Tisch School of the Arts Asia

The Blue Mansion, screenplay by Ken Kwek, Tisch Asia M.F.A. candidate in Dramatic Writing '10, was recently selected for the 2009 Pusan International Film Festival in Korea. We interviewed Ken to find out more and gain insight into his creative process.

Q. What is The Blue Mansion about?

A. A Singapore tycoon, Wee Bak Chuan, dies suddenly under mysterious circumstances--but returns as a ghost with unfinished business. A whodunit ensues when two detectives show up to question a host of suspects--including Wee's children. Director Glen Goei's comedy of manners explores the heart of darkness beating just beneath the successful patriarchal orders of Southeast Asia.

Q. Describe your writing process. How long did it take? What inspired you?

A. Singapore is my canvas. It's a very developed country. But there are signs of a growing rift between an older, more authoritarian and pragmatic generation, and a younger, more privileged and imaginative one. I wanted to explore this. So I created a protagonist, an old tycoon with a tyrannical streak--and stuck a knife in his back. Then I killed myself trying to figure out who did it.

Frank Rinaldi, Film Class of 2010, was recently awarded the Grand Jury Award for Best Short at the 2009 Slamdance Festival. Tisch Asia caught up with Frank to find out more.

Q. Tell us about the award you received. How did this happen?

A. Funny Guy was presented the Grand Jury Award for Best Experimental Short at the 2009 Slamdance Film Festival. There are Grand Jury Awards for best narrative feature, best feature documentary, best documentary short, etc. We won in the experimental category. I don't know how this happened.

Q. What is Funny Guy about? Tell us a little about what inspired you to create this project.

A. Funny Guy is a movie about the madness of trying too hard. Jamie Dent, the story's anti-hero, is a very lonely and confused young man. His social skills are beyond bad, and because of this he has no friends. He has no self-perspective, and instead of correcting his social inadequacies, he exacerbates them via his inappropriate efforts to gain the attention of others. Jamie has no social boundaries, and the harder he tries to make people laugh, the more people are repelled by him. Todd Solondz and his merciless critiques were the primary impetus for the project.

Q. Looking ahead to your third year of the program, what are you looking forward to?

A. I'd like my thesis project to be a cross-pollination of the run-and-gun aesthetic implemented on Funny Guy and the formal methodology applied to my second year film LOWbASiC (in theaters soon!). I have no idea how to do this, but it might be fun to try. I'm also looking forward to telling a story that can be articulated or represented as a differential calculus theorem, or an Ornette Coleman song.

Student short films from Tisch School of the Arts Asia will be screened at the 2009 Palm Springs International ShortFest on 23-29 June. News of the school's appearance at the film festival has sprung up in hollywoodreporter.com, indiewire.com, and The Desert Sun of Palm Springs.

Tisch Asia student films in the festival are The Smallest Cinema in the Universe by Uta Arning; Jonathan's Home by Nathanael Carton; Alexandria and Master of His Domain by Eric Elofson; Teleglobal Dreamin' by Eric Flanagan; Joyce Agape by Hsieh Chun-Yi; Intersection by Shivani Khattar; Rare Fish (Ikan Langka) by Basil Mironer; Godverdomme! by Rene Pannevis; Double Happiness by Jordan Schiele; Delilah, Before by Melanie Schiele; and Connections International by Putnam Trumbull.

By BROOKS BARNES
Published: June 2, 2009

LOS ANGELES — “Planet 51,” a forthcoming computer-animated movie about an astronaut who discovers happy green people, has the game maker Sega and HarperCollins signed up as promotional partners. Hollywood stars (Dwayne Johnson, Jessica Biel) lend their vocal talents. Online chatter about the film is notably positive.

The latest from Pixar? Try the inaugural effort from Ilion Animation Studios, an upstart film company in Spain. Hardly anyone in Hollywood has heard of Ilion, but here it comes with a big-time distributor (Sony), a high-profile release date (Thanksgiving) and a kids’ meal tie-in (Burger King).

Computer animation, once one of the most isolated corners of Hollywood, is rapidly becoming one of the most crowded. With the cost of computer animation coming down because of advances in technology and soaring box office receipts for family films, a broad range of new animation players are entering the multiplex....(for full article, click on the link below)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/03/movies/03anim.html

Tisch Asia is now on Twitter. Follow us for another great way to stay connected and get the information that's important to you.