Vesoul Asian Film Festival Programs World's First Lao Film Focus

The Vesoul Asian Film Festival begins next Tuesday, February 10th, in Vesoul, France. Vesoul is a top ten film festival in France and the only one with a focus on Asian cinema. It is also Europe's oldest independent Asian film festival, running for twenty-one years now. 

What makes this year's edition extra special is that the festival has programmed the first Lao film focus ever, worldwide. The program includes contemporary films from Mattie Do, 2014's Chanthalay, and Anysay Keola's crime thriller At The Horizon from 2011. Then there are the two movies shot in the 1980s. Attendees will also get to see Som-Ok Southiphone`s Red Lotus (Bua daeng) from 1988 and docudrama The Sound of Gunfire in the Plain of Jars (Siengpeun Chak Tong- hai) from 1983. 

The latter film was co-directed by Somchit Phonsena and a Vietnamese director named Pahm Ky Nam. It was banned upon its release back in 1983 and has never been shown since then. The festival is translating original version by Lao pro interpreter, and the Lao director, who had vanished since then, might join the festival for the screening.

Aside from this program the festival also includes the 2014 documentary Don't Think I've Forgotten: Cambodia's Lost Rock 'N' Roll. The movie was made by music clip director John Pirozzi about Cambodia's incredible rock'n roll scene. The programmers have found two musicians from that period who fled to France during Khmer Rouge period.

That is a great portion of programming for the Vesoul Asian Film Festival.