Future Gate 2022: The sci-fi film festival started in Prague with pastel sweets and horror classics
The playwrights selected the 5 most interesting films from the submitted films for the main festival competition, which will surprise you with their diversity and artistic originality. The first of the five was Tan Bee Thiam’s inaugural Singaporean film Tiong Bahru Social Club, which tells of the loneliness, age and power of modern technology. The title is exceptional for its timeless message and artistic treatment in the spirit of the poetics of Wes Anderson’s films. The film was personally presented in Prague by director Tam Bee Thiam and cinematographer and editor Lei Yuan Bin. The delegation will also accompany the Brno screening on March 15.
March 6, 2022 • 8:45 p.m.
PHIL TIPPETT
Director of Crazy God
Phil Tippett, founder of Tippett Studios, is a pioneer in the field of animation and visual effects. His career in visual effects is more than 45 years and includes two Oscars, six nominations, one BAFTA award, two Emmy Awards and many other accolades. In 1975, George Lucas commissioned Tippett to create a stop-motion miniature scene for Star Wars: The New Hope. In addition to this legendary series, Tippett has worked on such films as RoboCop, Jurassic Park, Indiana Jones and many others. Prague’s audience will be introduced to the long-running directing The Mad God, who is forgotten in a dark fantasy world at the edge of the apocalypse.
TAKAHIDE HORI
Director of Junk Head
Born in 1971 in Oita Prefecture, Japan. The short film Junk Head 1 began filming in 2009 and ended four years later. The following year, he began working on his feature version, which was re-edited and released in Japanese cinemas last March. projects in 10 cinemas were planned, but originally the great interest of the audience was caused by film screenings throughout Japan and prestigious world festivals.
TAN BEE THIAM
Director of the film Tiong Bahru Social Club
Tan Bee Thiam is a filmmaker and educator who has directed the short film Kopi Julia (Sharjah Biennale 2013) and co-directed a number of films. His solo debut Tiong Bahru Club became the inaugural film of the Singapore International Film Festival 2020, won the Roger and Julie Corman Prize at the 19th Fargo Fantastic Film Festival, the Grand Jury Prize for Best Narrative Film at the Guam International Film Festival and the Special Jury Prize at The 38th Los Angeles Asia-Pacific Film Festival. As a graduate of the Berlinale Talents and Rotterdam Lab, he produced Daniel Huie Demons (2019), Snakeskin (2015) and Eclipses (2013), Lei Yuan Bina 03-FLATS (2014) and White Days (2009), Liao Jiekaie As You Were (2014) and Red Dragonflies (2010) and Yeo Siew Hua In the House of Straw (2009).
March 7, 2022 • 2:49 PM
LEI JUAN BIN
Cameraman and editor of the film Tiong Bahru Social Club
Lei Yuan Bin (Looi Wan Ping) is a founding member of 13 Little Pictures. Lei directed, filmed and edited White Days, 03-FLATS, A Dance for Ren Hang (short film) and I Dream of Singapore (Berlinale Panorama 2020). He co-directed Fundamentally Happy with Tan Bee Thiam. Lei, a graduate of the Berlinale Talents 2016, made the film Tiong Bahru Social Club by director Thiam and was the cinematographer of Red Dragonflies and As You Were by director Liao Jiekai.
ACCOMPANYING PROGRAM IN PRAGUE
The ninth year of the festival will be accompanied by a joint exhibition of artists Michal Suchánek and Jonáš Ledecký. Michal Suchánek will present a sample from his legendary comic Scary Joy, which he based on short stories by Ondřej Neff. Jonáš Ledecký presents comic strips created with John Riley – Pussycat Assassins, which were regularly published in Playboy magazine in the years 2018–2020. The second festival exhibition will also be located in the Lucerna passage. The students of the Graphic Design and Visual Communication Studio in Prague’s Umprum created a redesign of the Ikaria XB1 magazine, the oldest Czech sci-fi magazine. The festival also deals with serious and current topics. War veteran Otakar Foltyn and journalist Ondrej Soukup will discuss the war in Ukraine.
The Czech film critic František Fuka accepted the invitation to a discussion after the end of the legendary film The Thing. After the film Predator, playwright Jiří Flígl talks to the audience. He will deal with the topic of sects after the screening of the documentary The Prophet and the Aliens by journalist Jiří X. Doležal. After the documentary Life Beyond the Edge, looking for an answer to the question of whether we are alone in space, biophysicist Vladimír Kopecký from the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Charles University will answer the audience’s questions. Scientist and philosopher Jan Romportl will discuss with the audience after the screening of the film Cyberpunk: The Top of the Genre.
UFO in the Lucerna Gallery
An exhibition of photographs from the documentary series by director Petr Vachler can also be seen in the Lucerna Gallery from March 7. Top Secret UFO Projects: Declassified. The exhibition will take you to places of extraterrestrial flying objects. On March 12, viewers will have the opportunity to watch two episodes of the film series, which was originally intended only for Netflix, this Saturday. On the same day and at the same place, a discussion entitled About UFOs will take place seriously, not seriously with neurobiologist and researcher of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic Tomáš Petrásk, Ph.D. and publicist, ufologist and project leader Záře Vladimír Šiška.
In Prague, the accompanying program will be complemented by the popular competition sci-fi pub quiz and concert Prague Cello Trio led by Jan Zvěřina, who will present original music covers.
March 9, 2022 • 11:27 AM
March 4, 2022 • 9:19 PM