Hanoi’s first international film festival

A scene in the film Choi Voi by director Bui Thac Chuyen

The first ever Vietnamese International Film Festival will take place in Hanoi from October 17 to 21 to mark the 1,000th anniversary of Thang Long-Hanoi, reports the Vietnam News Agency.

Le Ngoc Minh, the deputy head of Vietnam’s Cinematography Department under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, announced the festival on September 7 saying the festival would focus on Asian cinema.

Minh said the festival would promote cultural exchanges and cooperation between international and regional filmmakers by screening the latest films from across Southeast Asia.

Feature films, short films and documentary films produced in 2009 or 2010 that have not been screened abroad before or not been screened in Asia before October 21 can enter. Entries must have not been screened on TV or internet. There will be 10 feature films, 10 documentary films and 10 short films selected.

Films that don’t qualify for the festival will be screened on “World cinematography on Wednesday” or “Contemporary Vietnamese films”.

The judging panel will include five members for feature films, three for short, documentaries and cartoon films and three for the Network of the Promotion of Asian Cinema section. Among them are Vietnamese directors including feature film director Dang Nhat Minh, documentary film director Bui Dinh Hac and film critic Ngo Phuong Lan.

There will be a total of eight prizes awarded, including best feature film, best short film, best documentary, best director, best actor and actress and a prize of the Network of the Promotion of Asian Cinema, plus a media prize.

During the five-day event, there will be three seminars on Vietnam’s film industry. An exhibition of photos, an open air film screening and a meet and greet with actors and filmmakers will also be held.

The opening and closing ceremonies of the festival will be at the National Convention Center in Hanoi and will be broadcast live on VTV3.

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Belgian film director lectures on documentaries

The renowned Belgian film director Thierry Michel will teach Vietnamese directors and cinematography students how to make documentary films at a five-day training course, starting on September 6.

The course has been jointly sponsored by the Wallonie-Bruxelles delegation to Vietnam and Vietnam’s National Documentary and Scientific Film Studio, as part of an ongoing program of cooperation.

The course will help the trainees to analyze Vietnamese and foreign documentary films for reference, as well as films that have been completed, including documentary films projects of Vietnam.

Also as part of the course, the trainees will have the opportunity to discuss trends and renewal of documentary film making in Asia and other parts of the world as well as the techniques required by Asian and global TV channels. They will analyze the weak and strong points of Vietnamese documentaries so they can integrate the country’s film industry into world cinema.

The participants will also be taught how to create and form the necessary scenarios to meet the requirements of European film producers and TV channels.

Thierry Michel, who is also journalist and a lecturer at the Institute des Arts de Diffusion (IAD) in Belgium, has produced two feature films along with numerous well known documentaries including Mobutu the King of Zai-ia, the Congo River, Children of Rio, Iran: Veiled Appearances, the Metamorphosis of a Train Station and Donka.

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