International Film Heritage Festival
About
MEMORY! Festival has established a base in a country, Myanmar, with a rich cinema history dating all the way back to the 1920s. Continuing the tradition of the very few heritage film festivals in existence, MEMORY! aims to bring to the Myanmar public the kinds of films that were barely accessible for several decades in this country. Audiences will experience the rich histories of world and local film, and see Cinema as both a popular and an elevating artform that reaches across eras and nations. Though perhaps differently to each of us, Cinema speaks to all. Movies are journeys through time, space, and history, they are windows onto various cultures, traditions, societies, and religions.
The Myanmar Script Fund, an annual scriptwriting workshop competition, is MEMORY! Festival’s commitment to the next generation of Myanmar filmmakers.
As well MEMORY! Journalism & Culture is a program for the next generation of Myanmar journalists concerned by Culture.
MEMORY! Festival is developed by the MEMORY! Cinema Association, an international non-governmental organization, dedicated to the preservation of film and cultural memory worldwide. The Association is currently working on the Myanmar Film Heritage Project, a long-term mission that aims to recover and restore works of national significance and to establish a national film and media archive which would encourage historical research and function as a preservation and restoration facility.
Once a year, for the duration of ten days, Yangon becomes the capital of Worldwide Cinema Heritage in Southeast Asia.
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Program
Alongside the main theme, the film line-up included two additional sections: a Tribute to Colombia with thirteen heritage and recent works, and a section prepared entirely by the team of 3-Act, the recently created Myanmar Cinema magazine.
Events
In addition, the festival featured new exhibitions at the Waziya Cinema, in particular one about the famous German “Spiegel Affair“. Regarding the annual conference, it was held for the first time at the Secretariat, an iconic place in Yangon.
Guests
And also, for public discussion and run workshops: Producer Tran Bing Ngoc (Vietnam), Producer Rémi Burah (France), Programer Park Sungho (Korea), Distributor Vincent Paul-Boncour (France), Journalist Eko Maryadi (Indonesia), Tim Aye-Hardy from NGO myME (Myanmar), Chief-editor Sonny Swe (Myanmar), Prof. Ma Thida (Myanmar), Prof. Suresh Chabria (India), Prof. Howard Besser (USA), Prof. Roland Tolentino (Philipines) among others.
During the past editions, our distinguished Patrons Catherine Deneuve (France) and Grace Swe Zin Htaik (Myanmar) are joined by celebrated Malaysian filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang, Leading actor Lee Kang Sheng, Director Tan Pin Pin (Singapore), Director Midi Z (Taiwan), Director Eddie Cahyono (Indonesia), Directors Michel Hazanavicius & Olivier Assayas (France), Actress Cheng Pei Pei (China), Actress Michelle Yeoh (Malaysia), Actor Wyne (Myanmar), Actress Phway Phway (Myanmar), Directors Pascale Ferran, Davy Chou, Régis Wargnier (France) and many more…
Conferences
This year’s edition of the Memory! conference series focuses on PRESS & DEMOCRACY ON SILVER SCREEN.
The topic arrives at a critical historical juncture in which journalists and the media more generally are under siege from multiple angles. Alongside the screenings of classics and modern movies, the conference explored a series of necessary questions about how journalists, members of the media, artists, filmmakers, bloggers and even everyday social media users can understand today’s mediascape and participate in respectful and democratic exchanges of news and opinions.
This conference aimed to pull back the curtain and to bring out into the open a world often hidden from view: the social, political, professional, and personal lives of journalists in search of Truth. These stories are so abstract that they have only been successfully portrayed through film where romanticized heroines and heroes risk everything to bring us even just a tiny step closer to understanding the political and economic systems that run our worlds. Our focus on Press and Democracy (at the Movies) was a cross-disciplinary conversation between film and media scholars, journalists, and activists. Myanmar and international presenters joined us in addressing this topic from a variety of perspectives including case studies, theoretical investigations, problem-oriented arguments, and comparative analyses. Thanks to its interdisciplinary nature, the conference generated important discussions about the role of Freedom and the function of a Press in Democracies across various historical and geopolitical contexts.
The speakers invited were: Prof. Howard Besser (USA), Prof. Suresh Chabria (India), Educator Tim Aye-Hardy (Myanmar), Journalist Sonny Swe (Myanmar), Dr Ma Thida (Myanmar), Prof. Roland Tolentino (Philippines), Journalist Eko Maryadi (Indonesia) & Filmmaker Kiri Dalena (Philippines).
The conference was held Nov 10 at the Secretariat, Yangon.
The conference was organized by Dr. Paul Grant (Professor Graduate Cinema Studies, University of San Carlos, Philippines) & Theo Stojanov (PhD candidate, Film & Moving Image Studies, Concordia University, Canada).
Myanmar Script Fund
Myanmar Script Fund is a program for emerging local filmmakers working on their first or second full-length feature film. MSF is intended to help connect filmmakers from Myanmar with international audiences.
The 3rd edition of MSF taken place during MEMORY! festival from Nov. 9 to 13, 2018 at the Secretariat, Yangon.
The program includes professional workshops combining individual consultancies on script-writing, producing, and plenary sessions intended to provide insight into the international film market. The Fund’s objective is to support emerging filmmakers during the development process and to assist them in honing their professional skills. At the end, the candidates present their projects during a pitch session in front of a JURY comprised of international film experts. In 2016, the jury was presided by the director Michel Hazanavicius (France) and in 2017 by the director Midi Z (Taiwan). This year, it was chaired by Vietnamese director Phan Dang Di.
On Nov 13, 2018 the jury has awarded two projects:
The Jury Award
The jury is delighted to announce that 30,000 USD of in-kind post-production from Digital District goes to THE BEER GIRL OF YANGON by writer/director Sein Lyan Tun and producer John Badalu.
The Open Doors Award
This award goes to the highly promising female producer Khin Warso from the project SHE CALLED IT FREEDOM. She will be invited to participate in a week-long producers’ Lab at the Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland in August 2019 which will help her develop her skills.
MSF Laureates 2016
FOUR LEGS by Mg Sun (producer Ma Aeint)
SATURDAY BORN ARIES by Nwaye Zar Che Soe (producer Soe Arkar Htun)
WISDOM by Thet Oo Maung (producer Robert Winn Htein) – Mention of the Jury
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MSF Laureates 2017
FRUIT GATHERING by Aung Phyoe (producer Aung Phyoe)
WAY BACK HOME by Nay Chi Myat Noe Wint (producer Kaung Sint)
Since 2017, Digital District , a international company based in Paris, supports these awards by offering to the winner access to a bourse of post-production.
The Myanmar Script Fund works in close collaboration with Open Doors, a program managed by the Festival Locarno (Switzerland). It is supported by Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (Switzerland), Forever Group (Myanmar), ARTE (France), Institut français (France), Canal+ Myanmar, Digital District (France) & Transition (Czech Republique).
Journalism & Culture Program
Associated with the Myanmar Journalism Institute, we have developed the following program:
The participants to the curriculum are 20 students from Myanmar Journalism Institute.
MJI’s professors start the dedicated program at the beginning of October.
The workshop starts at the end of October supervised by Chris Peken from MJI then by French journalists Carol Isoux & Jérôme Boruszewski.
The workshop is shared in two parts:
End of Oct – Festival’s Opening: Theorical sessions
Festival: Practice with daily coverage of MEMORY! Festival & guests.
At the end of the workshop, a newspaper in Burmese, the Bioscope News, gathered all the articles. Printed in 3.000 free copies.
The 2nd edition of this program was supported by Parliaments and People Program / University of SOAS (London).
In 2018, MEMORY! International Film Festival was proudly supported by the following Partners:
Ministry of Information of Myanmar
Embassy of France in Myanmar
Institut français
Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation
Ananda
Forever Group
Canal+ Myanmar
Friedrich Ebert Stiftung
Embassy of United States of America in Myanmar
Centre National du Cinéma
Arte
Digital District
Pan Pacific Yangon
Myanmar Motion Picture Organisation
Embassy of Colombia in Thailand
Open Doors (Locarno Festival)
Yoma Bank
Goethe Institut
Secretariat Yangon
Myanmar Journalism Institute
Gulliver Travels
Yangoods
Coca Cola
If you want to become a partner of MEMORY! Film Festival, please send us a message through our contact form.
© Stephen Kelly
Myanmar Film Heritage Project
The project is comprised of three foundational components:
RESTORATION:
The Lost Film Search and the Restoration of Myanmar Classics programs aim to establish a national film collection. Our initial assessment revealed a dire situation: less than twenty titles still have celluloid elements that could permit restoration work. Among them, MYA GA NAING (1934) by Maung Tin Maung, one of the key directors of classic Myanmar cinema, restored in 2016 and PYO CHIT LIN (1950) by Tin Myint restored in 2017.
PRESERVATION:
The physical preservation of the films and film-related materials such as posters, scripts, photographs, sound recordings, press and advertising materials is a crucial part of cinema history and, even more importantly, of national cultural memory.
Urgent action is required to process existing collections as soon as possible, as physical decay and degradation are already taking their toll. Another part of this task involves searching and collecting these kinds of materials throughout the country and abroad.
ACCESS:
The creation of the National Film Archive of Myanmar is the ultimate purpose of this Project. As a key cultural venue in Yangon and a model in the ASEAN region, the Archive will highlight the rich history of Myanmar cinema, offer diverse programming of Myanmar and foreign films, and educate younger generations. It will house a comprehensive National Film and Media Collection and help inspire future film talent.
MEMORY! Mobile Cinema
MEMORY! Mobile Cinema Program aims to bring MYA GA NAING, part of national collective memory, to the people leaving in rural areas, where the access to electricity and culture is very limited.
MEMORY! Mobile Cinema starts in December 2018 and will travel during five months in 2019 in Magway, Bago & Ayeyarwady Regions and also Mon State. During this tour, more than 70 screenings will be organized.
The First Row will be held in 16 small villages of the Ayeyarwady Region from December 2018 to January 2019. During this tour, the townships concerned are Ingapu, Henzada, Pantanaw, Maubin & Mawgyun (see map below).
