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Is Southeast Asian Cinema Catching Up To Hollywood?
Made Arya Kencana | November 17, 2011

The main actors in The main actors in 'Di Bawah Lindungan Ka'bah' ('Under Protection of the Kaaba'), in a news conference during the movie launching on Aug. 16, 2011. The movie has entered the race to compete for the 2011 Foreign Language film oscar, the Academy for Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences announced Thursday. (Antara Photo)
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Southeast Asian filmmakers celebrated the region’s cinematic achievements while lamenting the difficulty of competing with Hollywood’s pulling power at a film festival on the sidelines of the Bali Asean Summit on Wednesday.

Participants said there were two main problems holding back the region’s national film industries: a lack of output and the relatively small local audiences.

“Five years ago we were producing hundreds of films, but we’re down to dozens now,” said Jose Miguel De La Rosa, a filmmaker from the Philippines.

Dang Nath Min, a cinematographer from Vietnam, said that Hollywood’s superior financial clout and marketing skills meant that consumers, and in particular younger moviegoers, tended to prefer the US product over their own nation’s films.

The two-day Asean Film Festival opened on Wednesday with a screening of a Burmese film, “Zaw-Ka Ka Nay Thi,” about a traditional medicine-maker with a talent for dance. The film earned Mee Pwar the Best Director award at the Myanmar Academy Awards.

Other films screened on Wednesday were “Only Love” (Laos), “Under the Protection of Ka’bah” (Indonesia), “Emir” (Philippines) and “Don’t Burn” (Vietnam).

Thursday will see the screening of “Memoir Seorang Datuk” from Brunei, Cambodia’s “Kiles,” “Tatsumi” from Singapore and Thailand’s “Eternity.” The festival will close with the Malaysian film “Bunohan.”