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Interview with Rose Kuo, by Gregory Austin Nwakunor and Michael Orie
African Filmmakers Need To Extend their Contact With World Cinema Circuit, says American film specialist, Rose Kuo
critique
rédigé par Gregory Austin Nwakunor
publié le 10/08/2008
Rose KUO
Rose KUO

Rose Kuo has worked both in film festival programming as well as film production for over 20 years. Kuo, 48, began her journey as a professional fest-hopper in the mid-'80s as a volunteer at Berlin. She has since been a prominent figure on the California circuit. A programming consultant specialising in Asian film, Kuo served as a consultant to the San Francisco International Film Festival, the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, LACMA Film Screening and the Mill Valley Film Festival. She has an intensive background as a filmmaker, working as an assistant to Oscar-winning editor, Thelma Schoonmaker, and as a camera assistant to the famed cinematographer, Haskel Wexler. Kuo has also worked with such top directors as Michael Mann's 1986 TV series Crime Story, Paul Schrader's Light of Day, Ed Zwick and Martin Scorsese's The Colour of Money. Well versed in both international and American cinema, Kuo has worked on several independent films, as post-production supervisor on Maggie Greenwald's The Kill off and as executive producer on Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland' s The Fluffer and Categories of AIDS Ride'94 - a documentary, which she wrote, produced and directed. After the Fluffer in 2001, Kuo worked as a consultant for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, programming retrospectives for Hou and Abbas Kiarostami and developing an intimate knowledge of the city's arthouse venues. It was at this time that she first crossed paths with American Film Institute, AFI's Fest, interviewing for a programming post - a gig she ultimately declined, along with any other full-time film work, to devote her full attention to her family. Six years later, including one spent abroad with her family in Shanghai, Kuo returned to Los Angeles in time to hear that AFI was looking for an artistic director. Having continued to steep herself in world cinema and the festival scene even during her sabbatical, and eager to start working full-time again, she saw the opportunity as a no-brainer. In this interview with GREGORY AUSTIN NWAKUNOR and MICHAEL ORIE, she reveals the American Film Institute's plan to help develop the local film industry and also, plans to have Nigerian filmmakers on the AFI 20/20 project. Excerpt

When did you start, and what is your involvement at the AFI Fest?

I started at the AFI FEST June 2007. I am the Artistic Director of the festival.

What do you think the main focus of the AFI Fest is?

I think the focus is to bring the best of international cinema to Los Angeles.

How strong do you think the presence of international cinema is at the AFI Fest?

Representing great films from around the world is the mandate of our festival, so, we are strong in the selection of international cinema; we host attendees from around the world. We have an excellent selection of Spanish language cinema, particularly from Mexico. With Asia, we have films from China, Korea, Japan, and our first Singaporean film at the festival, Solos.

What is the selection process of the films for the AFI Fest?
We get over 4,000 entries of features, documentaries and shorts. We have a screening committee that views all the films several times and in addition, someone from the programming staff views the films as well. Basically, we start to narrow the film selection down as we are viewing the films. There are a lot of things that are considered: where the filmmakers are from and the subject matter - all things are considered. We go to other festivals and try to gauge what is going on around the world in cinema; what are the main issues, trends, and observe what regions seem to be more active, and then we start to shape the programme.

What is AFI 20/20?

AFI 20/20 is a continual diplomacy project, which we began two years ago. AFI selects about a dozen filmmakers to travel round the world to show their films and we have to reach region far as China, Turkey, Israel, South Africa, Latin America, USA, among others. We are entering the third year and we want to do some outreach in this region because we don't have a lot of West Africans applying to the film festival. AFI is a 21year-old institution, and the festival is going to have its 22nd festival this year, from October 30 to November 9, we have shown over 150 films, 100 of them are feature films from about 37 countries. The screening committee has begun the interviewing session for the award season, exhibition and preview of studio films along with world cinema and discovery section, which shows both the feature and documentary films.

The financing of the AFI project 20/20, was it independently?

The financing came from the present council that is from several US government agencies that oversees the arts to the combination of the present council of Arts and humanity. At the NEA, The National Endowment Art. NEH, National Endowment Humanity and IMSL, Institution for Museum and Library Services. We have several government agencies who are our social partners; they collectively form the programme. So is collaboration between AFI and the present council of Art and humanities.

What else does AFI project 20/20 plan to do here in West Africa?

We want to build collaboration and potential areas of collaboration with Communication For Change, a non govermental organisation and Ford Foundation in West Africa. These two organisations are very good instruments for changing the West African cinema, the filmmakers and the industry in its entirety. We were invited here to observe the industry and to start a discussion with the two organisation to see what might be the possibility in the future, for collaborating and helping to develop programmes in West Africa.

Is any Nigerian involved in it?

No. We have very few countries that are participating; just about 20 filmmakers.

How soon are you getting a Nigerian involved?

Well, we will first have to get a Nigerian film in one of the foremost American film festivals because we select the 20/20 candidate from those festivals. So, they must apply to the film festival before getting to the 20/20 project.

What is your role?

Our role is that we select filmmakers who have participated on AFI fest or one of AFI film festivals to travel around the world with the film. So, it is done on invitation.

As somebody who organises the event what are your day to day responsibility?
I spend half of my year travelling around the world to attend festivals, like this year I've gone to Sundance, Berlin International festivals, Mexico City, Dallas, New York, France, China, Nigeria, Canada and I watch dozens of film from festivals half a year and try to select films from those films I have seen. We have opened up submission process and currently we have about 3000 to 4000 features, documentary and short films that have been sent to our office for consideration, we have a 35-member screening committee to help us watch the movies, recommend and shortlist movies for us to see, if there is a problem between movie and the people. So, we spend from January to August watching films and selecting films and from this month, we will invite the filmmakers to prepare for the film festival. I do oversee the year's theatre service and we have three theatres for that, in Los Angeles, we show classic films, that are about to be realised by the company and we usually present them with the director, a work or cast to talk about the film. We also invite very established and well-known directors to come and show their films and also talk about their own work and the inspiration behind the making.

Your encounter with film

I WAS actually a filmmaker; I was involved in film production. I was working on studio films for about five years, then I became a camera person as well as working as a programmer for the film festival. I'm the artistic director of AFI in Los Angeles, which is a part of AFI. I left production about 10 years ago. Actually, I was doing both, side by side. I do spend eight to nine months on film production while three to four months for film festivals. I did this for more than 10 years, so, I took some time out and when I come back, I will work for only film festivals.

Your experience of the production aspect and that of organising festivals, which one do you think has been more challenging?

They are equally challenging in different ways, they are very similar; they both involve participation. You use all available knowledge to restructure an idea to give you what you want. The main difference is that when making a film, a lot of physical energy is involved and it is easier when you are younger to be travelling from location to location sleeping for two hours; getting up at 3am and working in the rain and in the heat. Physical knowledge of literature is necessary and constant brainstorm is useful. I love both production and film festival organisation, and never want to choose any. I know it is quite unusual to do both, but it is great to be a filmmaker, and I love to run film festivals because I really understand the nitty gritty of filmmaking.

As the artistic director of the film festivals you are so deep in the organisation of festivals, what is your encounter with film festivals in Africa?

I have never attended a film festival in Africa.

Why?

Before now, my area of specialisation was region cinema; however, earlier, it was the America independent cinema. I never had the opportunity because going to film festivals was more to panellise, it pays to extend a programme at a goal; so I never got time to attain a film festival in Africa.

Before you quit production, how many film did you work on?

I have worked on many films.

What motivated you to pick up a career in film industry?
I love cinema, I grew up in a small town in the middle of the country called Kansas and film was something I spent a lot of time doing when I was younger. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that my parents were from China and when I was very young I remember my parents taking me to the university where there was a Chinese language film that will show this is the town with only one high school. My parents also showed me foreign film when I was young. So may be that's where it came from.

How do you coupe six months outside your family?

When I travel, I make it compulsory not to spend more than a week at a time. I have travelled a lot this year, trying to introduce the festival sector because I started with AFI a year ago. So, I need to travel a little bit more and meet everyone. I have travelled for 20 years; so it is not something unusual.

Encounter with Nollywood

THOUGH I have little knowledge of this region, I came to Nigeria because it has one of the most thriving film industries in the world; and so many people talk about it. Before now, my impression is that the industry grew very rapidly. The industry has been on for 16 years, but has grown steadily, quickly. I think when movements like this occur in a region with so much films being produced, in video, DVD, and whenever there are so much activities going on in the region, it is always interesting to watch what is going to happen to that region because things that get produced is unexpected.
Though I have heard a lot of people say that Nollywood is just commercial in nature, the films are simple, but what can't be taken away is that its a commercial-driven industry. One of the criticisms I get is that the same marketers make the same story over and over again with different characters, that the same person plays the same role in different films; what I will say is that Nollywood sounds a lot like Hollywood. It is just that Hollywood has a lot of money. They are in the business of making movie for all strata as an electronic device. They are in the business of making entertainment that is profitable. They are not in the business of art cinema. The scale is different but the goals are similar.
It is going to take a creative filmmaker to figure out how to take the system that is in Nollywood and the limitations that are inherent in the film culture and figure out how to make a movie interesting within these limitations. I think filmmakers will be very creative to figure out the solutions within the limitations that they have.
Nollywood is like the US independent industry, where a group of filmmaker decided to find another way of filing out a movie out of the studio. I have much faith that Nollywood will change because there are filmmakers who want to work in different ways and they will find that way. It only takes one filmmaker from the West Africa region or Nollywood to break out to land on the world cinema film and being considered as a serious filmmaker and that will encourage the change.

Your encounter with the stakeholder of the Nollywood in the workshop what kind of idea does it give you?

As a new industry that has some things to offer, I see that the industry is not completely established; because I see a kind of gap mostly in the distribution aspect. There are some participants who belong to Nollywood and some outside it. It has two tiers. A level type of distribution and B type - they will do distribution differently, so unifying them matters a lot.

Gregory Austin Nwakunor and Michael Orie

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