STF: Kung fu style
- by Raphaela Neihausen, October 08, 2009
Last Tuesday, STF screened Alexander Sebastien Lee’s THE REAL SHAOLIN to an audience that was equal-parts documentary lovers and martial-arts enthusiasts. A crowd-pleaser at last year’s Toronto International Film Festival, THE REAL SHAOLIN follows two Chinese and two Western students of martial-arts over months of difficult lessons and life-changing experiences, revealing just how much hard work goes into those dazzling moves. The film not only transports us to a different country, but to a different state of mind, where everything is sacrificed for athletic mastery. For the Westerners Orion and Eric, adjusting to the foreign mindset is an added challenge. For Yuan and Zhu, the stakes are even higher, as they have no other prospects. Alexander Sebastien Lee (visiting all the way from Beijing, China) explained the challenging multi-year process of filming and editing this project, and also shared some martial arts philosophies that he picked up along the way. The Q&A was capped off with the audience singing “Happy Birthday” to STF host Thom Powers. It was a somewhat excruciating experience for Thom, leading him to dictate a new STF rule: STF audiences can only sing this song to 10 year olds (like Doug Pray’s daughter during the screening of BIG RIG) or 98 year olds (like film subject Ruth Gruber during last week’s screening of AHEAD OF TIME).
(photo courtesy of Joshua Z Weinstein)
Related Film/Screening: THE REAL SHAOLIN by Alexander Sebastien Lee
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Feb 7: UNFINISHED SPACES
by Alysa Nahmias and Benjamin Murray“Cuba will count as having the most beautiful academy of arts in the world.” —Fidel Castro (1961) Cuba’s ambitious National Art Schools project, designed by three young artists in the wake of ...
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Feb 14: ZELIG
by Woody Allen”[Allen’s] new, remarkably self-assured comedy is to his career what… Berlin Alexanderplatz is to Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s and… Fanny and Alexander is to Ingmar Bergman’s ... Zelig is not only ...
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Feb 28: THE PROMISE: THE MAKING OF DARKNESS ON THE EDGE OF TOWN
by Thom ZimnyDescription from TIFF 2010 catalog by Thom Powers: The Promise: The Making of Darkness on the Edge of Town takes us into the studio with Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band for the recording of ...
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Mar 6: SMASH HIS CAMERA
by Leon Gast“Famously and successfully sued by Jackie Onassis, and slugged just as famously and successfully by Marlon Brando, denounced from the pulpits of punditry for decades, Galella has been a man easy to ...
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Mar 13: THE MAN NOBODY KNEW: IN SEARCH OF MY FATHER, CIA SPYMASTER WILLIAM COLBY
by Carl ColbyA son’s riveting look at a father whose life seemed straight out of a spy thriller, THE MAN NOBODY KNEW: IN SEARCH OF MY FATHER, CIA SPYMASTER WILLIAM COLBY uncovers the secret world of a legendary ...
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Mar 20: GIRL MODEL
by Ashley Sabin and David Redmon Description from TIFF 2011 catalog by Thom Powers: Girl Model shows a rarely seen side of the fashion industry. The film brings a novelist’s eye for emotional and psychological complexity to its ...
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