People become  familiar with “Macao” from movies. The streets, architecture and legacy from  colonial times, have always attracted many filmmakers. It is a hot spot for movie shooting, but there are very few “real” Macao films.

 

Macao has  lacked  indie production to reflect local people’s life. Due to  limitations in various aspects, achievements in film creation are not very satisfactory. The local industry is not as flourishing as it is in the neighboring city, Hong Kong.

 

After the handover of Macao, some local producers began to seek their own uniqueness and tell their stories through audiovisual media. In order to promote the development of local film talent and Macao film culture, a non-profit organization, Creative Macau-Center for Creative Industries, organized an international film competition to provide a platform for people to communicate and improve the film art.

 

“Sound and Image Challenge International Festival”, which has been held for eight years, encourages local and overseas productions to compete in Macao. The festival is open to both audiovisual professionals and beginners. There are more than 4000 works submitted from the whole world in the international short film competition – “Shorts” and music video competition – “Volume”. The honor guests are influential and the film selection is deliberated.

 

Umac Bridges invited the festival director Lúcia Lemos to share her views on the festival and Macao films.

 

Lemos is the Director Member of the Festival Committee, and also the Coordinator of Creative Macao. She has been working in the Creative Macau as a project manager since 2003, responsible for operating the programs, which include competitions, workshops and master classes and so on.

 

 

R (Reporter): How did the Festival start?

L (Lemos): It started in 2010, in the  form of competition of audiovisuals for creative people in Macao.  As we knew the gaming industry was looking for local talent of audiovisual for event marketing, the festival would help both the creators and casinos.

 

R: What is the difference between the festival this year and the previous years?

L: The festival has become an international short film festival since 2015 and is getting better year after year. For the submissions of “Shorts” and “Volume”, we accept films in the following categories:  Animation, Fiction and Documentary.  For the festival in 2017, we will organize more master classes and the increased number of films will be the major attraction for local audiences. We have films from all continents, so the variety is huge as well as the genres.

 

R: What are the specializations of people involved in this project?

L: Currently, we have three full-time staff with degrees in the areas of Management of the Arts, Design and Business of Information System. Until now, we have had two interns majoring in Communication from the University of Macau, two interns majoring jn Communication and Media from University of Saint Joseph, part-time staff with academic background in Journalism and Media, and Visual Arts. There are six volunteer students from Film Production, and Communication and Media.

 

R: What are the practical difficulties the project encounters?

L: None. In fact, we just do what the budget can afford. We do enjoy organizing it every year and we are creating a program to attract more audience.

 

R: What are the differences between a “film curator" and “festival director” to you?

L: A film curator is a film critic who usually writes film reviews and advises organizers of film festivals. The festival director in my case is a planner and organizer who executes the program, making the Festival happen.

 

R: How are winning films selected from a huge amount of materials?

L: We invite the six winners of last year to serve as pre-jury selection. They will score the films from 1-10, films scored the highest become the finalists. Those finalist films will be sent to the Grand Jury consisting of the Portuguese News and Program Controller TDM João Francisco Pinto, Shanghai film director Liang Cheng and Hong Kong film director Zeming Zhang for the evaluation of winning films.

 

R: How do you find new potential producers and works from the candidates?

L: It is very easy. The best films usually get the same scores from each Grand Jury member. The result is unanimous.

 

R: How can local independent films be improved and well-known at the festival?

L: Every year, we showcase extra local film productions at the festival and set up the Best Local Entry Award to encourage our local producers. The music video competition “Volume” also advocates local music and inspires Macao filmmakers to produce videos based on the original songs.

 

R: What do you think of Macao’s local movies? What is the issue?

L: Macao is very small. Although there are more than 20 Macao professional filmmakers, the scale is small due to the nonexistent market. The filmmakers are struggling with the limited range of consumers, production and investors. If the government decides to open the film market and gives facilities to international investors, producers, movie directors in a way similar to the policies of casinos, Macao will be one of the centers of the film industry.

 

R: Is there any suggestion to promote the development of small-budget movies?

L: Now, people want to make big and good films to compete in the worldwide festivals, which means they want to be known and recognized by their peers. However, it is more important for small and good films to deliver specific messages to the world or community. The audience can tell if the film is good or not  despite  its budget. What a movie director should consider is to express creativity and himself or herself.