Toronto Film Festival 2006

The Toronto International Film Festival happens every year around the second week of September.  Actors, directors and fans alike flog the city to soak in the atmosphere and catch a few films.  Sean Penn was here to promote his latest film, All the King’s Men and ended up getting the wrong kind of attention.  He forgot to check the smoking code before coming to Toronto and decided to light up during an interview – does he not know that Toronto is one of the most unwelcoming cities for smokers?  Media and fans alike were astounded and offended, though other sympathizing fans actually defended him saying that the poor man was addicted and he should be given a break!

Soap operas aside, the film festival is a great time to catch really great creations from all parts of the world.  It caters to all tastes but one has to be willing to experiment a little in order to find a few really great films.  I personally like being taken to so many far away foreign places, and being dropped in the middle of some improbable story I couldn’t have thought of myself.  Last week I saw an Italian-Mandarin film that presented a suitable contrast of east and west.  In The Missing Star Vincenzo, a steel mill engineer travels to the bowels of China to attempt to deliver a piece without which the newly purchased factory that was imported from Italy would have very serious problems and presumably cause many casualties.  The man tracks down the female interpreter that had been involved in the transaction and together they embark on their quest to save the factory.  They get into a number of adventures and misunderstandings and take to liking each other through the mishaps.  We see industrial China at its worst – oppressive, polluted, ugly, uninspiring.  But in the middle of it an inspiring story unfolds.  The highlight of this movie was the subtle and expressive acting from both protagonists, Sergio Castellitto and Tai Ling.

Vincenzo’s misunderstanding of the Chinese ways in this film, reminded me of some of my own cultural experiences in China.  When I went over to Beijing 10 years ago to study Mandarin I quickly realized a bike was a must to get around the school and the city and to try to understand the Chinese way of life.  On my first week there, I eagerly approached a man selling bikes just outside the school.  “How convenient that they would have a bike shop just outside the school”, I thought.  “And they’re used, so they fit in with student’s budgets.”  I had a brief exchange with the bike sales man, me saying ‘Wo yao mai zheige’, pointing at a bike I had selected, a Flying Pigeon, and he responding ‘Bu mai’.  I couldn’t figure out why this man didn’t want me to buy his bikes until I finally clued in that this was a bike parking lot and that he was only looking after the bikes!  He would have had a very unhappy customer if I’d convinced him to take the few yuan from me for one of them!  I eventually found a proper shop and a shop owner who would take my money and I ventured all over in my Flying Pigeon.

This article was posted by Veronica Montero.