8 days Ho Chi Minh City breathes with cinema: HIFF 2024 has excellent film quality

Ho Chi Minh City International Film Festival attracts 250,000 attendees, especially the outdoor film screenings are very crowded - Photo: TTD

According to the Organizing Committee, if the Busan International Film Festival needs about 10 million USD to be successfully organized, HIFF was initially budgeted at 3-4 million USD (nearly 100 billion VND), including operating costs for the past 2 years, not just the 8 days of HIFF (from April 6 to 13).

Currently, the approved plan includes state budget sources and social mobilization according to regulations.

At the end, the organizing committee will count all the costs and give a more accurate figure on the total budget of the Ho Chi Minh City International Film Festival (HIFF) 2024.

The budget is quite large, Ho Chi Minh City supports it wholeheartedly

According to the organizers, the contributions and support of Ho Chi Minh City for HIFF this time are very significant and valuable, not to mention other departments and agencies.

The city actively supports HIFF in terms of infrastructure - which is a must and can only be supported by the State. That is in terms of hardware.

Legendary director Hirokazu Kore-eda is the biggest name in world cinema to attend HIFF for the first time - Photo: TTD

Mr. Pham Minh Toan, CEO of HIFF, told the press: "Regarding software, we have to invite many international guests to HIFF, but the spending level cannot be the same as that of Ho Chi Minh City. Regarding awards, it is also difficult to approach international standards, so we have to socialize. Hopefully next year, brands and investors will see the potential of HIFF and participate in investing."

HIFF's highest award is the Golden Star for Best Southeast Asian Film, which comes with a trophy and $10,000 (about VND250 million).

The value of this award cannot be compared with the world's leading film festivals, but it is approaching regional film festivals.

HIFF screened nearly 100 films, except for a few gala films that were re-screened Vietnamese films, the majority were films screened for the first time in Vietnam or Asia.

The Southeast Asian category has 11 films, the First or Second Feature category has 11 films, the Short Film category initially had 25 films but later changed to 22 films.

There are some films that choose HIFF for global premiere such as Dearest Viet (documentary about Vietnamese-German twins), Badboy Club (Malaysia), short film Homeland is a bunch of sour star fruit (Vietnam).

The world premiere of the film Dearest Viet left a lot of emotions - Photo: TTD

Some of the "festive" activities that HIFF is proud of are the digital re-screening of two classic Vietnamese films - Buffalo Wool Season and Wild Fields .

With the screening of Buffalo Wool Season , director Nguyen Vo Nghiem Minh was very moved that after 20 years, his film was once again brought to the general audience through an inspiring outdoor screening.

At the same time, for the first time, Ho Chi Minh City has an outdoor movie screening space on Nguyen Hue walking street and Saigon riverside park (Thu Duc city), attracting thousands of spectators.

Value is not only in the red carpet

At major film festivals, the red carpet is where the world's top stars gather and is considered the most glamorous place in the entertainment industry.

With brand new film festivals like HIFF, of course the red carpet is still an attractive event when actors, directors, producers, film crews... get to dress up and show off their beauty in front of the public.

Director Luong Dinh Dung - member of the jury for the category of First or Second Film - Photo: TTD

But the HIFF Organizing Committee also noted: "The most important thing of a film festival is to invest in discovering talent." If HIFF's operations are accompanied by new talents in the film industry, HIFF will build its own reputation and position in the industry.

The Organizing Committee also received questions about the criteria for films that have never been released or premiered to be eligible for the award, which is a bit strict for a film festival that is being held for the first time (and is also the reason why there are no Vietnamese film representatives in the two major competition categories of HIFF 2024).

The Organizing Committee said it will stick to this criterion because the younger the festival is, the more it must be innovative to create a solid position.

Director Luong Dinh Dung - a member of the jury for the First or Second Film category - added: "If HIFF "stubbornly" maintains the criteria of films that have never been shown before or only accept second screenings after world-class A-list film festivals such as Cannes, Venice, Toronto... then in the future we can have class."

The organizers said that thanks to this criterion, this year there were very high-quality films participating in HIFF, with some films in the top 8 of the world's leading film festivals.

The organizers emphasized that in one or two major award categories, there are two excellent films with close scores, so it is likely that both films will receive the same award.

250,000 spectators attended

The total audience participating in HIFF activities reached more than 250,000 people, including 73 events in 13 indoor cinemas and 2 outdoor locations (Nguyen Hue walking street and Cine Park) with nearly 200 film screenings, plus discussion events, exchanges, workshops, and presentations at major hotels and the Ho Chi Minh City Theater.

Being held for the first time, besides the positive points, HIFF admits that there are some points that need to be improved to improve the quality in the future. There are still some confusions in coordination leading to technical problems in screening films or calculating reasonable time for exchange sessions to ensure that they do not affect the screenings. Changing the event schedule also needs to be limited to avoid inconvenience for film crews and support staff.

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Source: https://tuoitre.vn/8-ngay-tp-hcm-tho-cung-dien-anh-hiff-2024-co-chat-luong-phim-xuat-sac-2024041309484116.htm