Bruce Robinson & I, Apichatpong Weerasethakul & I, Aki Kaurismäki & I, György Pálfi & I, Dagur Kári & I, Ken Loach & I, Emir Kusturica & I, Lisandro Alonso & I…

Auteur theory representation in real life

It came to my attention that I even in my quite short life spam I ´ve managed to “meet“ quite an interesting group of filmmakers. Not all I would want, but enough to start (and because I am still what job search agency would call too inexperienced) bragging about. A chance to meet your often favourite director is the best thing festival can offer. Normally I would be really hard to even come closer to him. If you don’t know right people, of course.

You can meet them face to face, question them about their style, ask them about work, you can take something of your own from them. You can notice that Lisandro Alonso has the saddest smile, Ken Loach has longest successful film career and most fascinating hairstyle, or the fact that Dagur Kári can perfectly answer question about Iceland tapestry, fact that Kusturica has to become as famous as Fellini otherwise his father won´t acknowledge his directing career, or that György Pálfi is definitely nowhere close to his characters in Taxidermia.

And sometimes when you are brave enough, you can catch them on a street, buy them some beer and have them only for yourself. I heard György Pálfi is very friendly type of guy. And I meant it in a good way. However Aki Kaurismäki is completely different cause. Not that he is not friendly or what, he was certainly good to people, but he doesn’t like – to his fans dismay – attending O&A after festival screenings. He had spent most of his time in Czech Republic drinking outside festival cinema. Not alone of course, he was very buying shot for all his new friends.

My last encounter was with the director and writer Bruce Robinson, mostly known as creator of Britain much loved buddy film Withnail & I, or now in cinemas adaptation of  the famous Hunter Thompson novel – The Rum Diary. Truly remarkable person – and amazing storyteller I have to say. For nearly two hours he had managed to hold our attention with his witty remarks about world of film or writing. Only telling stories, sometimes backtracking from original question, just to reach deeper and tell us something new and amusing about how it works, for example in Hollywood. It´s very bad, he said. We shouldn’t go there. And now for another useful advice. If your are director struggling with camera or setting just : “ Point your camera at the story. “
I hereby name him The funniest director I ever met.

My award to The cutest director goes to young female director Sophie Schoukens. Check out her debut film – Marieke Marieke.
Another award goes to Kaurismäki for being the closest to the characters he created in his movies – as much one director can be.
And to Apichatpong for being one of the most intelligent and inspiring people I met in years.
Other awards should be coming soon. I am still waiting for encounter with Lars von Trier.