International 'cli-fi' movie awards for 2015 announce "Best Picture" and "Best Director"
by Staff Writer and agencies
In an Associated Press (AP) wire story by Tamata Lush in Florida about a new climate-themed
genre of movies in Hollywood, the AP wrote that "climate change is be
becoming the start of more and more 'cli-fi' movies.
And with the
recently-concluded COP21 climate talks reaching a successful
conclusion in Paris, climate issues are making the front pages of
newspapers wordwide now.
Climate-change narratives are going Hollywood, so much so that I am
now curating a global Cli-Fi Movie Awards program based out of Taiwan,
with the best picture ad best actor awards for movies released in 2015
going to "Taklub" from the Philippines and its director Brillante
Mendoza. The movie is a 80-minute feature film about survivors of the
2013 Typhoon Haiyan starring Nora Aunor. Mendoza presented his movie
to popular acclaim at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2015.
"Cli-fi" movies have emerged as a niche genre, taking the pomp of
doomsday science-fiction flicks and mixing it with the underlying
message of environmental awareness.
Such movies allow filmgoers to view a changing part of the world
through the prism of an anecdote or current news event related to
climate change.
Documentaries are powerful, but feature movies with film stars and
vivid storytelling are also pieces of the equation.
I feel that cli-fi movies can help raise awareness worldwide, through
the power of cinema, both in darkened theaters full of
popcorn-munching film fans and on DVDs released later. We need to go
beyond abstract, scientific predictions and government statistics and
try to show the cinematic or literary reality of a painful, possible
future of the world climate changed.
After the recent Paris climate agreement, the world is focusing more
than ever on issues relating to man-made global warming, and movies
can help in this context by reaching millions of people worldwide with
compelling stories and well-directed movies. With "Taklub" (which is
the local name for the city of Tacloban), Mendoza has made a movie
that will stand the test of time, even though it's a small movie made
with a limited budget compared to most Hollywood productions.
He's a director worth watching, and the pride of the Philippines.
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More news about the annual Cli-Fi Movie
Awards may be viewed at the website at korgw101.blogspot.com
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