Retrospective celebrating films of Edward Yang to open in Brussels

Brussels, Aug. 7 (CNA) A retrospective film festival featuring all but one of the films in the catalogue of award-winning Taiwanese director Edward Yang (楊德昌) will open in Brussels on Aug. 13 and run for three weeks until Sept. 3.

The festival will be held at Cinema Galeries, located in the Galeries Royales Saint-Hubert in Brussels, and feature seven of Yang's eight movies.

Speaking with CNA, festival curator Levon Kirakosian said most cinephiles are familiar with Yang's "Taipei Story" (青梅竹馬) and "Yi Yi" (一一).

They generally have not gotten the chance to enjoy the rest of his filmography, however, and because the festival would like to guide audiences on a journey of discovery to get to know different cultures through movies, the retrospective features Yang's other works, the curator said.

Yang gained fame as part of the Taiwanese New Wave of the 1980s and is regarded as one of Taiwan's greatest filmmakers. Yi Yi, which came out in 2000, was his last work and earned him a best director award at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival.

He died from colon cancer seven years later at the age of 59 in the United States.

The only film in Yang's catalogue not being screened in Brussels is the 1983 movie "That Day, on the Beach" (海灘的一天), Yang's first feature film, because the festival was unable to secure the rights to screen it, Kirakosian said.

While "In Our Time" (光陰的故事) was released in 1982, "That Day, on the Beach" was technically Yang's first feature film because the former was an anthology Yang made with other Taiwanese greats such as Ko I-chen (柯一正) and Chang Yi (張毅).

To promote the retrospective, the poster of "Taipei Story" was selected as the main visual material, with the title of the film replaced with text about the event.

Kirakosian said the poster was chosen as the main graphic because of the original's beautiful composition, adding that it would be a waste if the image is not used to promote the festival.

The retrospective film fest follows the 15th edition of the annual "L'Heure d'Été" summer film festival, which runs from June 30 to Aug. 11 at Cinema Galeries as well.

Taipei was selected as the thematic destination of L'Heure d'Été, with Taiwan-based Malaysian director Tsai Ming-liang's (蔡明亮) "Goodbye, Dragon Inn" (不散) chosen out of 18 Taiwanese pictures as the opening film of the festival.

At the current festival, Kirakosian -- who is the co-curator of L'Heure d'Été -- described the festival as "unprecedented" because almost all of the screenings were sold out.

As L'Heure d'Été takes place in the summer, Taiwan's "Left-Handed Girl" (左撇子女孩), "The Assassin" (刺客聶隱娘) and "Nina Wu" (灼人秘密) received special outdoor screenings, which, according to Kirakosian, all attracted more than 2,000 viewers.