Udine FarEast Festival Wrap

Fareast wrap On its final day, the Far East Film Festival, awaits announcement this evening, May 2nd, of its 3 prizes, THE AUDIENCE AWARDS. Will it be a film from Japan, Korea, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines - some of the featured works this year. The event has come a long route from its early beginnings eleven years ago, when it specialized only in films from Hong Kong. Initiated and organised by the Associazione Culturale Centro Espressioni Cinematofgrafiche (Cec) , it has now put the beautiful Northern Italian city of Udine on the cultural map, with each year, an increased participation of journalists and media from additional new countries. Closely followed by local young students, including the University, they will cast their votes for their favourite films.

This year, screenings held at the Teatro Nuovo "Giovanni da Udine" (1.200 seats) and the Cinema Visionario showed over 50 feature films, leading with 14 works from Japan, followed by 10 movies from South Korea, 7 from Hong Kong and mainland China, 6 from Indonesia and Thailand, 3 from the Philippines and 1 from Thailand and Singapore. Evenings showed an array of "pink" erotic Asian films and mornings at the Visionario, TV works by Ann HUI, Hong Kong New Wave director from the '80s.

Boasting Italian premieres for all the works, some even were world premieres outside their native countries, such as the Oscar Winner Departures by Takita Yojiro. The

"Far East Nights" parties every evening featured DJs from Asian and popular European music trends.

On the pro front "Ties that bind", held April 26 through 28th, held a training workshop for cinema organized in conjunction with European Audiovisual Entrepreneurs, part of the MEDIA program of the European Union which supports the audiovisual industry.

In addition, the "Far East Market", provided a venue for Asian producers to commercialise their films. Helen Dobrensky at Udine FarEast 2009, May 2nd