars that ostensibly (naively) have nothing to do with Australia, then you didn't need to pick Billy Sing's story. You could have picked any of a number of famous rags to warriors tales from our military past. And with so much production downtime, you had plenty of opportunity to rewrite. But then you'd miss the sucker punch of Billy Sing. 

The problem is it becomes a blatant attempt to use the inspiring and popular story of an Australian war hero for a cause that although worthy, overlooks events that could have equally as much, if not more impact for the storyline, had it retained more of the true Sing story. "

Join the Asian ANZACs facebook page. 

You may also like to read about Caleb Shang.

Angels in New York - 4 part series on SBS

Just saw the advert for this, looks quite interesting.  It's a four part series with part one starting at 8:30pm on Thursday.  I think you can watch them online at SBS after they air on free-to-air.

Angels in New York
Two young Aussie rookie producers attempt the seemingly impossible: to take an unknown musical straight to Broadway! Set in New York, New Orleans, LA and Sydney, this series follows the journey of two rookie Australian producers who dream of taking their unknown musical straight to Broadway. Meet Marcus Cheong, a graduate Architect, and Ken Lai, an aeronautical engineer, who have dedicated four years to writing the book, music and lyrics for Angels: The Musical", heavily influenced by Star Wars, The Matrix, Lord of the Rings and the flying excitement of Cirque de Soleil.
 
Episode 1:
Air Date: 18 February 2010 8:30 PM
Two Aussie boys have a dream to take their unknown musical straight to Broadway.
 
Episode 2:

Air Date: 24 February 2010 8:30 PM

The team heads south in search of funds and a theatre. Frank's connections in the South take them to Louisiana in search of Christian dollars to find new investors into the project.
 
Episode 3:
Air Date: 4 March 2010 8:30 PM
The clock is ticking and the team start to feel the full pressure of their off Broadway opening debut in Louisiana in just 8 weeks time.
 
Episode 4:
Air Date: 11 March 2010 8:30 PM
The world awakes to a cold chill and the crash of the stock markets around the globe. Can the musical survive?

For more news headlines that may not be posted on the Asians Down Under blog, visit the facebook page.

Mao's Last Dancer - The film, out in October

"The film of Mao’s Last Dancer is in the post-production stage. A great creative team, wonderful cast of many talented dancers, great actors and dedicated crew are involved in bringing Li’s story onto the silver screen. The filming took the cast to China, Australia and America. The film is scheduled for release in the second half of 2009.

Director - Bruce Beresford: Driving Miss Daisy, Breaker Morant, Black Robe, The Contract and other films.

Producer - Jane Scott: Shine, Crocodile Dundee II, Head On and other films.

Screenplay Writer - Jan Sardi: Shine, The Notebook, Love’s Brother and other films."

http://www.licunxin.com/film.htm

Stars Bruce Greenwood, Joan Chen, Jack Thompson, Aden Young and various other actors.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1071812/

I've read the book and am really looking forward to seeing this movie. Cunxin had an extraordinary life, few could imagine the heights he would reach when he reached his full potential. Add to that the friction between CN and the US at the time and you've got a really compelling storyline. I think he's living in Sydney now with his wife and three kids.