HKIFF: Day 6

I didn't write any report for my viewing of Once because I gave up the ticket to work some more. Life is busy. March life is busier.

Nevertheless, I made it to my two screenings yesterday, and I'll talk about my second movie of the day more in detail because I won't be reviewing it


Sitting 3 rows behind stars Karena Lam (!!!!) and Cyndi Wang, I watched the lesbian omnibus film Candy Rain. The film is made up of 4 stories, about 4 different lesbian couples that has their own respective problems. However, it doesn't really say anything profound about neither homo nor heterosexual relationships other than whatever the narrators tell you. In fact, it's like watching four very long and damn near incoherent music videos. The music are nice, and the art direction is beautiful in that "I wish my house look that tragically hip" sort of way, but it doesn't connect at all. Worst film I've seen at the festival so far.

I also saw Shinji Aoyama's Sad Vacation, though I might not be qualified to review it. Along with Eureka and Helpless, this film completes a so-called "Kita Kyushu" trilogy by the auteur. However, I couldn't help but wonder about these characters' backstories as I was watching the film. Turns out a few of the characters are from the previous films, which was a minor annoyance, though it didn't deter from my understanding of the film. Instead, it's the film's editing style that provided the deterrence. A work worth respecting, though I'm not entirely sure about liking it yet.

Next, the final film of my HKIFF experience: Bare-Assed Japan.