The 67th San Francisco International Film Festival
Founded in 1957, the San Francisco International Film
Festival is the longest running film festival in
the Americas. Even though in 2016, the festival adopted
a new name, SFFILM
Festival, the original title remains as most
people's reference point.
This year marks the 67th edition of the festival, and it
continues a striking trend of downsizing
its programming and duration. This year, the festival
only has 22 narrative features and 14 documentary
features, notably a handful of the selected feature films
were also part of this year's Sundance
Film Festival. The festival's duration is also cut
almost by half compared to the past, and only lasts five
days, April 24-28, 2024.
On Wednesday, April 24, the festival opens
with the Bay Area filmmaker Sean
Wang's semi-autobiographical directorial feature
debut "Didi"
(弟弟 | USA 2023 | in English/Mandarin | 90
min.), which won the Audience Award at this year's
Sundance Film Festival. It tells a coming-of-age story of
a 13-year-old boy's first happenings while growing up in
a loving family in Fremont, CA.
The festival closes
on Sunday, April 28, with another directorial feature
debut but featuring a 93-year-old lady—Josh
Margolin's comedy "Thelma"
(USA 2024 | 94 min.). It tells the story of its titular
character who fights back against a phone scammer.
(You may click on each still image for the corresponding
screening or event's show time and ticket information.)
This year, the festival has two tribute programs to
celebrate two outstanding artists—Oscar-nominated
filmmaker Chiwetel
Ejiofor and award-winning San
Franciscan Joan
Chen. On Saturday, April 27, after an on-stage
conversation, Chiwetel
Ejiofor's new film "Rob
Peace" (USA/Brazil 2024 | 119 min.) will
have its West Coast premiere. On Sunday, April 28,
following an on-stage conversation, Joan
Chen's directorial debut
feature "Xiu Xiu:
The Sent Down Girl" (天浴 |
China/USA 1998 | in Mandarin | 99 min.) will be shown on
a 35 mm print.
Even though the festival's program is relatively
smaller, this year's Asian films have a remarkable
presence. Besides opening night's Asian American
film "Didi"
and the special screening of Joan
Chen's "Xiu Xiu:
The Sent Down Girl", there are a few
interesting Asian films or films telling stories about
Asian Americans or Asia. Here are a few samplers.
Black Box Diaries
(Japan/USA/UK 2024 | in Japanese/English | 99 min. | Documentary)
The #MeToo movement
against sexual violence has made some progress in
Western countries, but not much so in Asian
countries like Japan. Named as one of the 100 most
influential people in the world by Time magazine in
2020, Japanese journalist Shiori
Ito (伊藤 詩織) changed
that status quo by publishing a book, "Black Box,"
in 2017 to criticize sexism in Japan's society and
institutions based on her own experience as a rape
victim. She also turns her courageous fight into a
deeply personal and moving
documentary, "Black
Box Diaries."
This powerful film chronicles her battle in Japan's
criminal justice system, which is still upholding
the outdated and unjust 110-year-old law toward
rape victims. Instead of keeping silent as most of
the sexual assault victims do in
Japan, Shiori
Ito went public and accused her predator,
Noriyuki Yamaguchi, who is a high-profile Japanese
journalist and a close personal friend to the prime
minister Shinzo Abe. Over several years, she writes
diaries to document the emotionally draining
journey of seeking justice for herself and for
other sexual assault victims, and candidly shares
her personal story in this extraordinary
documentary.
Agent
of Happiness (Bhutan/Hungary 2023 | in
Dzongkha/Nepali | 94 min. | Documentary)
What might be your answers if you are asked this
question, "How happy and satisfied are you with
life?" If that sounds like too big of a question
to answer, how about answering some simpler questions
such as "how many cows do you have?" or "do you have
a TV?" or "how much sleep do you get?"
That's how the Bhutan citizens are surveyed by 75
trained agents roaming the country to conduct the
yearly census about happiness. The answers collected
then are aggregated into a number, called Gross
National Happiness Index, to measure the citizens'
happiness.
The fascinating documentary "Agent
of Happiness" follows one of these survey
agents, 40-year-old bachelor Amber
Kumar Gurung, traveling around the beautiful
mountain villages, and samples some of the answers
from interviewed individuals. This engrossing film,
co-directed by Bhutanese director Arun
Bhattarai and Hungarian
director Dorottya
Zurbó, terrifically captures the daily lives
of some of the characters and provokes us to question
the credibility of such survey and whether it
truthfully reflects the happiness of the nation's
citizens.
Even though happiness is what Amber and his
colleague Guna Raj
Kuikel talk about with others all the time while
traveling around, he almost never smiles and seems
very unhappy himself. Amber serves as the only
caregiver for his aging mother, he desperately looks
for a woman to marry, and he is frustrated of not
being granted citizenship which is causing all kinds
of hardship for him.
For others interviewed by them, the results can vary
widely. For example, the man who has three wives and
11 children in four years sounds really happy; so
does the young couple who don't have much but adore
their two young sons. However, a 17-year-old girl who
has helped her alcoholic mother since she was twelve
has a heavy burden on her young mind; so is the
transgender woman who worries about her future and
next life.
The happiness index is calculated based on 148
questions in 9 categories. Some of the questions
range from silly to ridiculous, and others should
have been only asked by a licensed therapist. The
film doesn't explain the details about how the
happiness index for each individual is calculated,
nor tell us why some are asked one set of questions
while others are offered with different ones. More
interestingly, some of the answers appear to be
randomly determined by Amber and his colleague
Guna. Observed from the interviews in the film, I can
certainly conclude that the survey is neither
statistically valid nor scientifically sound. The claim
that 93.6% of Bhutanese are happy this year, an
increase of 3.3% from last year, is severely
doubted.
Despite that the happiness index numbers are
questionable, the film offers a glimpse of how
Bhutanese live on top of the mountains and the unique
culture they cherish and embrace. Some of the
citizens don't seem to have much material possession,
but they are content with what they have and they
appear very happy with their lives. That clearly
echoes the wisdom from one Chinese proverb:
"Happiness lies in contentment"
(知足者常乐).
Even if a number can measure one's happiness, it's
probably not the number Amber and other agents are
coming up with.
Sidonie
in Japan (Sidonie au Japon |
France/Germany/Switzerland/Japan 2023 | in
French/Japanese/English | 95 min.)
Quite often, a movie about ghosts in Japan falls into
the horror genre. But there is nothing scary in the
director Élise
Girard's drama "Sidonie
in Japan." It tells a story about a
French author going to Japan for a book tour, only
to encounter the ghost of her late husband, while
developing a bit of affection toward her publisher of
her book's Japanese translation.
Sidonie Perceval (Isabelle
Huppert)'s book was just translated and published
in Japan. Invited by her publisher Kenzo
Mizoguchi (Tsuyoshi
Ihara), she comes to Japan for a book tour,
accompanied by Kenzo who acts almost like a
bodyguard.
Sidonie appears to have never been to Japan before,
nor knows much about Japanese customs. She mimics
hotel workers' bows and feels strange by Kenzo's
behavior. However, the two quickly find something in
common—they are both survivors of personal
tragedies. Sidonie has lost not only her parents in a
car accident, but also her husband Antoine Percevel
(August
Diehl) in another car accident, and she survives
those accidents unscratched. Kenzo has lost his
relatives tracing back multiple generations.
Soon after Sidonie arrives in Japan, she starts to
see her late husband Antoine showing up around
her. Even though Antoine is a ghost figure and
doesn't have any physical form other than an image,
he is able to communicate with Sidonie and tries to
help her to come to a closure. Meanwhile, Sidonie
begins to have some feelings toward Kenzo. A
productive trip, isn't it?
Élise
Girard unfolds her story in a low-key manner
that's quite fitting for some of the scenery
locations in Japan, for example, a cemetery or a
river bank lined with cherry blossom. However, the
story lacks the emotional gravity as
in "All of
Us Strangers" (2023) which has a similar
setup about reconnecting with loved ones in a ghost
form.
The romance between Sidonie and Kenzo also seems to
be a little forced, and there is little chemistry
between the two on screen. Perhaps the director
Élise
Girard already realized that, and she chose to
use still images to display the intimacy of these two
characters, rather than live actions. It makes you
wonder if the romance is real after all, like the
ghosts.
Labeled as "Observation Film #10," the
director Kazuhiro
Sôda's new mesmerizing
documentary "The
Cats of Gokogu Shrine" is definitely
observant and inquisitive about stray cats living at
the site of Gokogu Shrine (五⾹宮)
in the seaside town of Ushimado
(牛窓) in Japan. But his camera, as curious as
those cats he filmed, extends beyond the playful cats
into the surrounding aging community.
Apparently, the cats around Gokogu Shrine are quite
well-known. People from near and far frequently come
to feed, pet, and adore these stray cats. But as
complained by the locals, they only come to feed them
but don't take care of the poop from these cats. They
also create a wrong impression that people can
abandon their cats here, because they will be fed
often by other people.
We hardly see any young people in the film. A group
of most elderly volunteers maintain the shrine, tend
the plants, look after each other, clean after the
cats, and even neuter the cats to control the
population. They also share their life stories and
their candid opinions about these cats.
In this film, the director Kazuhiro
Sôda subtly captures the daily details and
slowly assembles them into a complete mosaic that is
both fascinating and mesmerizing. His filmmaking
style is strikingly similar to how the legendary
documentarian Frederick
Wiseman makes his films, except Sôda's film
is much shorter and he sometimes interacts with the
subjects he is filming while on camera,
which Frederick
Wiseman never doe.s
Regardless of whether you are a cat lover or not,
after watching this documentary, those cats at Gokogu
Shrine will stay with you for a long time, as well as
those kind elderly people who take care of nature and
the living. You wonder what their future will be
like.
Great
Absence
(大いなる不在 |
Japan 2023 | in Japanese | 152 min.)
As we live longer, dementia has become more and more
prevalent, especially in Japan which has about five
millions people suffering from this terrible
disease. Based on his own experience, the Japanese
director
Kei
Chika-ura's poignant sophomore
feature "Great
Absence" unfolds a son's quest to
reconnect with his estranged father who suffers from
dementia. It's heartbreaking to see how an intelligent
and romantic mind can completely slip away.
The film opens with an amusing scene of the police
raiding a home after a hostage situation is
reported. By the end of the film, that amusing scene
has become profoundly somber, because the call is made
by the elderly physicist Yohji (Tatsuya
Fuji), whose dementia has become so severe that
he can no longer make any sense, nor take care of
himself.
After he is admitted to a medical facility, his
estranged son Takashi (Mirai
Moriyama), an actor playing in a contemporary
play, is summoned to sign some legal documents. It
turns out that it has been years since the father and
son connected. When Takashi was young, Yohji left his
family for his first love Naomi (Hideko
Hara), and Takashi lost touch with Yohji. Even
when Takashi got married to Yuki (Yôko
Maki), Yohji was absent.
Now, when Yohji completely loses his mind, Takashi
begins to piece together who his father Yohji really
is. It is almost like a detective job for him because
it's too late for him to talk to Yohji directly. He
can only look for clues from Yohji's love notes
attached to Naomi's diary, the sticky-notes posted
all over the house to remind himself about daily
tasks, and the surviving friends who used to know
Yohji. It's a way for Takashi to search for the
father he lost, twice.
In this slow burning film, the director
Kei
Chika-ura vividly brings the devastation of
dementia to the front and center, and develops a
moving father-son relationship. Using a structure of
going back and forth in time, he carefully reveals
some of the mysteries his characters encounter and
intentionally leaves the rest unresolved, just like
life itself.
Winning the best actor award at last
year's San
Sebastian Festival, Tatsuya
Fuji gives a calibrated and arresting performance
as the aging professor. He was also the fantastic
lead actor in Kei
Chika-ura's directorial feature
debut "Complicity"
(コンプリシティ 優しい共犯
| Japan 2018). The rest of the cast are also
terrific, especially Mirai
Moriyama as Yohji's son, Takashi.
The film could have been shortened from its two and
half hour running time. Takashi's contemporary play
scenes seem unnecessary to be included, because they
only distract from the main story, and don't add
anything to the Takashi character. We already learn
so much more about him, and feel his pain and sorrow
when we hear him recite Yohji's love notes to Noami.
