The World Film Festival of Bangkok wrapped up on Sunday. I didn't see as many of the films as I would have liked, mainly because I was working. Anyway, even if I had devoted all my time and energy to the festival, I still would have missed some good films. That's just how those things go.

The Harvest of Talents Awards went to:

• Best film: Import Export (Austria, 2006), directed by Ulrich Seidl
• Best artistic achievement: Phantom Love (United States, 2007), directed by Nina Menkes
• Best director: Semih Kaplanoğlu, director of Egg (Turkey, 2007)
• Special jury awards:
  • Help Me Eros (Taiwan, 2007), directed by Lee Kang-sheng
  • The Band’s Visit (Israel/France, 2007), directed by Eran Kolirin

Of the competition films, I saw only two, 881 and The Band's Visit. I wish 881 would have received more recognition; maybe a special award for best costuming? However, as a bonus for me, I actually got to chat with the director, Royston Tan. He says that a catchphrase from the film, "Techno cat", is gaining traction with audiences. Nobody is sure what it means, but it relates to a moment in the film when Auntie Ling sees a street cat and turns and looks at it, and hollers, "Techno cat", and then everybody busts up laughing. Maybe it's a Singaporean thing, but I think it's funny.

I also met Taiwanese actor-director Lee Kang-sheng. Actually, it's embarrassing. I walked up to Lee, thinking he was Royston Tan (the two look nothing alike). Royston was sitting nearby and introduced himself. I then caught on that it was actually Lee who I had talked to first, and I went back over and apologized, and then had to apologize further, because I hadn't been able to see his film, Help Me Eros. But I could at least tell him I enjoyed last year's Wayward Cloud, and looked forward to seeing I Don't Want to Sleep Alone, which has just opened in Bangkok in a limited release. I'm not sure if this is the best way to go about things. I'm new in this business of chatting with celebrities and filmmakers, having avoided such situations until recently. But I believe that if I am completely honest with them - i.e. not pretending to see their film when I haven't seen it - they will recognize that sincerity and be able to relate.

Anyway, the awards night turned out to be a big one for Lee, as he won a special jury award for his directorial debut. The film was also one of the most popular in the festival, showing to a full house for both screenings. Also popular was the "Romanian abortion film", 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, which was screening as part of the European Union session, but I didn't see it.

So what did I see? Here's the rundown:

• Genghis Khan: To the Ends of the Earth and the Sea - This was the opening film, and I found it to be overly melodramatic and flat. But it's a gorgeous film, and a feat of old-time movie making, with the spectacle of tens of thousands of extras. The film has also been chosen to open the upcoming San Francisco Asian Film Festival.
• Flower in Pocket - Directed by Liew Seng Tat from Malaysia, this was a co-winner of the New Currents Award at this year's Pusan International Film Festival, where it shared the prize with Wonderful Town by Thailand's Aditya Assarat and Life Track by China's Guang Hao-jin. Flower in Pocket is a funny, quirky film that is a hilarious, sometimes bittersweet look at two young, bratty Malaysian-Chinese boys whose mother has run off. Their father (Malaysian indie filmmaker James Lee, in a comically wry turn) neglects them as well. Ironically, he works in a shop making maniquins, and is chided for making them too real, like he's trying to make a figure to replace his wife.
• 881 - A full review is here. I'd like to see it again sometime. Techno cat!
• Songs of Eh Doh Shi - A full review is forthcoming for this heartbreaking, compelling documentary on the situation with Karen refugees along the Burmese border.
• The Band's Visit - Israel submitted this film to the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. But it has too much English, so was disqualified. It is a lovely, entertaining film, about an Egyptian police orchestra that is suppose to play at the opening of an Arab culture center in Israeli. However, nobody picks them up at the airport. They then end up stranded in an Israeli desert town, where "there is no Arab culture, no Israeli culture, no culture at all." The band, wearing its crisp, blue uniforms, stands out against the stark desert landscape. In a small town, they bond with the townspeople, with a feisty, 40-something female restaurateur making a play for the band's upright, tradition-minded leader. Meanwhile, a rift has developed between the leader and the band's young, skirt-chasing trumpet player. One of the best scenes involves the trumpeter singing Chet Baker's "My Funny Valentine" over the microphone to a woman in an information booth at the airport.
• Driving With My Wife's Lover -  Directed by Kim Tai-sik, this dryly comic drama about a meek husband who discovers his wife is having an affair with a taxi driver. He tracks the taxi driver down to his home in Seoul, catches him has he's leaving home for the day, flags him down, and asks the guy to drive him about 200km. Along the way, the men develop a strange bond. At one point, the taxi breaks down, and then watermelons come rolling down the hillside blacktop. I'm not sure what it meant, but it made for some cool images. The man is confronted at times by a chicken, which I believe to be a symbol of his fear to outright confront the taxi driver and his wife. The director was present for a question-and-answer session. He said he harmed just 100 watermelons, and the rest was done in CGI. 
• The Man from London - This is an amazing achievement - a timeless, Hungarian film noir filmed on actual black-and-white stock. Bela Tarr directs, with Fred Keleman as cinematographer, a story about a rail switchyard worker who witnesses a murder, and then undergoes an existential crisis, fighting with his wife (Tilda Swinton) about the upbringing of their teenage daughter. It's very slow moving, but by the time it is was all over with, my mind was blown.
• I Served the King of England - Czech director Jiri Menzel returns to his usual subject: post-war Czechoslovakia. It's an epic, life-spanning tale of a man, just released as a political prisoner and banished to do hard labor, single-handedly building a gravel road in a rural border region. In his isolation, he thinks back on his interesting life, from when he was a hustler selling hot dogs at a train station, to his jobs working as a waiter in fine hotels and his marriage to a Hitler acolyte. The title comes from the words of one of the man's mentor's, a maitre 'd at a fine hotel in Prague, who knows everything, because he served the king of England. The film is lavishly entertaining, even erotic, following the sexual exploits of the protagonist as he decorates the naked torsos of his female conquests with flower blossoms, or, when he has them, bank notes. I cried at the end, it was so poignant.
• To Each His Own Cinema - Commissioned by the Cannes Film Festival for its 60th anniversary, this is an anthology of 33 short films by famous directors, all having to do with the experience of going to the cinema. Among the best were the shorts by Takeshi Kitano, the Coen Brothers, David Cronenberg and Gus Van Sant. Directors from all parts of the world were represented, including Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige from China, Wong Kar-wai from Hong Kong, Taiwan's Tsai Ming-liang and Hou Hsiao-Hsien. I wish Thailand had been represented. Well, maybe for the next anthology; I just hope they don't wait another 60 years.
• Secret - This is Jay Chou's directorial debut. I went and saw it because, a) I could, and b) nothing gets me to plant my butt in a seat faster than a film with Hong Kong actor Anthony Wong. I think Anthony Wong is one of the finest actors working today, anywhere. And so when I saw the preview for Secret, and saw that Anthony Wong was in it, I decided then and there to go see it, even if I don't particularly enjoy watching teenage romance films. There's more to say about it, but it'll be in another upcoming review.

Finally, a word about the venue - I like the Esplanade Cineplex as a venue for a festival. Having the festival in a place where the cinema is an anchor, puts the focal point on the films, something that's missing in a sprawling venue like CentralWorld or Paragon. The subway stop right there at Esplanade makes it as easy to get to as anything else - or, if you must drive to it, just has hard, because traffic on Ratchada is just about bad as it is anywhere else in the city.