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The award never lies
A jubilant Nadine Chandrawinata, producer of The Mirror Never Lies, holds her APSA Award after the production won best children’s feature film
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span class="inline inline-left">A jubilant Nadine Chandrawinata, producer of The Mirror Never Lies, holds her APSA Award after the production won best children’s feature film. (Courtesy of APSA)The Asia Pacific Screen Awards (APSA) wrapped up its sixth annual award ceremony in Queensland’s capital Brisbane with good news for Indonesia – Kamila Andini’s The Mirror Never Lies took the award for Best Children’s Feature Film.
Kamila Andini’s beautiful film, shot in Wakatobi, Southeast Sulawesi, highlights the Bajo community (sea gypsy) people — a unique culture of people who live on the sea and from the sea.
Dini, the director, was unable to attend, as she’s currently studying in Paris, but producer Nadine Chandrawinata was present and accepted the award at the ceremony on Nov. 23, saying that she was happy to receive it on behalf of all the children of the world, especially Indonesia’s children.
It was quite a coincidence that there was another APSA nominated film, highlighting a community of Muslim sea gypsy people from the Philippines (Badjao), entitled Thy Womb, and directed by Brillante Mendoza. The Badjao live in Tawi-tawi, an island between district of Mindanao and Sabah in Malaysia, close to the border of Indonesia
The total number of films submitted to APSA 2012 was 264, and 34 films from 18 countries survived the elimination process to attain nominations.
In total, nine films were submitted from Indonesia, with two of them making it through the scrupulous nominations process.
The other nominated film was The Land Beneath the Fog, a documentary by Shalahuddin Siregar that won the Special Jury Prize at the 2012 Dubai Film Festival and the Best Film at the Yogya Asian Film Festival in 2011. Shalahuddin has been travelling and publicizing the film since then.
The film is a sensitive portrait of two farmer families, living in the village of Genikan on the slopes of Mount Merbabu in Central Java. It was filmed over a period of years, with research beginning in 2006.
The villagers are vegetables and tobacco farmers; however, a change is disrupting their previously traditional lives. Modernization is encroaching; there have been changes in weather patterns and their traditional and long-standing reliance on the Javanese calendar to plan their agricultural activities, no longer works.
One family has a bright young son who has done very well in primary school. However, the family cannot afford to send him to high school, even though they only need Rp 350,000 (about US$40) to finance his continuing education.
The amount may not seem much for some but for them it is impossible. It is so moving to see the neighbours contributing long-term loans and donations to help this clever boy succeed in life. They all know that education is the key to a better life.
The other family has a very young child, so they give a kind of long-term loan hoping that one day when their child grows older it will be reciprocated.
This is the family with whom Shalahuddin stayed each weekend when he went to Genikan from his job at an NGO in Yogyakarta. He is 33 years old, still single and has lived there for 14 years, since arriving from Blang Kejeren, in Aceh, to study in the city.
He said he did two years research, immersing himself in that village and the filming took place over 18 months, followed by a further 18 months of editing. He cut 118 hours of footage down to 105 minutes.
“The pace of life in the village is very slow and also I had to find the right rhythm for each family,” he said.
His connection with Genikan began in 1987 when he went hiking on the mountain and first came upon the village and made friends there.
‘”Slowly, the people began to tell me their stories and the more I heard and thought about them, working so hard and growing our food, the idea to make a documentary film grew in my mind,” said Shalahuddin.
He studied accounting but only ever worked in that job for one month. He learned to make films by watching them. He prepared a thorough plan for his project and received some assistance in script development from Berlinale.
When asked about any future films in the pipeline, he said, “Not yet. I am too exhausted. When I return to Yogyakarta from Brisbane, I will sleep for six hours, then I must wake up and leave again, first for Vietnam, Laos and then later, France.”
The reputation of APSA has developed over the last six years, so that the region’s top filmmakers are submitting their films, some of them have already received some of the world’s most prestigious prizes, such as the Golden Lion in Venice and Palme D’Or in Cannes, or Silver Bear from Berlin.
In fact, APSA is now often being called “the Oscars of the Asia Pacific”. It is not a film festival (that screens films) but an awards event, similar in structure to The Academy Awards.
From this perspective, it is a great honor for the two Indonesian films to have nominations. For The Mirror Never Lies winning in its category the creators of the film, and the nation, can feel proud of the achievement.
There is a long term intention to build up the profile of APSA and then begin to have every second awards ceremony in a different city in the Asia-Pacific region.
Other outstanding films
The Best Feature Film at APSA 2012 was Beyond the Hill from Turkey. It’s a metaphorical tale depicting humanity’s tendency to be suspicious of strangers, and how this can lead to catastrophe. A tiny village becomes a microcosm of the whole world.
The Jury gave a high commendation to another film in this category Nameless Gangster: The Rules of the Time from The Republic of South Korea, set in the 1980s, about corruption and collusion in high places. Choi Min-sik (made famous by Old Boy) won Best Actor for the same film.
From the Philippines, Brillante Mendoza won Best Director for Thy Womb. Philippines superstar Nora Aunor won Best Actress for her performance in this film. Thy Womb won two major awards and a four minute standing ovation at the Venice Film Festival in 2012.
The Best Cinematography award went to Touraj Aslani from Iran, for his innovative and striking images in Rhino Season, which eloquently expressed the mood of the story.
The Best Screenplay award went to Reis Celik for his touching story Night of Silence, which he also directed. It was based on the life of his grandmother. The two actors won The Crystal Bear in Berlin 2012.
Best Documentary prize went to In My Mother’s Arms — the first film ever submitted to APSA from Iraq. This a heart-rending film about the orphans of Baghdad, and a caring but stressed man who is providing a home for about 35 traumatized children with no financial support from the government.
The Animation category was dominated by four nominations from Japan. The fifth nomination was Happy Feet 2 from Australia. The winner was A Letter to Momo.
Two special Jury Grand Prizes, were awarded to Anurag Kashyap (India) for Gangs of Wasseypur, and actress Cho Min-soo for Pieta (South Korea). Cho Min-soo’s performance was riveting.
The UNESCO Award went to the producers of Seediq Bale (Taiwan), and the NETPAC Award for Best Asian Film, to Marlon Rivera (The Philippines) for Woman in a Septic Tank.
The prestigious FIAPF Award recognized the long career of Ryuichi Sakamoto of Japan, actor and matchless musician, composer of such film scores as Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence (in which he also starred) and The Sheltering Sky. At APSA he was reunited, after 30 years, with Australian actor Jack Thompson (Patron of APSA) who also acted in Mr Lawrence.
– Cynthia Webb
