The three members of the jury – Giannalberto Bendazzi, Girish Kasaravalli and Takashi Shimizu – meet the audience and describe their relationship with cinema
Yesterday at the sixth edition of the Ca’ Foscari Short Film Festival, took place the very much awaited Special Jury Program, an opportunity to learn more about the three members of the International Jury of this edition: Giannalberto Bendazzi, Girish Kasaravalli and Takashi Shimizu. Each member was asked to choose a short film, comment upon it and talk about their career.
The first jury member to take the stage was Giannalberto Bendazzi, the highest authority in the field of the animation studies. He chose the short film Schody – Stairs (1969), directed by Stefan Schabenbeck. About the reason of his choice, he declared: “I feel like this is my biography made into film. It is the story of a man who was looking for his way, unfortunately this way was ever an uphill battle and he was ever alone. I think that his story resembles mine.” The main character, in fact, is a stylized human figure that climb without stopping a series of countless steps. When he arrives exhausted on the top where he became the highest step. The second videoclip screened was the book-trailer for Bendazzi’s latest work, an encyclopedia of history of animation entitled “Animation: A World History”, published in 2015. Bendazzi himself has defined his latest work as “an act of love”; love for the topics and people he talks about. He also stated that his works have an intimate value and are meant to be read as if he were welcoming his readers in his own home. The interview, hosted by Davide Giurlando, also covered his career, the method he uses for animation history’s periodization and his conception of animation as an adaptable means of communication.
The second juror to come up on stage was Girish Kasaravalli, the multi-awarded Indian director, considered one of the fathers of Parallel Cinema in the 70s. The short film he chose to screen was Avsesh – The Remnants (1975), directed by himself when he graduated at the Film and Television Institute of India in Pune. This short film also earned him a gold medal as India’s best student film. During the interview, conducted by Cecilia Cossio, the director emphasised that there is not just one “Indian cinema”, since India is made up of different, co-existing realities, especially on a linguistic and cultural level. This would make identification with the characters harder for the viewers who don’t share the same language and traditions, but the director stated he trusts his viewers’ ability to sympathise and to understand situations and problems that are universal.
The last jury member to go on stage was Takashi Shimizu, one of the father of the J-Horror genre, internationally renowned for his cult film series Ju-on and its American version, The Grudge. The director presented three short films at the Festival: the first was the short film he made to support the promotion of the video game NightCry and the second was the trailer of the video game itself, which was released in Japan just yesterday. In the interview conducted by Eugenio De Angelis, thanks to the collaboration of the Japanese Institute of Culture in Rome, Shimizu told to the public of his dislike for horror films until he was 14 years old and how, thanks to his friends, he has begun taking an interest in this genre. During the meeting, the director revealed some interesting fact about his career: in particular, he told how he started to be a video-maker using a VHS camcorder, easier to find and less expensive, and only then he switched to an analogical one, donated to him by his grandfather. At the end of the interview he presented the trailer for his latest work, the 3D Dome movie, The Man from 9 Dimensions.
