Hollywood star Natalie Portman called school shootings America’s “civil war” Tuesday, comparing the psychological torment they cause to the threat of terror attacks in Israel. The Oscar-winning actress drew the parallel before the premiere of her new film about a traumatised pop diva, “Vox Lux”, which opens with a Columbine-style massacre.

“I have been interested in the questions around the psychology of what violence does to individuals and in mass psychology for some time, coming from a place where people have encountered violence for so long,” said the Israeli-born star, best known for “Black Swan”.

“Unfortunately it is a phenomenon we now experience regularly in the United States with the school shootings.

“As (the film’s director) Brady (Corbet) has put to me before, it is a kind of civil war and terror that we have in the US,” she told reporters.

The regular mass killings were having a “psychological impact on every kid going to school every day and every parent dropping their kids off,” she added.

“Small acts of violence can cause widespread torment.”

Portman, 37, plays a singer who is badly wounded in a bloodbath at her school but builds a pop career after she sings at a memorial for her classmates.

The movie’s director Corbet, who was a schoolboy in Colorado at the time of the Columbine killings, confessed that the massacre “marked me psychologically. I was living there when it happened. It was close to home.”

Corbet, who is best known as an actor – starring in “Thunderbirds” and Michael Haneke’s “Funny Games” – was editing his award-winning directorial debut, “The Childhood of a Leader”, in Paris when the city was hit by a wave of terror attacks in 2015.

“I had a five-month-old (child) at that point, and me and my wife were shaken by it. One restaurant that got shot up was a place we went a few times a week, it was a narrow miss. We were haunted by it,” he said.

Corbet described his story as a “poetic rumination of what we have all been through… We live in an age of anxiety. We are having more sleepless nights than ever.”

He said the film, with its anti-heroine star – played by British actress Raffey Cassidy in her younger years and Portman when she becomes a Madonna-like diva – was meant as a salve, “something we could come together over”.

“When I think about what will define the early 21st century, especially as an American, it’s Columbine, 9/11 and the global terror threat that has permeated every place I have lived. I wanted to look at what we’ve all been through in the last 20 years,” he told Screen magazine earlier.

Corbet later told reporters that “the 20th century was defined by the banality of evil. I think the 21st century will be defined by the pageantry of evil.”

The director – one of 21 vying for the Golden Lion top prize at Venice which will be awarded Saturday – said it took him a year alone to put together the film’s soundtrack before he started shooting.

Australian pop singer-songwriter Sia and avant garde darling Scott Walker came up with the tunes for Portman and Cassidy’s characters, with Portman’s husband, French choreographer Benjamin Millepied, putting together the dance numbers for the stadium show finale.

“Vox Lux” is the second major pop music-based movie to turn on the rise of a female singer at Venice. Lady Gaga last week won glowing reviews for her debut as a big screen leading lady in a remake of “A Star is Born”.

A NEW film about the artist Vincent Van Gogh claims that he was murdered rather than having shot himself.

“At Eternity’s Gate” starring Willem Dafoe as the tortured genius, was premiered Monday at the Venice film festival.

In it the painter is shot after a struggle with local youths near the village of Auvers-sur-Oise outside Paris, where the artist spent his final months in 1890.

 Van Gogh’s “Self-Portrait”, 1889

He died 36 hours later after staggering back to the local inn in the dark.

While most historians agree that Van Gogh killed himself, renowned painter and Oscar-nominated director Julian Schnabel fuels a theory that he was killed in the film.

Legendary French screenwriter Jean-Claude Carriere – who co-wrote the script with Schnabel – says there “is absolutely no proof he killed himself. Do I believe that Van Gogh killed himself? Absolutely not!”

“He came back to the auberge with a bullet in his stomach and nobody ever found the gun or his painting materials,” Carriere adds

“What we have been fighting against is the dark romantic legend of Van Gogh. In the last period of his life Van Gogh was working constantly. Every day he made a new work.”

 “Sorrowing Old Man” (At Eternity’s Gate), 1890 

His final weeks, when he painted the “Portrait of Dr Gachet” – which set a world record when it sold for $82.5 million (Bt2.9 billon) in 1990 – were “not at all sad”, the writer argues.

Schnabel insists that a man who had painted 75 canvasses in his 80 days at Auvers-sur-Oise was unlikely to be suicidal.

The theory that Van Gogh did not commit suicide was first raised in a 2011 biography of the painter by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith.

Director Julian Schnabel (left) and actor Willem Dafoe attend a photocall for the film “At Eternity’s Gate” at the 75th Venice Film Festival at Venice Lido. /AFP

Schnabel says neither the gun nor “the painting material he had that day were ever found. It is strange to bury your s**t if you are committing suicide.”

“At Eternity’s Gate” is also likely to open a new front in the row over Van Gogh’s “lost” sketchbook, which purportedly resurfaced after 126 years in 2016 and was authenticated by two eminent art historians last year.

Veteran British expert Ronald Pickvance claimed the book was “the most revolutionary discovery in the history of Van Gogh” studies.

But the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam hotly disputes its provenance and dismissed the drawings as fakes.

The book, originally a ledger from the Cafe de la Gare in Arles where Van Gogh stayed at various times between 1888 and 1890, features prominently in the film.

Willem Dafoe plays as Vincent Van Gogh in “At Eternity’s Gate” (2018). /IMDB.com

When Dafoe, who looks uncannily like the Van Gogh in the film, was limbering up to play thar artist, he did something that will give museum curators nightmares for years to come.

He was leafing through that “lost” sketchbook of the artist’s from his time in Arles, when Schnabel looked at him like a man possessed.

“We had the white gloves on and everything,” Dafoe recalls, “and we were gently going through it looking at the drawings. Then at one point Julian grabbed my hand and slammed it down on one of the sketches.

“It was like something out of ‘The Exorcist’,” the actor adds.

“He was forcing a transmission – a connection between me and Van Gogh – and I think it worked.

Critics at the Venice film festival agree, with Dafoe an early favourite for the best actor prize.

Like Schnable, Dafoe believes the sketchbook is genuine.

The two are on familiar territory tackling the furies that drive and sometimes dog great artists.

Dafoe had to grapple with the demons of the great Italian director Paolo Pasolini in Abel Ferrara’s 2014 film “Pasolini”.

Schnabel also brought the tortured life of his old friend on the New York art scene, Jean Michel Basquiat, to the big screen in “Basquiat”.

In that film, the painter – who got four Oscar nods for “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” – did not pull back from the hell Basquiat endured before his early death from a heroin overdose.

Willem Dafoe plays as Vincent Van Gogh in “At Eternity’s Gate” (2018). / IMDB.com

But Dafoe says his Van Gogh film is more than a simple biopic.

“I hate to be a cheerleader for my own movie but this is quite radical and emotional, it is not conventional in any way.

“It is not an ‘awards movie’, made with one eye on the Oscars. “It is about painting, it is about being an artist, it is about nature and spirituality… because Van Gogh wanted to be a pastor before he became a painter. He thought the bible was the greatest book ever written,” Dafoe notes.

“Painting is something Julian really knows – this is where his two loves come together: painting and filmmaking.”

Dafoe, who first learned to paint three decades ago for “To Live and Die in LA”, when he played an art forger, says shooting in the fields around Arles and in the asylum at Saint-Remy where Van Gogh wrote that “one continually hears shouts and terrible howls as of animals in a menagerie”, gave him goosebumps.

“I felt close to him,” he says.

Unlike other films about Van Gogh, such as the 1956 classic |“Lust for Life” starring Kirk Douglas, Dafoe says the new movie avoids |“the greatest hits” like the “Sunflowers” or depicting him hacking off his ear when he fell out with Gauguin.

“But for part of the movie he has no ear. We do not shy away from what he did to himself.

“It focuses on the end of Van Gogh’s life and starts right before he meets Gauguin and he goes to Arles,” he says.

“We shot there and in Paris |and in Auvers-sur-Oise,” where |Van Gogh shot himself – |although the film goes with the controversial theory that he was killed after grappling with some local youths.

“The Church at Auvers”, 1890

By filming in so many real locations like Saint-Remy, “part of which is still a hospital, we were flirting with his ghost”, says Dafoe, who missed out on a best actor Oscar for “Florida Project” last year.

“I never thought about any other person playing Van Gogh,” Schnabel adds.

“Willem has such inner depth. To have him with me on set was the best ally I could have.”

The ebullient New Yorker also wanted to correct the “bad rap” that Van Gogh’s friend Paul Gauguin gets from history.

Van Gogh may have cut off his ear when the painter announced he was leaving him to return to Paris, but “Gauguin really cared about him”, Schnabel says.

“He is portrayed usually as an arsehole. Anthony Quinn [in the 1956 movie “Lust for Life”] played him like that, but he wasn’t.”

  Set in 1955, in the middle of a howling snowstorm, a bus out of Kansas City, Missouri pulls up at a jovial roadside diner, all roads are blocked, and four weary travelles are going to have to stay up until morning. The William Inge play is directed by Michael J Allman.

Cherie, (Prashanti Subramaniam) a nightclub chanteuse, is the passenger with most to worry about. She’s been pursued, made love to and finally kidnapped by a 21-year-old cowboy (Ricardo Hizon) with a ranch of his own and the romantic methods of an unusually headstrong bull. The belligerent cowhand is right behind her, ready to sling her over his shoulder and carry her, alive and kicking, all the way to Montana. Even as she’s ducking out from under his clumsy but confident embraces, and screeching at him fiercely to shut up, she pauses to furrow her forehead and say, “Somehow deep inside of me I got a funny feeling I’m gonna end up in Montana”.

As a counterpoint to the main romance, the proprietor of the cafe (Jolene Mathi) and the bus driver (Alvin Salvador) at last find time to develop a friendship of their own. A middle-age scholar (Duane Hauch) comes to terms with himself and a young girl (Liu) who works in the cafe gets her first taste of romance.

Tickets are priced Bt500 and book your seat at www.bangkokcommunitytheatre.com or email info@bangkokcommunitytheatre.com

In a statement issued on Friday, Rick and Mark Armstrong said “First Man,” starring Ryan Gosling, was intended to depict their father’s journey to the moon and delve into “the man behind the myth.”

“This story is human, and it is universal,” the brothers said in their statement issued jointly with “First Man” author James Hansen. “Of course, it celebrates an American achievement. It also celebrates an achievement ‘for all mankind,’ as it says on the plaque Neil and Buzz (Aldrin) left on the moon.”

The trio added they did not feel the movie was “anti-American in the slightest.”

“Quite the opposite,” they said. “But don’t take our word for it. We’d encourage everyone to go see this remarkable film and see for themselves.”

Gosling, who portrays Armstrong in the film, and director Damien Chazelle also hit back at criticism the movie was un-American for not depicting the iconic flag-planting.

“In ‘First Man’ I show the American flag standing on the lunar surface, but the flag being physically planted into the surface is one of several moments of the Apollo 11 lunar EVA that I chose not to focus upon,” he said in a statement carried by Variety. “To address the question of whether this was a political statement, the answer is no.

“My goal with this movie was to share with audiences the unseen, unknown aspects of America’s mission to the moon — particularly Neil Armstrong’s personal saga and what he may have been thinking and feeling during those famous few hours.”

Among those who have criticized the film is failed presidential candidate and Republican senator Marco Rubio.

“This is total lunacy,” he tweeted on Friday in reference to the absence of the flag planting. “And a disservice at a time when our people need reminders of what we can achieve when we work together. The American people paid for that mission, on rockets built by Americans, with American technology & carrying American astronauts. It wasn’t a UN mission.”

“First Man” opened the Venice Film Festival this week and is set for release in US theatres on October 12.

Indonesian martial arts star, Iko Uwais (“The Raid”), appears in his first major Hollywood role. As Li Noor, Uwais plays a trusted US intelligence asset in Southeast Asia holding the key to encrypted information needed to prevent an imminent terrorist attack – information he’s willing to share with the Americans only in exchange for safe passage to a refuge in the United States. To get him there, it’s down to Jimmy Silva’s (Mark Wahlberg) elite paramilitary unit to transport Noor from the relative safety of the US Embassy to an airfield for extraction  a distance of 22 miles from the city centre; as Silva and his team must fight their way through an urban landscape populated by local forces determined to prevent Noor’s escape.

Discovered in 2007 by director Gareth Edwards while filming a documentary on Indonesian martial arts, Iko Uwais went on to make his feature debut in Edwards’ 2009 film, “Merantau”. His breakthrough would come threeyears later with “The Raid”, which captured the attention of martial arts fans, worldwide. Uwais, who also choreographs his own fight sequences, including those seen in “Mile 22”, briefly appeared in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” (2015) as the feared mercenary, Razoo QinFee.

What’s it like starring in your first big American movie?

It’s flattering, you know. To be able to work with such talented and big names on this project is like a dream come true for me. I mean, all of this had never been an ambition for me, so it’s beyond my expectation.

How did your casting in “Mile 22” come about? Had Peter Berg seen your work in The Raid?

Yes (Laughs)… He called me at 4an in Jakarta saying he wanted to bring me to Los Angeles to talk about a project called “Mile 22”. And I immediately said yes! He told me that he saw me in “The Raid”; that he liked what he saw, and that he wanted to make something with me. Which was a compliment, considering Peter Berg is not your usual martial arts film director.

What was it like working with Mark Wahlberg? What do you think it is it about him that’s so appealing on screen? And is that the same thing you found by working with him and getting to know him?

It was a humbling experience. Honestly, I was kind of star-struck when I first met Mark. But he was a funny guy and really easy to work with. And that guy can do anything. He can fight, he acts beautifully, and he works hard.  I learned a lot from him. For example, he is a very spontaneous actor. He improvises, and he brought an energy to the set that was infectious, The first time we met he already made me feel like an old friend. I can see why he’s a big star.

How did you collaborate with Peter Berg in choreographing your fight sequences?

One of the best things about working with Pete is that he trusted me and gave the freedom to do my own fight choreography. We would discuss what he wanted to achieve in a particular fight scene, what would be the goal of the fight, the tone of the fight, the emotional aspects that should be shown in the scene, and then he would just let me work on it. I choreographed each fight with my team, shot a previz video of it, and would then present it to him. You know, sometimes, I tend to have an aggressive, violent imagination when it comes to fight scenes – and Pete expected nothing less.

Your fight scene in the medical examination room is one of the film’s standouts. What went into putting that together? Did anyone get hurt? And how does it compare to other fight-sequences you’ve filmed before?

Well, we worked hard on that scene. We created the choreography for it, shot the previz for a week, and then spent 4 days actually filming it. It’s quite challenging shooting a scene like that for 4 days especially just wearing your underwear in a cold warehouse (laughs)… Sam Looc, my fellow choreographer, slightly injured in his forehead while we were filming when a sharp edge on the plastic end of the handcuff that I’m wearing kind of slashed him – but he was okay. Although, this fight scene is shorter than what I did in “The Raid”, I think it’s special nonetheless. We put a lot of work into making it look like a real fight. We wanted it to be brutal and visceral. And that’s what we got.

What was the biggest challenge making Mile 22? Did the film push you or challenge you in ways you hadn’t experienced before?

It was challenging because this is my first time having a big role with a lot of English dialogue. So, that was new for me. Pete Berg’s method of improvising on set was also new and challenging, and kind of pushed me to do better. I learned a lot making “Mile 22”. The film also pushed me to create an intense and complex fight scene in a very limited time. It wasn’t like my previous films, where preparation can take months. This time I had to work more efficiently. And I loved the challenge.

What do you like most about making Hollywood movies, and what do they do better back home?

Well, It’s healthier, for one. For my previous films I once spent two days nonstop shooting a fight scene. That’s not going to happen in the US, mainly because of union regulations. And that’s good. Not that I’m complaining, because I’d do whatever it takes to make a breathtaking fight scene. But it’s nice to be able to work with better hours, you know. What is better back home is definitely the location – of being close to your family. It’s quite hard to leave your family to shoot abroad for months and to be apart. Especially when I have a new baby.

What was it like seeing the film cut together for the first time? Was it what you envisioned when you first read the script?

Better. I think Pete did a fantastic job in keeping the audience on the edge of their seat. I mean, I had some idea of what the movie might look like. But when I saw the final cut, it was just… Wow! The intensity is breathtaking. It’s a roller-coaster ride.

I hear you have a new series coming up for Netflix – “Wu Assassins”? What can you tell us?

Yes, “Wu Assassins” – I play a character called Kai Jin, a Chinese-Indonesian chef. It’s set in San Francisco’s Chinatown, and it’s an action drama with elements of martial arts, organised crime, and Chinese mythology.

Are you planning on working more in Hollywood? What does the future look like for you?

I would like to do more work here, but I just tend to focus on what’s in front of me. So, I don’t know about the future. I just focus on trying to make the best actionmovie you could ever see, work hard at it, and just go all the way.

The documentary is scheduled to premiere later this year on HBO Asia’s on-air, online and on-demand platforms.

“The World” is an HBO Asia original documentary that delves deeper into the traditions and culture on which the coming-of-age series is based. Filmed entirely in Taiwan, the hour-long Mandarin documentary explores some of the unique shamanistic practices that call Taiwan home and takes the audience on a journey through the rituals and beliefs surrounding the Ghost Month.

The Ghost Month is the pinnacle of the annual spiritual calendar in Taiwan – when the gates of hell are said to open, and spirits enter the world of the living. Weaving through the festivities, “The World” follows different characters to explore how a distinct blend of Taoist, Buddhist, Chinese Folklore and indigenous belief systems continue to flourish in modern Taiwan.

One of the characters in the documentary is award-winning Taiwanese actress and singer, Nana Lee who starred in “The Teenage Psychic”. Lee grew up surrounded by temple culture and beliefs. With her family having suffered the loss of a loved one, Lee visits her hometown of Nantou and reconnects with her past. Spanning worlds old and new, and having a direct link to the original “The Teenage Psychic” series, Lee’s unique perspective offers a personal account of how traditions of life and death survive in Taiwan today.

Throughout the documentary, followers and devotees share thoughts on why these practices are still relevant and a part of everyday life, while leading academics explain how and why spiritual belief remains so deeply-rooted into the modern fabric of the island.

In “Mile 22”, the new action-packed thriller from Peter Berg that opens in Thailand today, Mark Wahlberg stars as Jimmy Silva, the leader of an elite paramilitary team charged with transporting foreign intelligence asset Li Noor (“The Raid’s” Iko Uwais, here in his first major Hollywood role), from the relative safety of a US Embassy in Southeast Asia to an airfield for extraction – a distance of 22 miles (35 kilometres) – from the city centre.

Silva’s mission, of course, proves hardly a walk in the park. With Noor holding the key to encrypted information needed to prevent an imminent terrorist attack in exchange for safe transport to a refuge in the US, Silva’s team (featuring Ronda Rousey and “The Walking Dead’s” Lauren Cohan), must fight their way, mile by mile, through a dangerous urban landscape as local forces close in, determined to preven this escape.

“Mile 22” marks the fourth collaboration between Berg and Wahlberg (a fifth film, “Wonderland”, is currently in pre-production). Their first pairing came in 2013 with the critically acclaimed “Lone Survivor”, featuring Wahlberg as Marcus Luttrell in the true-story of an ill-fated US Navy SEAL mission in Afghanistan. Their follow-up, 2016’s “Deepwater Horizon”, cast Wahlberg as Mike Williams, the last man to escape the infamous BP oil rig, followed by “Patriots Day” (also released in 2016), a gripping account of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and it’s aftermath. While the new movie marks a departure from the duo’s previous focus on true-life stories, the action-packed thriller is nevertheless infused by the real-world culture of special ops forces, with an overall aesthetic from Berg that eschews CGI spectacle for the grit of close-quarters combat.

Berg recently sat down with the media in Los Angeles where he discussed the making of the film and his ongoing creative partnership with Mark Wahlberg, as “Mile 22” readied for its global premiere.

What is it about working with Mark Wahlberg that keeps you coming back for more?

I think he’s just a very talented actor – that’s a given. But he’s also like a brother. We get along very well. We have similar tastes in life. We like the same sports, we like the same wine, we have kids the same age. Our work ethics are similar. And so there’s a great affection and trust, which makes for a fun work environment. And I believe it should be fun to go to work every day. I work a lot. And I’ve been on film sets where there’s a lot of divisiveness and contention, creative heat and all that stuff. That can work for some people, but for me that’s a bunch of bullshit. I like to have fun. This is what I choose to do with my life and I plan on doing it for a long time… I want it to be good work, I want to have fun doing it, and that’s Mark too.

What’s your collaboration like on set?

As someone who grew up acting, I try to be very cognisant of character. Sometimes I succeed, sometimes I fail, and often times it’s somewhere in between. People ask why we keep working together. Well, Mark for me falls into a sweet spot where I can trust him to either figure out things that I’m not seeing as far as character goes – whether it’s Marcus Latrell or Mike Williams or Silva, the character he’s playing in this. He’s very vigilant about coming to me and making sure that I’m paying attention. If I’ve taken my eye off it because I’m focused on some action or some improv or whatever else gets my attention, Mark is very good at saying, “Maybe you should look at this…” Also he’s very selfless, because he’ll do that with other characters. He’ll come up to me and say, “He should say this… He should do this…” For me that’s a partnership. These films may not be as rich in character as other filmmakers’ and more action-heavy, but one of the things that I value about Mark is he’ll constantly be like, “Character, character, character…” That creates a balance that works for me aesthetically.

Why did the two of you want to make this film, and why the break from true stories?

Having done three true-stories, we wanted to do something [different] for many different reasons. We both saw “The Raid” and the sequel to it and felt that Iko Uwais is so unique and so talented, and brings so much art to these combat films, that it would be really fun for us to work with him. And it was like, ‘Okay this could be perfect.’ We wanted to do something fictional. I had an idea for this tight little action film…We figured if we could get him, we’d do it, and we were lucky to get him.

What was it like working with Iko Uwais?

One of the things that I found really interesting was that Iko came with some of his guys from Indonesia. And he had to work with some pretty accomplished American stunt guys who are like, “We have our way of doing things”. And here comes Iko. Everyone was sort of sniffing each other out at first and my hope was that that these guys would see that there’s something that they could learn [from him]. I wasn’t sure that it would go that way. I’ve seen films where stunt guys, who were pretty aggro, macho guys, can bump heads. But Iko disarmed them all so quickly. Because he’s such a hardworking, original-thinking artist with this stuff, they were just like, “Go…” They let Iko take the lead. And it was a beautiful thing to watch. These tough fighters agreeing that this guy really does know what he’s doing, and that they wanted to learn from him.

Did anyone ever get hurt?

We actually take safety very, very seriously. We have an extraordinary crew; these guys were all well trained. We joke around. But we don’t play around with safety. So, no, fortunately nobody was hurt.

The film’s opening sequence features a clip of Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un, amongst others, pulled from the latest headlines.

What’s the underlying idea behind the sequence?

This is a work of fiction. But it’s about the CIA’s Ground Branch (part of the agency’s Special Activities Division, responsible for covert operations) which really exists. They really are “the third option”. So we talked to a company that does opening credits, and I’m like, “Let’s do something that feels like it’s got one hand in reality”. That credit sequence was me saying “Can we do something that feels current? That makes people go, “Wait a minute. Was the Ground Branch behind this? Suddenly Trump and North Korea are sitting down shaking hands? Maybe something else was going on.”

What was it like shooting in Bogota?

We were a bit sceptical, particularly our production guys, about how feasible shooting big action sequences, shooting anything really in Colombia was. A good friend of mine, Eric Newman who produced “Narcos” for Netflix, had been very positive about his experience, but it was on smaller scale. For this we were talking about gun fights and explosions right in downtown Bogota. So we went down there and met with President Santos who was relieved that it wasn’t a film about cocaine. But then quickly we had to be like, “But we are going to blow up everything in your city”. I think they saw that we were responsible and professional. And we truly had a wonderful time. The Colombians couldn’t have been nicer.

Were you happy, on the whole, with the move from non-fiction to fiction or was there something missing for you?

There were things I missed. It’s addictive when you do something almost journalistic. When we’re making a movie like “Friday Night Lights” or “Lone Survivor” or “Deepwater Horizon” and you get to go like a journalist and meet these people and uncover these stories and realise, “Oh my god you did this..?” That’s an addictive feeling. And so I miss that. I got to do some of that by interviewing ex-Ground Branch and some current CIA for this movie. But when you do those real movies, you have to show the film to all the families of people who died. Their parents, their children, their brothers. And that’s heavy. It’s intense and can be very emotionally draining. I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t less of that stress, talking to Iko about doing some great fights and blowing stuff up. So, I don’t miss that right now. I think I’ll go back to that again, in my career. But it was nice to just make an action movie.

 The winner of more than 50 international awards including the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2010, “The Secret” is one of the most talked-about movies from Argentina and was also the second-highest grossing Argentinean film, in history.

“The Secret” is a riveting crime thriller, legal drama, love story, rolled into one. The story centres on a rape-and-murder case which is re-visited 25 years after it was committed. Legal Counsel Benjamin Esposito is obsessed by the case not being solved and decides to write a fictional book about it, for which he visits his boss, Judge Irene Mendez Hastings. It revives old events, feelings and memories. It also brings to a close to the murder case, in a shock ending.

The 2009 Argentinean film was re-made, as a Hollywood thriller in 2015, directed by Billy Ray and starring Julia Roberts, Nicole Kidman and Chiwetel Ejiofor.

The film event is supported by the Embassy of Argentina, who will serve drinks and snacks, after the screening. The ambassador of Argentina Alicia Sonschein will introduce the film.

Films are screened in the RCB Forum on the second floor.

Book your seat at rcbfilmclub@gmail.com

An RCB Boat-Service will leave Saphan Thaksin Pier, at 3.30 pm.

The 2016 smash hit, “Your Name” did much to revive Thai interest in Japanese animation and now acclaimed director Mamoru Hosoda is back, thrilling local moviegoers with “Mirai”, a story that will resonate loudly with anyone, child or adult, who has a younger sibling.

Hosoda popped over to Bangkok last week to promote the film with its distributor M Pictures and the Japan Foundation arranged a public talk with him.

“Mirai” is Hosoda’s fifth movie in 12 years and follows on the heels of other successes, namely “The Girl Who Leapt Through Time”, “Summer Wars”, Wolf Children” and “The Boy and the Beast”.

He won three awards for animation from the Japanese Academy for “The Girl”, “Summer Wars” and “Wolf Children” and “Mirai” was selected for the Director’s Fortnight at this year’s Cannes International Film Festival this year.

“Mirai” is a story of four-year-old Kun-chan, who is waiting for his mother to return home from the hospital. At first, he is delighted when she comes back with his new sister Mirai but his happiness doesn’t last long. With his parents busy taking care of the baby, Kun-chan shows his displeasure at the lack of attention being given to him and indulges in nasty and sometimes irritating behaviour, even hitting his sister with his bullet train model.

The little boy then has a series of strange experiences whenever his parents berate him. There, in his garden, he meets a mysterious prince who turns out to be the human personification of the family dog Yekko and a teenage girl from the future who is a grown up version of his sister Mirai. He even travels back to the post World War II period and meets his great-grandfather and encounters a little girl of his age who turns out to be his scary mother. The adventures meld with his daily life and help him become comfortable with his environment.

“I got this idea from my own son. When his younger sister was born and we took her home, I saw his strange and untrusting look in his eyes. I was interested in how such a young child perceives the world around him,” says the director.

“Adults don’t have time to see the whole world like children; we tend to just focus on everyday matters. As parents, our duty is to take care of children and teach them but in fact, we are the ones who learn from our kids,” Hosoda continues, adding that he also injected his personal experience into the story.

As in his previous films, director has made family relationships at the centre of the story.

But while to him this appears perfectly natural, he appears surprised when the Thai media note that this phenomenon is common in Japanese animations and want to know why.

“I have never been asked that before though it is an interesting observation. However, it is not my intention to focus on the family matters in my films. It just happens. Take this film: the main character is a young boy and showing his character development automatically means focusing on his life and his family,” he explains.

The topic of family in his and other animations, he adds, is probably a reflection of the drastic changes in the Japanese family unit.

“Families in Japan are undergoing so many changes. For example, the Internet has made people isolate themselves from other members of the family and that lessens the relationship between family members. We are in a transition period and we don’t know where we are or how life should be. And that affects the way the children are raised,” he says.

Even though the main character is a young boy, the director stresses that the movie is suitable for people of all ages.

“Many people might write it off as a kid’s film but it isn’t. But I know what it’s like. When I was at university, I hesitated about going to see the Gibhli film “My Neighbour Totoro” because the main character is a four-year-old girl,” he says.

Hosoda often uses real locations in his films because he says it helps to give more dimensions to the characters. In “Mirai”, the key location is Yokohama and the scene where Kun-chan travels back to the post-war years and meets his great-grandfather is fascinating.

The director says the idea came from his wife’s grandfather who lives in the industrial area of Yokohama. It is not a tourist area but it does have plenty of historical memories. “But the audience doesn’t have to know all the background history,” he smiles.

Bringing real locations into animation is tough even though advanced techniques help make it real as possible. The working process starts by shooting photographs and video. In this case, introducing images of the city after the war was even more difficult as there is little evidence left and the public is not allowed in certain areas. The solution, Hosoda says, lay in interviewing local officials.

When asked about the most important tool an animation director should have, he says: “Just paper, pencil and pen. Seriously, making an animation costs a lot of money so you must create things that a movie with actors can’t. Most of the time, it isn’t just entertaining the audience but conveying a message. For me the most important thing is having a new and vivid idea and communicating it to the audience in a simple but powerful way.”

Although his films are well received in the box office and have won awards, he doesn’t consider himself a success. “I am still on the journey; it’s tough, tiring and has its own problems. But making animation is now part of my life and I know that I have to cope with those problems.”

The process from start to finish of an animation often takes years and the director says that the hardest part is keeping the story idea alive and interesting until the end.

“When we get an idea to develop the plot, we think it works. But as time passes, our feeling of excitement about the idea changes and we start thinking it’s not working. So the best ideas are those that excite throughout the project,” he says.

The director adds that he has loved drawing since he was young and became fascinated with the animation as a child, “Art was my way of healing when I had problems,” he muses.

“Children draw and paint to communicate what is in their minds. I was like that too. I was a quiet boy and had many unsuccessful experiences but I was always proud of my drawing. “I got plenty of inspiration from animation when I was young so, as an animation director, I really want to create animations that inspire |others.”

 It consists of 16 episodes and the first screening tonight.

The drama that tells the story of a man who believes life’s only value is money. He meets a woman who’s on the edge of her life. After a dramatic first meeting, they find and learn the true meaning of love.

Lee Seo Jin portrays the wealthy and arrogant Han Ji Hoon while Uee portrays his much younger wife Kang Hye Soo, a struggling single mom working as an assistant to a chef. She raises her daughter while paying off her late husband’s debt. Ji Hoon finds himself seeking a contract marriage to save his mother, who is dying of cirrhosis of the liver. The woman who will sign the contract marriage will donate a part of her liver to save Ji Hoon’s mother. In return, Ji Hoon will pay an exorbitant amount of money. Hye Soo eventually agrees to the contract marriage after learning she has an inoperable brain tumour. In return, Ji Hoon will pay enough money to provide for her daughter until she reaches adulthood.

The series also stars Kim Yong-geon, Park Jung-soo, Lee Hwi-hyang, Kim Young-pil, Kim Kwang-kyu, Kim Yoo-ri, Jung Kyung-soon, Lee Hyun-geol, Pyo Ye-jin, Ahn Ji-hoon and Kim So-jin.