Cannes in hindsight...

So I really need to find the time to update this blog more often, but it's hard to find the time to do anything when you're so pre-occupied doing everything to get a film off the ground. :-I While I was in Cannes, I had dinner with Davien and I was telling her that I really did not expect the whole process to be as long as it has been; it's really a super marathon more than it is a sprint. But things are slowly winding down, and I can almost see the light at the end of a tunnel.

Cannes, Cannes, Cannes was fun. It was busy as hell first trying to get people into the screening rooms of my film, and then trying to hand my film to important enough people to consider for distribution. Now, it's really just a waiting game, but having been doing this film thing for some years now, I've learnt not to expect anything. It's an evil necessity.

I really do hope my film goes to Telluride though. It's the greatest film festival in the States that's held in Colarado over Labour Day weekend. Man, if that happens, it'll all be worthwhile.

People often ask me how I expect my film to do in Singapore, given that it is such a different style of storytelling, and in all honesty, I don't expect that it'll do all that well; meaning, in Singapore, I don't expect that people would flock to theaters to watch the film, like they would a Royston Tan/Jack Neo film. When I was pitching the idea of my film, I often refered to it as a cross between Coffee and Cigarettes and Before Sunrise. Coffee and Cigarettes made a total of $2000 at the box office in Singapore, so yah...

It's not always an easy thing to watch a conversation film; most people will find it boring and understandably so, but it's the school of filmmaking that I endorse, that I love. Films like My Dinner with Andre, Coffee and Cigarettes, Days of Being Wild, Masculin/Feminine, The Breakfast Club, Before Sunrise, Walking and Talking, Juno, do it for me more than the Spidermans, or Ironmans, or whatever big film they're trying to make into a franchise.

I always like to think that a person is made up by the films that he watches. I can tell whether I can get along with someone by looking at his/her DVD collection, whether he thinks Infernal Affairs, The Departed is a better film. I used to room with someone who thought The Departed was a better film than Infernal Affairs, and conincidentally, I hated her. :-)

When it's all said and done, I think I'll look back at this three and a half year journey fondly. Next film will either be a Cluedo/Murder mystery or a Romantic Comedy called 'The Habits of Five Kinds of Men (in Bed)'.