paris.love in Slovenia - part 2

Outside is raining at the moment so the best thing is to finish with what I have promised.
Sunday was the day of the screening(s). First was at 11 a.m. When Mirella and I came to Kinodvor, there were around 30 people sitting there. Mostly men. Koen told us that each Sunday Albanian comunity gathers and they drink a coffee there. It was very funny. On morning screening we had something like 15 people among whom was also my family: my mother Metka, my brother Andrej and my nieces Manja and Nika. While driving to Ljubljana my nephew Matic got really sick so his mother Mojca took him back home so at the end I didn't see them at all. Mirella's coment after the screening you can see in the first video. Vlado Skafar also came in the morning saying that he doesn't want to take precious seat in the evening. Thank you Vlado. Anyhow, the projection was nice and after it we went for a lunch with my family. It was nice, we spent a nice time but they were in the hurry so they left soon and Mirella and I went for siesta in the hotel. Around 6.30 p.m. Tom, Dzeni and Tomaz from Luksuz Produkcija came to take us back to cinema where we met again Koen and Nina and they invited us for lunch. I was already very excited so I drank also a glass of cognac. At the screening I met a lot of my dear friends and colleagues, I will not tell the names because I'm sure that I will forget someone. As I forgot, when I was presenting the team of collaboraters, to present Jure Moskon, Tom Gomizelj and Tomaz Pavkovic. Guys, I'm really sorry. Next time I will have a list on the paper.

J.J.B.

paris.love in Slovenia - part 1

We came back yesterday (on Monday), today I was trying to put together videos and pictures. It's almost midnight, on googlevideo.com is impossible to upload for a moment, my space has also some problems and on you tube the situation is the same. Till now I succeded uploading two, there are three more to come (maybe I will publish them tomorrow).
We came to Ljubljana on Friday evening. Vlado from Gustavfilm waited for us at the airport and he drived us to hotel. We went out for a dinner, we drank a glass of vine and that was it. On Saturday we met Jure Moskon. We went together to Kinodvor to make a test screening.

After that we were sitting, drinking coffee. This is how I surprised Jure Meden who was working on something. After a while we also met our dear friend from Paris, Reza Serkanian and I made a quick interview.
reza serkanien


The guys from Charlie TV arrived so they made an interview with me and immediately after Katja Lenart made an interview with me for vest.si (you can see it here). And the reverse shot that I made is here.

Then we went for a lunch: Mirella, Reza, Jure, his girlfriend Ivana and me. I took them to Bosnian restaurant to try our speciality cevapcici. Mirella didn't like kajmak (she called it vanilla ice-cream), I was more than glad to eat her portion by myself. After that Jure and Ivana went home and we went back to Kinodvor.
We met there Koen - the program director and Nina - the festival director. The cast on his hand is a consequence of a traditional football match on Isola Cinema Film Festival between guests and voluntary brigade.
He posed for us in front of our poster and after he took a photo of me and Mira. In between we went to see The Teacher, I am ashamed to admit but I felt to sleep although the film was very interesting. Cevapcici in my stomach were just too heavy. We spent the afternoon walking around. We passed by Metelkova where we stoped in Jalla, Jalla. Mira spoted the poster of Desperado Tonic, I haven't even seen it.


The evening was easy, Mirella started to feel sick so we went to sleep early.
Part 2 is cooming soon.

J.J.B.

I was in Cyprus with my film

I came back on Friday but I needed two days to recuperate. Unfortunately from Cyprus I was not able to post my impressions. Anyhow, the Cyprus Inernational Film Festival has finished, the awards were given and now is the time for analysis.
Personally, the festival was one of the most horrifying experiences in my life. When I came to the airport in the middle of the night, noone was waiting for me. I took a taxi, came to hotel at 5 a.m. just at the time to hear the first morning prayer from nearest mosque. Next day, Friday 13th :), I asked at the receptionist desk, where is the cinema where the festival takes place. First, the receptionist didn't know anything about the festival, second, he told me that the cinema is far away from city center and that I have to take a taxi. So, taxi again. When I came there, I couldn't beleive my eyes. This is what I saw:

Of course, the cinema was completely empty (actually, very soon 300 kids arrived to see Mr. Bean). Guy and the girl from the festival were there doing I don't know what. At 5.30, when the screening of paris.love started, we were two (2!) people in the room: Akemi Tachibana, the Japanese director and me. No audience. Not to mention that the first 5 min of the screening was with slovenian subtitles, until I finally didn't find the cinema operator. When the screening ended and I met Stephanos and Danae from the festival, they didn't seem at all disturbed that there was no audience. I was so shocked that I even forgot to be angry. In front of the cinema another shock: fucking limo was there to take Akemi and me back to the hotel. They should use that limo to bring the audience to that from god forgotten place. And these are my feet having fun inside.
However, here I will stop the diary narrative because in next six days things didn't change at all. We were 6 to 10 filmmakers who were watching their films by them self (I arranged another screening of my film so at least 5 people saw it :). If the screening was interrupted less than 3 times, we felt lucky. Some of the films were stoped at the half and never screened till the end. Normally, when we were searching for the cinema operator to tell him that there were problems, we couldn't find him. The worst is that the organisers didn't care about all those things, even worse, they were not even there. Very soon we started to joke about everything, the last defense one can take is to escape into the humour. The first joke by Victor Barrera was that the one who gets the main award will have to stay there for another year :), my joke was that we are collateral damage.
The conclusion is that recently a lot of new film festivals had appeared on the map. A lot of them (qouting guys from Crossing Bridges that just came from one) are run by the people who doesn't have any connection with the cinema: neither as a filmmakers, nor as a cinema lovers. They don't respect filmmakers, they don't care about screenings, they don't care about the audiance (the three most important things!). Obviously they care just about the money (which I don't care if the three first things are fulfilled).
So, be aware of Cyprus Film Festival. And even if you submit your film there, think 10 times before you attend it, because be aware that your dignity as a filmmaker will be challenged on every step. And on their website will everything still look nice and clean.

P.S. - 03.04.2010 - don't mix this event with Cyprus Film Days - their website look like they are serious film buffs

J.J.B.

Hey Ho, Let's Go

This is my table today with things not to forget to take with me on a trip. I've just red the newspapers, the traffic controllers at CDG are on strike, so 2 from 3 flights will be cancelled or delayed. Concidering the fact that the screening of paris.love at the festival will be tomorrow, on Friday 13th, I will obviously have a lot of fun.
J.J.B.

She Is the Boss

"I've never been to the film festival before and now, my first one will be Cannes." That's what Mirella Habr told me on Saturday while we were celebrating the news that she got selected among 60 other young cineasts from France (she represents Parisian region!) to participate The Cannes Film Festival. Seven from them will form Jury-Jeunes, the jury that will decide the laureat of Prix de la Jeunesse. During the festival they will attend a lot of screenings and workshops and of course, they will meet a lot of interesting filmmakers.
My cooperation with Mirella goes back to first years at Eicar film school. We worked a lot together, at the time she was the most wanted script supervisor at the school and I DOP-ed her fiction short film Crisis in Hell. After that, at her age of 22, she produced my feature paris.love. Here is a nice picture of her from that shoot.

After that I again DOP-ed her documentary Little Beirut and our cooperation went into several other directions, but here, I will keep them hidden:). She speaks five languages fluently and she is one of the most talented and creative people I've ever met. Be aware, she is on the move.
J.J.B.