Hey folks, here's a bit of a report from ROTTERDAM from the Rotterdam International Film Festival. Hopefully we'll here from the likes of The Beast or Joram... but let's wait and see. I had a wonderful time last year at the festival... and hopefully will return in the next couple of years. It really is a wonderful festival and city. Here's Amsterdam Pat...
Hey Harry,
This is just a short report about the first few days of the International Rotterdam Film Festival (IFFR) in the Netherlands.
I'll start with some information of the festival.
The festival takes place since 1971. In 1999, there were more than 300,000 tickets sold, 460 titles presented at 1,060 screenings, 1,999 guests (INCLUDING HARRY KNOWLES, as the guest of honor). All of this was covered by 487 journalist, 211 of which were foreign press. (You can naturally find all this information on IMDB)
Last years winners included:
Tiger Award (the main award); Following (1998) - Christopher Nolan
Festen (1998) - Thomas Vinterberg won the Audience Award
The Tiger Award itself isn't very important, but a lot of movies have there
European premiere (or at least their Dutch premiemre) at IFFR.
This year the festivals runs from January 26-February 6 and the main theme is Japanese films, since the Dutch (trade) relationship with Japan has existed for 400 years. One of the sub-programs is called "Bad Teenage Taste" (screening movies such as Election, The Virgin Suicides, South Park - Bigger, Longer & Uncut)
Visit the official website for the main programme at THIS LINK
It's the largest public film festival in Europe and the largest cultural event in the Netherlands. It has more visitors, screenings and films every year. Harmony Korine (julien donkey-boy), Terrence Stamp (The Limey) are some of most known people walking around here (along with a lot of Japanese directors).
The program has some similarities with Sundance. For instance "But I'm a Cheerleader", "Absolute Giganten" (Gigantics), "The Cup", "New Waterford Girl", "Not One Less", "The Virgin Suicides." It is also showing interesting movies such as "Swimming", "Fucking Amal" (Show Me Love), "Moloch", "American Movie", "Lies", "Wildside", "Todo Sobre Mi Madre" (All About My Mother), "Boys Don't Cry", "julien donkey-boy", "Felicia's Journey", "Rosette", "Ghost Dog - The Way of the Samurai", "Strike". Not to mention all the main-stream American movies, which are always released MONTHS after the US release in the Netherlands. (The opening-movie was "The Insider")
So far I've seen 15 movies in the last 5 days and I'll see another 15 during this week. I don't have time to write short reviews and my personal opinion now (will do later this week!), because the Japanese Sci-Fi "The Dimension Travellers" starts in half an hour and I'm going to see that.
I CAN already tell you the public favorites. After three days no movie was able to knock down the Swedish film Fucking Amal (Show Me Love) of the charts. Today that finally happenned.
The current Top 10 movies (the number one will win the public's choice award) are:
Tuesday January 1, 2000
1. Solas
2. De Grote Vakantie (Dutch film)
3. Fucking Amal (Show Me Love)
4. Todo Sobre Mi Madre (All About My Mother)
5. GhostDog: The Way of the Samurai
6. Boy's Don't Cry
7. Erleuchtung Garantiert
8. The Winslow Boy
9. The Cup
10. The Insider
This will definately ALL change. Being John Malkovich, Absolute Giganten (Gigantics), Not One Less, might still make the list by the end of the week. The biggest disappointments so far have been "Holy Smok"e (though I thought it was OK), "Topsy-Turvy", "Lies", and the director's cut of The Wild Side (a.k.a. Wildside, starring Christopher Walken and Anne Heche).
Fun movies have been the Japanese horror-succes "Ring", the original Japanese version of "Princess Mononoke" (with an introduction by the director!), "The Cup" and lots more, but I have to go!
call me "Amsterdam-Pat"
