Hong Kong still front and centre at Italy's Far East Film Festival
Jackie Chan puts in an appearance, recent Hong Kong movies Kung Fu Jungle and Sara are shown, and Roger Garcia programmes a kung fu film retrospective at Udine event
It was raining outside, but the drizzly weather didn't dampen the enthusiasm of viewers at Italy's 17th Far East Film Festival. Moviegoers in the northern city of Udine's elegant Teatro Nuovo Giovanni opera house, which had been converted into a cinema for the occasion, clapped along with the introductory music each night, and greeted each guest with unabated glee.
The annual festival, which ran from April 23 to May 2, bills itself as a celebration of Asian popular cinema, and features hit films and celebrities from across the region. Hong Kong directors Teddy Chen Tak-sum and Herman Yau Lai-to were present, for screenings of Kung Fu Jungle and Sara respectively, while Japanese composer Joe Hisaishi appeared in a special show, conducting a symphony orchestra brought in from neighbouring Slovenia. Even Jackie Chan, still loved by action fans abroad, turned up for a screening of Dragon Blade.
Seventeen years is a long time for a film festival, especially one which started off as a fun project for Asian film fans in a small makeshift cinema. There have been problems along the way: a few years ago, the festival, like many in Europe, was hit by substantial funding cuts due to the financial crisis. But the festival's ever-resourceful organisers, president Sabrina Baracetti and co-ordinator Thomas Bertacche, worked hard to cover the shortfall with private investment and sponsorship, and this year's event was deemed by many to be one of the most enjoyable ever.
What's more, the festival's success has not gone unnoticed in Asia, says Bertacche, an amiable film fan who has acquired an expansive knowledge of popular Asian movies. "We spent 17 years building our reputation as the place to come to see popular Asian films - movies that audiences actually watch in their own countries, rather than ones that are only seen at film festivals," he says.
"That reputation has gradually spread to Asia. Filmmakers and distributors come because they realise that it is good for them and their films to be here."
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