THU NOV 8

8:00 PM

AGO JACKMAN HALL

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LUNG NEAW VISITS HIS NEIGHBOURS

CANADIAN PREMIERE | RATED G

Director: Rirkrit Tiravanija | Mexico/Thailand 2011 | 154:00 | BluRay | Northern Thai W/ English Subtitles
Producers: Christian Manzutto And Rirkrit Tiravanija | Cinematographers: Christian Manzutto And Rirkrit Tiravanija | Editor: Christian Manzutto
Sound: Eva Sangiorgi And Chalermrat Kaweewattana | Cast: Neaw

Official Selection–Venice Film Festival 2011
Official Selection–Copenhagen International Documentary Film Festival 2011
MOMA: ContemporAsian 2012

The first feature film from acclaimed Argentinian-born, New York-based visual artist Rirkrit Tiravanija is an exquisitely photographed, minimalist portraiture that skirts the rich territory between documentary and fiction. A nearly plotless, observational encounter, the film follows its eponymous subject as he drifts through the seasons in a small Chiang Mai village. A retired rice farmer, Lung Neaw is a quiet and boyish man who spends his idle days conversing with neighbours, doing odd jobs and walking through the jungle. A fascinating, almost indescribable charge hangs about him; while leading a simple, rural life, his quotidian acts become things imbued with much deeper senses of meaning through the eyes of Tiravanija.

Neaw is a man curiously both timeless and thoroughly modern, both everywhere and invisible, alternately in and out of step with his surroundings. The simplicity of his existence–one of foraging, local routines and solitude–point to larger questions of the self, sustainability and modernity. At the same time, he is a man constantly out of place; pleased to be in the presence of others, but most at ease when alone and drifting/walking–a symbol of the unmoored contemporary world that surrounds him.

Tiravanija’s film is a sensual encounter with an individual and environment; through gorgeous super-16mm cinematography and a dense aural landscape, he captures the vitality and complexity of rural existence, and with a patient, deliberate pace creates a remarkable experience of looking and listening.

- Chi-hui Yang

ABOUT THE DIRECTOR:

Rirkrit Tiravanija was born in Buenos Aires, in 1961 and is currently based in New York, Berlin and Thailand. Tiravanija’s installations and actions provide platforms for artistic, public and private activities—effectively blurring the boundaries that customarily separate them. His projects invite the public to enter into and literally engage with his work; in fact, the active participation of the viewer is necessary for the work to be fully realized.

REVIEWS:
"Lung Neaw Visits His Neighbors, shot with a 16-millimeter camera, is visually sumptuous. The electric greens of the fields and forests evoke an all-embracing fecundity. If you imagined that a rural Asian farmer didn’t enjoy as full a life as the most sophisticated and well-traveled urbanite, the film should make you think again." - NY Times

"This epic-length Thai documentary takes the observational jungle stillness so hypnotic in Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s work and doubles the bet…Finally, a doc that’s an experience, not just an infantilized civics lesson. Calling the movie simply Buddhist might be just another way of saying it’s awesome, as in it inspires legitimate awe." - Village Voice

PRINT SOURCE:
Cristian Manzutto, Estudio de produccion
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estudiodeproduccion.com