Young Chinese directors content with Cannes Film Festival debuts, whether they win or lose
For Wei Shujun and Shen Di, the memo that their films had been shortlisted for prizes at the prestigious film festival took a while to sink in
Wei Shujun was playing basketball when he received a call from the Cannes Film Festival organisers. His latest work, On the Border, was up for an award in the shorts category, the winner of which will be announced on May 19 (Wei’s short film was awarded the Jury Special Mention). His screenwriter and cinematographer happened to be with him at the time. “We were very excited, and we immediately set about discussing what our next project should be,” Wei recalls. “But we ended up spending the whole night talking about the fun things we could do at Cannes – we are so useless.”
Shen Di, meanwhile, says she overlooked the initial email from the festival confirming the selection of her directorial debut, the half-hourThe Storms in Our Blood, for the Cinéfondation prize. Four days later, she received another message, asking her to convert her film into a DCP – the high-quality format in which movies are shown in cinemas.
“I thought it sounded ridiculous: why would they require me to do that during the selection process? Couldn’t they just watch it from an mp4 file?” she says. “And I suddenly realised, I might have made it onto the shortlist. I couldn’t believe it and I emailed the man at the Cinéfondation to checkif he was lying. It made him pretty exasperated.”
If their reactions seem comical, blame it on their youth: Wei is a sprightly 27 while Shen is 24.