Latest update February 11th, 2015 2:56 AM
Finding New Talents
By He Fan
The North America Chinese Directors Short Film Tour is a showcase of the best short films directed by Chinese directors in the U.S., to discover the potential feature film directors in all genres to make a change and to be a bridge to connect Chinese directors who have received education in the States with the Chinese movie market.
Originally I just want to find out more high-quality short films by Chinese directors. For I worked in new media distribution for a while and saw some in festivals and other screenings, like PLURALITY, A HEART FELT and HONEYMOON SUITE totally blew my mind off. They are so different from the films made by China-based directors. They are unique yet universal.
I was curious about how many of those amazing films are there. So I kept on searching. Until I went to this year’s Student Academy Award semi-finalist screening in New York: 4 out of 9 national finalist films from the New York area are directed by Chinese directors. I know it is about time to do something.
5 years ago, there were very few Chinese directors or film students in the States. The China film market was dominated by big directors and blockbusters. But now, the number of Chinese film students in the States is soaring and younger directors have a bigger share in China. The market and audiences call for young directors who can handle films in all kind of genres, so I was more convinced this is the right thing to do.
EnMaze is a group of Chinese students dedicate our life into film. We are directors, producers, distributors and business developers. Many of us are fresh graduates from American film schools. It’s nearly impossible to get a regular job as a Chinese filmmaker in the States, so we are united to do something meaningful.
We launched North America Chinese Directors Short Film Competition, and received 93 submissions from 30 film schools in the States. My team and I feel that a new force is rising. It’s like a list of next generation Chinese directors. Some years later, some of them will be somebody and will make a change in the future, we will be so proud of it.
There is a memorable moment: one of our final competition judges, an established New York-based film editor, who is also Ang Lee’s classmate – Jean Tsien wrote “30 years later after Ang Lee, I can see the future of Chinese directors is bright.” I was on a train when I saw her words – it was so encouraging that I felt the train was flying.
I think we will continue this competition in every 2 years. As a friend’s comment goes, “It will open an oil pipe.” The best film talents in the States can go through it to China endlessly. There will be directors, writers, photographers, producers who are well educated in film, they have their unique style and know how to tell a story in a universal way.
EnMaze Pictures will keep supporting this North America Chinese Directors Short Film Collection/Tour, actually me and a couple of friends are also registering an association – Chinese Pioneering Filmmakers Association. The best Chinese young directors in the States and China will be invited to the association. We will have writers’ workshop, meetings and funding to help directors to develop the script, bridge resources, doing some consulting to help make their films.
As a production/distribution company, EnMaze Pictures will go further on production and distributing, hopefully we will become a company like Miramax in its early stage, we will discover directors and projects with huge potential, and make it into a good movie, and bring the movie to the audiences all around the world.
More details to be found on: http://www.enmaze.com
Related articles
More in this category
