Well, I never....
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/8699394.stm
Thai Film wins Palme d'Or at Cannes
Re: Thai Film wins Palme d'Or at Cannes
A side note about this. The all knowing Cultural Ministry here just awarded about 60% of next years' budget to one famous producer/director who will make yet another sequel to some past historical drama about the Burmese wars. All other young and developing artists here up in arms and actually petitioned the government to look into what is obviously some corrupt practice within the Ministry. The complaint was accepted and things being investigated.
This award goes a long way in showing the Ministry that the little guy has talent! A good cheer up story for the country as well.
Pete 
This award goes a long way in showing the Ministry that the little guy has talent! A good cheer up story for the country as well.
Pete Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. Source
Re: Thai Film wins Palme d'Or at Cannes
Thai director wins top Cannes prize
http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/local/1 ... nnes-prize
* Published: 24/05/2010 at 02:12 AM
* Online news: Local News
Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul won the Palme d'Or top prize at the Cannes film festival Sunday for a surreal reincarnation tale, Lung Boonmee Raluek Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives).
Apichatpong was a surprise best film winner after critics strongly tipped French director Xavier Beauvois, who took the runner-up Grand Prix for Of Gods and Men, about Catholic monks threatened by Islamists in Algeria.
"This is like another world for me... this is surreal," Apichatpong told a packed festival hall after receiving the Palme d'Or from the head of the festival jury, US film-maker Tim Burton.
The 39-year-old director thanked "the spirits... in Thailand that surrounded us" while making the film, a hypnotic tale featuring a humanoid monkey ghost and a disfigured princess having sex with a catfish.
Hundreds of celebrity-spotters lined the waterfront around the festival hall ahead of Sunday night's gala ceremony.
Critics have widely pegged this year's edition of the world's biggest film festival as more low-key than usual, with fewer big stars and hit movies.
But the main competition still drew some big names, including three former Palme winners: Britons Mike Leigh and Ken Loach plus Kiarostami.
Last week, Apichatpong gained some noteriety with a strong attack on Thai censorship.
"You cannot blame Thai film-makers" for a dying cinema industry in Thailand, he said at a press conference. "They cannot do anything because of these censorship laws.
"We cannot make a movie on the current situation," for example, "due to laws that ban threats to national security. Anything can be thrown into that."
The film-maker, who said he flew to Cannes "as Bangkok was burning", expressed hoped that "something will change for the best" from the current chaos.
"Thailand is a violent country," he added. "It's controlled by a group of mafia."
In Apichatpong's somewhat bizarre film, Uncle Boonmee is suffering from acute kidney failure and has decided to spend his last days in the jungle, where the ghost of his dead wife returns along with his missing son, turned into a hairy monkey ghost.
Apichatpong admitted to being nervous as he picked up the award Sunday, but joked he would like to kiss all the jury members - especially Tim Burton, whose hairstyle "I really like".
He ended his speech by dedicating the prize to his fellow countrymen. He again denounced Thailand's strict censorship rules. Just as the ending music started up, he hastened to add he also wanted to thank his parents.
Five Asian works were competing on Sunday, including another South Korean film, The Housemaid.
Cannes had asked Iranian film-maker Jafar Panahi to sit on the jury but he was prevented from attending. He has been in jail in Teheran since March, accused by authorities of planning a film against the country's Islamic leaders.
The French government and the festival demanded Panahi's release and the film-maker himself spoke out against his detention in a letter to Cannes organisers.
Controversy also erupted over Outside the Law, a violent thriller about Algeria's independence struggle which sparked rowdy demonstrations by protestors who accused director Rachid Bouchareb of rewriting history.
Spanish actor Javier Bardem, who plays a terminally-ill hustler in Biutiful by Mexico's Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, shared the best actor award with Italy's Elio Germano.
And France's Juliette Binoche was named best actress for her role as an unhappy antiques dealer in Certified Copy by Iran's Abbas Kiarostami.
Frenchman Mathieu Amalric won the best director prize for On Tour, about a troupe of buxom American stripteasers touring French seaside towns, while South Korean director Lee Chang-Dong's Poetry scooped best screenplay.
Also at the ceremony was Charlotte Gainsbourg, who won the prize for best actress last year for her role in Lars Von Trier's erotic shocker, Antichrist.
The French actress was presenting the last film of this year's festival - The Tree, a Franco-Australian movie directed by Julie Bertuccelli which screens out of competition.
Last year the Palme went to Austrian director Michael Haneke for The White Ribbon.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/local/1 ... nnes-prize
* Published: 24/05/2010 at 02:12 AM
* Online news: Local News
Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul won the Palme d'Or top prize at the Cannes film festival Sunday for a surreal reincarnation tale, Lung Boonmee Raluek Chat (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives).
Apichatpong was a surprise best film winner after critics strongly tipped French director Xavier Beauvois, who took the runner-up Grand Prix for Of Gods and Men, about Catholic monks threatened by Islamists in Algeria.
"This is like another world for me... this is surreal," Apichatpong told a packed festival hall after receiving the Palme d'Or from the head of the festival jury, US film-maker Tim Burton.
The 39-year-old director thanked "the spirits... in Thailand that surrounded us" while making the film, a hypnotic tale featuring a humanoid monkey ghost and a disfigured princess having sex with a catfish.
Hundreds of celebrity-spotters lined the waterfront around the festival hall ahead of Sunday night's gala ceremony.
Critics have widely pegged this year's edition of the world's biggest film festival as more low-key than usual, with fewer big stars and hit movies.
But the main competition still drew some big names, including three former Palme winners: Britons Mike Leigh and Ken Loach plus Kiarostami.
Last week, Apichatpong gained some noteriety with a strong attack on Thai censorship.
"You cannot blame Thai film-makers" for a dying cinema industry in Thailand, he said at a press conference. "They cannot do anything because of these censorship laws.
"We cannot make a movie on the current situation," for example, "due to laws that ban threats to national security. Anything can be thrown into that."
The film-maker, who said he flew to Cannes "as Bangkok was burning", expressed hoped that "something will change for the best" from the current chaos.
"Thailand is a violent country," he added. "It's controlled by a group of mafia."
In Apichatpong's somewhat bizarre film, Uncle Boonmee is suffering from acute kidney failure and has decided to spend his last days in the jungle, where the ghost of his dead wife returns along with his missing son, turned into a hairy monkey ghost.
Apichatpong admitted to being nervous as he picked up the award Sunday, but joked he would like to kiss all the jury members - especially Tim Burton, whose hairstyle "I really like".
He ended his speech by dedicating the prize to his fellow countrymen. He again denounced Thailand's strict censorship rules. Just as the ending music started up, he hastened to add he also wanted to thank his parents.
Five Asian works were competing on Sunday, including another South Korean film, The Housemaid.
Cannes had asked Iranian film-maker Jafar Panahi to sit on the jury but he was prevented from attending. He has been in jail in Teheran since March, accused by authorities of planning a film against the country's Islamic leaders.
The French government and the festival demanded Panahi's release and the film-maker himself spoke out against his detention in a letter to Cannes organisers.
Controversy also erupted over Outside the Law, a violent thriller about Algeria's independence struggle which sparked rowdy demonstrations by protestors who accused director Rachid Bouchareb of rewriting history.
Spanish actor Javier Bardem, who plays a terminally-ill hustler in Biutiful by Mexico's Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, shared the best actor award with Italy's Elio Germano.
And France's Juliette Binoche was named best actress for her role as an unhappy antiques dealer in Certified Copy by Iran's Abbas Kiarostami.
Frenchman Mathieu Amalric won the best director prize for On Tour, about a troupe of buxom American stripteasers touring French seaside towns, while South Korean director Lee Chang-Dong's Poetry scooped best screenplay.
Also at the ceremony was Charlotte Gainsbourg, who won the prize for best actress last year for her role in Lars Von Trier's erotic shocker, Antichrist.
The French actress was presenting the last film of this year's festival - The Tree, a Franco-Australian movie directed by Julie Bertuccelli which screens out of competition.
Last year the Palme went to Austrian director Michael Haneke for The White Ribbon.
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. Source