Wonderful Town R: Aditya Assarat Land: Thailand 2007 Drehformat: HD Format: 35mm, Farbe Länge: 92 Minuten Sprache: Thai mehr Informationen

Ton, ein junger Architekt aus Bangkok, soll den Wiederaufbau einer vom Tsunami zerstörten Ferienanlage im Süden Thailands überwachen. Statt in einer der Bettenburgen von Takua Pa mietet er sich in einem unscheinbaren Kleinstadthotel ein, wo er der einzige Gast zu sein scheint. Tons Flirt mit der jungen Hotelwirtin Na entwickelt sich zu einer leidenschaftlichen Beziehung, die dem argwöhnischen Blick ihres sinistren Bruders Wit nicht entgeht.
Bereits die sanften Meereswellen, die in der ersten Einstellung des Films von einem subtil bedrohlichen elektronischen Sound überlagert werden, lassen ahnen, dass es in Wonderful Town um weit mehr geht als den üblichen Konflikt zwischen Stadt und Land. [aus dem Forumprogramm]

How would you describe the aesthetics of your film?
i was much inspired by landscapes. the film is in a way a love song for a town. so the town was the main character. the green hills, the gray walls - these form the aesthetic of the film.

Why did you choose to shoot on a digital format (was it solely for financial reasons, or did aesthetics play a role)?
mostly its a format that i feel comfortable with. in thailand, 90% of the independent films are now shot on digital. so i have always worked with it. maybe it started out of necessity but now we get comfortable with it, are able to understand its benefits and also weaknesses.

Which format exactly did you choose (MiniDV, DVCAM, HDV, HD...), and why?
we chose to shoot on HD with panasonic varicam. (i should give them an advertisement here that their office in singapore were very helpful and sponsored all the tape stock for the film. so thank you panasonic.)
even though we didn't have any money we wanted to shoot in a format that would allow to blow to 35mm film in case the opportunity arose. and it did. pusan film festival's asian cinema fund (ACF) saw the rough cut and gave us a fund to finish the film to 35mm. so the choice of HD was good because it protect the blowup which in the end looked very good.

What was special about shooting digital (e.g. compared to 35mm, was it your first time with dv or are you used to it ..)?
it's just a format that i am used to. nowadays, the young filmmakers from thailand, we never get to use film. its just too expensive. so it started from this financial reason, but you adapt to the format that you are using.

certainly, the video image is not as strong as a film image. you have to be careful about contrast and there are some situations when you cannot shoot. but during the post production process, i find that working with video is much easier than film. you have flexibility to correct things and to finish the film is much quicker and easier than with film. the process is simpler. with film there are more steps - and every step adds money.

What was your shoot-edit ratio?
it was about the same as shooting on film. maybe 15 to 1 or something like that. the common view is that with video you can shoot more because tape is cheap. while this is true, in a production situation, the size of the camera and crew of HD is really the same as 35mm shoot. the speed of the shooting and set-up and production is kind of the same. so in the end, you shoot like its film anyway. the speed is roughly the same.

One good word about DV / HDV / HD (or two):
cheap.

One bad word about DV / HDV / HD(or two):
contrast.