Impressions from Louis Vuitton Hawaii International Film Fest
Aloha SPE friends!
I can’t tell you how delightful an experience it was at Hawaii International Film Fest (HIFF)! The HIFF staff welcomed me like a indie filmmaker star and made the whole journey so enjoyable… I can’t thank them enough: from Anderson, Audrey, Chuck to Natalie, Frank, Janis, Brigid, Jamie, Sean, Jason, Jeff and the many other staff members there!
I arrived on Saturday October 11th quite late in the afternoon after a long day of traveling from Chicago to LA to Hawaii… I never thought it’d actually be such a long flight! I was so glad to land at Honolulu Airport under a picture perfect warm sunset and be picked up by Frank, a HIFF volunteer driver with his giant white truck! So he drove me down to my hotel on Waikiki beach, and we managed to go to the hospitality lounge by the movie theaters to pick up my delegate package from Jeff, the hospitality coordinator.
Along the way, Frank also picked up a couple from the HIFF theaters… little did I know that it was Roy executive producer of movies such as The Departed, The Ring, The Grudge, etc… So I kind of talked casually to him on my way to the hotel and explained what our movie was about. I believe it was a little hard to sell it to him as well, Someplace Else is not exactly comparable to hollywood films as you well know… we’re just such a small little film with a budget litterally 1000 times lower than any small hollywood film.
Alright, so I arrive at Moana Surfrider and wow… this place is a looker… it has an old colonial look to it, and sports its own beach… But I felt a little jet lagged by then… so I knew it was going to be a short night… still I was so happy to have a view of the ocean from my room number 777! It’s funny, I like numbers in my life, and 777 is a pretty fetiche one for some reason…
Sunday was the Meet the Filmmaker evening at HIFF and it was truly a great occasion to meet up with many industry makers/shakers/filmmakers! I made sure I was quite alert while also enjoying a few drinks chit-chating by the ocean front, and snacking on the great little hors-d’oeuvres from this place called the Rum Fire. I met with past HIFF winners and A-list film festival winners… It was all quite enlightning.
Then the showing of Someplace Else came on Monday October 13th at 7pm. Our film was shown at the same time as another film by famed french director Desplechin. So it was quite an honor to be part of a lineup with such films being showcased, especially for a small feature like ours.
The Q&A was quite something… as we had to leave the movie theater and go to the cafe area in the cinema… and there were about 15 people or so following us to that Q&A area… Questions ranged from “how long the movie took to make?” to “how one really becomes succesful?” to “how is vance in real life?” to “what is next in your life?”. From what Christa told me, a famed German filmmaker/critic, “the audience got a real treat with what you’ve told them and will remember it for years”… let’s hope so.
Before the showing, we had this lovely reception organized by Modern Luxury (the magazine that makes Chicago Social) at a swanky Hotel called Hotel Renew… a sort of green hotel with a zen asian feel. It was great there as I met with a few more famed filmmakers and industry makers. But I had to rush quickly out of the place to go to the end of the film’s screening for Someplace Else and the Q&A.
Tuesday was the awards ceremony for the festival… and I sat right next to the executive director of The Vilcek Foundation, the regional VP of Louis Vuitton, one past academy award nominee, and a famous film critic… quite a lineup… and everyone was truly very nice!!! There was no prize for Someplace Else, but I knew that already… but I was so happy that our film was selected already and moreover got distinguished and honored to be profiled as part of the American Immigrant Filmmakers on Profile series by The Vilcek Foundation in New York City alongside much more established filmmakers who’ve previously won many awards… so it was all quite something!
And then Wednesday came and I had to pack and leave this wonderful place… one last stop to Farrington High School where I was scheduled to give a speech to teenagers studying media production. Despite the bad projection and audio equipment, the experience was great and I saw many kids really into becoming a filmmaker! The advice I had for them, not to get lost in the medium itself but use the medium to convey what you want to convey… and also have lots of perseverance… it’s a very tough and competitive field in the movie realm… and making a film these days is only half-way through getting the film seen by a larger audience such as theatrical or broadcast or DVD.
The playing field has changed so dramatically these days for indie filmmaking. Nowadays any film that’s not produced by the majors are called indie films, even if they sport A-list starts or budgets in the millions of dollars… so Someplace Else isn’t certainly part of that indie realm… It’s most often likened to a DIY film.
Finally I was interviewed by Jason Soeda from HIFF: you can read more about the process of making the film here:
http://www.hiff.org/filmmakers/qa-2008-kai-duc-luong.php
Mahalo!
K
