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Bertha
Pan on Cinema's Face
By Ramona Prioleau
If
telling a moving story with a wonderful cast and solid production
value is all that it took to get a film shown at the multiplex, then
Bertha Bay-Sa Pan's Face would have been in your face a while ago.
Unfortunately, more often than not, the honchos that decide whether a
film is released theatrically seem to lack the marketing savvy to
distribute films that break the mold and offer fresh perspectives on
universal themes in a cinematically satisfying way. Thankfully, Pan
was steadfast in her desire to secure a distribution deal for Face and
endured the rebuffs of distribution executives. Pan spent 3 ½ years
in the film distribution business and she was willing to beat the
bushes until the right offer came along.
Having secured a deal with Indican Pictures, the
shrewd Pan and her team are not resting on their laurels. They have
widely embraced the public relations aspects of film distribution and
created buzz for Face by conducting numerous interviews, appearing on
panels, taking advantage of cyber promotion and leveraging Face's
urban contemporary theme with the coordinated release of a soundtrack
featuring hip-hop all stars and a music video starring Treach
(Empire), Kristy Wu (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
and Hassan Johnson (Wee-Bey on HBO's The Wire) that is set to air on
VH1. Demonstrating another aspect of her talent, Pan, who writes for
keyboards and plays other instruments, produces and performs on two
songs from the soundtrack.
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Face is based on a short film of the
same name that Pan directed while in graduate school. The short film
went on to screen at numerous film festivals and garner multiple
awards. The short was honored with the Polo Ralph Lauren Award for
Best Screenplay at Columbia and the People's Choice Award at the Black
Film Festival in Memphis. The short also earned Pan the Director's
Guild Award for Best Asian American Student Filmmaker in 1997.
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© 2004 Indican Pictures
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With
the success of the short film, Pan began writing the script for the
feature film, but after about 10 drafts Pan joined forces with Oren
Moverman (Jesus' Son). Pan describes Moverman's style as
complementary to her own and their collaboration resulted in a film that
more than lived up to the award-winning short film. An official
selection at the Sundance Film Festival, the feature film brought Pan
various awards including the Best Director Award at Urbanworld Film
Festival, the Critics Award for Best Director at CineVegas, an Open
Palm nomination from the Gotham Awards in 2002, as well as the Premio
Speciale Prize at Torino International Women's Film Festival.
MORE >>>
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© 2002 RLP Ventures, LLC
(l.
to r.) Treach and Bertha Bay-Sa
Pan
at the 2002 Urbanworld Film Festival
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Set
in New York City in the '70s and the '90s, Face is the coming of
age story of two women and their distinct approaches to reconciling
conflicts that occur when their individual spirits clash with their
traditional heritage.
Pan produced Face with
Alexa Fogel and Joseph Infantolino of New York-based Beech Hill Films,
with Jonathan Shoemaker and Derrick Tseng serving as co-producers. In
addition to Wu and Treach, the film stars Bai Ling (Star Wars
III), Kieu Chinh (Joy Luck Club), Will Yun Lee
(Elektra) and Ken Leung (Sucka Free City).
In an interview exclusive to MOSAEC, Pan discussed
her background and Face's long and winding journey to the big screen.
When did you
decide that you wanted to be a filmmaker?
I knew in college by my 3rd or 4th year, but it was
because of selfish reasons. I love music, language, photography,
literature and philosophy. I wanted to do all those different things
and with film, I can.
Also, a lot of things that happened in my life and
in the world made me question what I really wanted to do with my life
and what I wanted to contribute to life. I realized at that point that
I have strengths in the film area and that is how I want to give back.
I want to tell universal stories that can move and entertain, that can
transcend or breakdown barriers whether they are social, class,
race, religious, language or culture. Through telling universal
stories that entertain and move, I'm able to do that.
How did you
develop the concept for Face?
Originally, the film began as my screenwriting
project at Columbia Film School. The initial story was inspired by a
very good friend of mine from Boston. Several years and lots of drafts
later, it has evolved into this whole other thing, but the initial
inspiration was from things that were going on in her life.
Does Columbia
Film School graduate more writers or directors?
I only applied to one film school and that was
Columbia. Columbia's well-rounded curriculum appealed to me. The
school is focused on nurturing really good storytellers rather than
certain other film schools where the education is so specific as to
whether you're going to be a cinematographer, a writer, or a director.
Whatever compliments I receive, I can trace the source back to my
education at Columbia.
The actors in Face really liked working with me and
I credit that to the fact that at Columbia I was required to take
acting courses. Those courses helped me understand on a visceral level
how to communicate with actors and how actors do what they are going
through. That acting experience also helped me in my approach to
screenwriting, directing, producing and film theory and history. At
Columbia, it doesn't matter what your concentration is because the
school offers a very broad education and I'm a more well-rounded
storyteller as a result.
Because
you also write, do you see yourself purely as a director or do you not
set limits on yourself?
I'm a director. But whatever material I direct, I
always request to be able to write from a director's point of view. I
think it's really important.
Since this is
your first feature, how did you get your producers to agree to give
you creative control to the extent that you had?
Well, a good thing was that I was one of the
producers. As a first timer, it's important to prove that you can be
trusted whether it is with the producers, the crew or the actors. With
everything, you have to show rather than tell. Along the way, the more
I did that, the more everyone had faith in me.
Why did you
choose New York as the setting for Face as opposed to Boston where
your friend is from?
Although I went to undergrad in Boston and I lived
there for 4 years, I grew up in New Jersey until I was 7 when I moved
to Taiwan. My family used to come to New York every weekend when I was
little and I think the way people in Chinatown live is very, very
specific. It doesn't matter if you're in the Chinatown in New York,
San Francisco or Kuala Lumpur. Chinatown is very, very specific and
it's also very universal. Currently, I have been living in New York
for over 10 years. So it was just easier to write about what I know,
the people I know and the people I see.
So Face has a
New York flavor to it but in a lot of respects you can take out the
New York street scenes and the story at the core is the same?
In terms of the Chinatown parts, yes. But in terms
of Genie's world that extended beyond Chinatown, then it is very New
York. I wanted to make a film that was urban because this is the world
that Genie lived in. This is also the world that I know very well and
have come to love.
The wardrobe
for the 70's scenes was quite effective - especially the suede front
sweater worn by Ken Leung :-). Who did you work with to create that
element of the film?
The costume designer was Sarah J. Holden and she
was amazing. We interviewed so many costume designers and they all had
wonderful books and resumes. From the interview stage, the thing that
impressed me the most about Sarah was that everything she did came not
from the clothing, but from the character, the character's world and
the character's state of mind. That's how she approached every single
character and I was blown away. She did so much research and she
worked her butt off. She had an amazing personality and everybody
loved her. Sarah made a huge effort to go deep into every single
character's emotional journey. MORE >>>
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© 2002 RLP Ventures, LLC
(l.
to r.) Treach, Alexa Fogel and Eriq LaSalle at the 2002 Urbanworld Film Festival
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Speaking
of the cast generally, you assembled stellar talent for your first
feature. How were you able to get that caliber of talent on board?
Mainly, I got very lucky because one of my
producers is Alexa Fogel who is an Emmy Award- winning casting
director. Having her name attached to the film, gave us a lot of
credibility and agents would return our calls much faster. Her merits
as a casting director allowed us to cast like a big budget Hollywood
movie when we were a tiny little movie with no money. In terms of
Treach, Alexa had cast Treach in the second season of OZ and she also
cast Treach in HBO's Baseball Wives. Bai Ling was someone I spoke to
before I started working with Alexa. But with Alexa attached, it made
Bai Ling and everyone else pay more attention to the film.
Kieu Chinh,
the actress who played Mrs. Liu has been in a lot of films. You
directed her in a way that distinguishes her performance in Face from
her other roles as opposed to directing her as an icon. When you
worked with her, what did you stress? How did you direct Kieu Chinh so
that Mrs. Liu became more than an icon of traditional values?
Kieu Chinh's character, Mrs. Liu, originated from
the writing. When I was writing the part, in my mind, Mrs. Liu was a
very real person and she was not representing any icon or issue. Like
anybody else, she is a character who is flawed, but still sympathetic.
That's what I really wanted to show with every character in the movie,
but especially with her.
Universally, Mrs. Liu is the favorite
character in the movie with audiences. But if you really think about
it, she is a bigot. She would rather sacrifice her daughter and
granddaughter just to save her own pride, her own face, and her own
traditional values instead of unconditionally loving her children. Yet
at the end of the day, audiences love her most and find that she's the
most adorable and the most sympathetic.
I wanted to show that we are
all flawed human beings and yet we are still sympathetic because
that's like real human beings and that's what makes characters
interesting on screen. Mrs. Liu is a character that is portrayed as a
real person with many despicable qualities. But at the end of the day,
she is lovable. I thought it was important to show audiences how she
became who she became and make her sympathetic. A lot of the times
with racism or hatred, terrible things happen and they're not
necessarily out of malicious intentions. Sometimes they're out of
ignorance and for Mrs. Liu they're out of ignorance. I've shown Face to
audiences of only African-Americans and they laugh and they think Mrs.
Liu is adorable. They understand the character and see why she is the
way she is.
Mrs. Liu
definitely was unlikable in some respects, but the character is an
honest depiction of a person for whom premarital pregnancy and
interracial romance are affronts to her values. Was there any
resistance to the portrayal of Mrs. Liu's positive and negative
qualities?
As a first time feature director, there will be
some resistance because the actors probably haven't seen your other
work. Kieu Chinh is an actress who is highly acclaimed, who has been
in the industry over 30 years, who has won many awards and who is
well-respected. At first, she was really reluctant and she read the
script very differently for her character. I remember the first week
into the shoot; Kieu Chinh just looked at me and said, "Okay,
Miss Bertha Pan, I'm going to trust you. I don't agree with you, but
I'm going to trust you. And you better be right."
She has been to screenings of the film and she's
very, very proud of the movie. She's been so supportive.
When most
people think of Treach, they think of Naughty By Nature and some of
the other characters he has played in films where he doesn't display
any insecurity. Yet in Face, he showed some insecurity during the love
scenes. What factors lead to casting Treach as Michael?
Actually, I have to give credit to Alexa. She was
the one who suggested Treach. My impression of Treach was mostly from
Naughty By Nature, but Alexa said to just meet with him.
At the initial meeting, we had a very extensive
discussion. I've worked with a lot of rappers and most of the time
they like to hear the sound of their own voices and they come in with
boisterous personalities that are larger than life. But that's what
makes rappers interesting to watch and what makes them icons. That's
how I thought Treach would be. But as soon as he came into the room,
he listened to his manager, Alexa, the other producers and me. While
listening to everyone else talk, he observed and evaluated. I could
see his mind working. He took it all in, gathered his thoughts and
then said something. What he ended up saying was incredibly observant
and insightful.
After he read the script, we had another extensive
discussion. We discussed Michael's background, where he came from, why
he acts the way he does, his history, his relationships with women and
Treach was completely on point on every level. And I was sold.
Treach was really impressive throughout the shoot.
He was the lowest maintenance of all the actors. Everyone was amazing,
but I thought a world renowned superstar would be a high maintenance
diva and he was not. He was always there on time or early. Our
conditions were so much less than what exists on the set of a big film, but he
was always smiling and always cool - no matter what had to happen.
The
very first scene of the first day was a 3 am call. It was freezing
cold, we were in the subway station and it had to seem like
summertime. The actors had to wear summer clothes in 30 degree
weather. Because there was mist coming out of their mouths when they
spoke, I made the actors chew ice so there wouldn't be any mist.
Treach was like, "It's all good." But he would also tease me
and say that "You're showing me getting whipped, putting me on a
leash, making me crawl, picking on my manhood…." Although
Treach was always making jokes, he was such a professional actor. He
knew that it was for the character and he stepped up.
MORE >>>
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© 2004 Indican Pictures
(l.
to r.) Genie (Kristy Wu), Kim (Bai Ling) and Mrs. Liu (Kieu Chinh) in Face
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The
romance between Genie and Michael is presented as two people who
happen to dig each other, rather than simply focusing on the fact that
they are an interracial couple. Why was it important to you to direct
the love story in that way?
If I directed it any other way, it would seem more like a fetish than a
romantic relationship. It was really important that there was a
genuine attraction between these two people and that they get to know
each other.
When you first fall in love or fall in crush, no matter
what racial background, you're in this world where nothing else
matters and where the outside world doesn't even exist. That's how I
wanted it to be presented. Once they did end up together, that's when
the outside world comes in and they realize that they have a problem
that they didn't notice before. Early on, a very good friend of mine
pointed out that I shouldn't let race be an issue, but let the story
be about how they genuinely have an interest in each other.
Genie is a
young girl that wanted to make decisions regarding her romance with
Michael rather than just going with the flow and being controlled by
him. That aspect of Genie's character also seemed like a defense
mechanism to prevent pain and rejection. Would you agree? Why or why
not?
I definitely think it was a defense mechanism.
Growing up, Genie had been abandoned by her father first and then her
mother. You learn how to protect yourself from ever feeling that way
again and that's the goal in her life. Also, if you never give someone
a chance, you never allow someone to make you feel abandoned again.
Have you
received any specific comments from men about how men have been
portrayed in Face?
Most of the men who have seen the film and
approached me have really liked it. I think the men who hated it
wouldn't talk to me. But I would get questions at screenings and I did
get some hate mail. But my response is if someone thinks the men are
flawed or weak, look at the female characters. They're even worse: the
grandmother is a bigot, the mother is a deadbeat and the granddaughter
is a bitch.
Secondly, I've been told that I should be more
responsible portraying Asian American males on screen. Well, I'm not
representing all Asian American males. I'm portraying these specific
characters. I'm not representing all males. I'm not representing all
of Asian America. Also, whether it's a gender issue or a racial issue,
it's more important that I show the characters as real people on
screen so that the characters are not portrayed like tokens,
caricatures or comic book characters in the way a lot of mainstream
Hollywood movies treat ethnic minority or women roles.
How was the
Sundance experience?
It was so surreal, beyond anything I could ever
imagine. First of all, I didn't expect to get in. I was in Taiwan when
Sundance announced its selections. It was 7 in the morning and I was
half asleep when my producers called. My dad answered the phone and
said they were on the phone. I said, "Tell them, I'll call them
back when I wake up." Alexa loves to tell the story about how she
was trying to tell her little director about Sundance and I wouldn't
take her call.
Face's first screening was Sunday at 9:15 am, the
morning after the first big party night. The screening was at the Echo
Theater, which seats 1200 people. I thought no one was going to wake
up early and come, so I was frustrated. I walked into the theater and
it was packed. I think at least 1100 people were there on a Sunday. I
couldn't believe it. I was really sick so my head was buzzing.
Everyone else I knew who premiered at Sundance told me that their
hands couldn't stop shaking and they couldn't utter a word. I didn't
feel any of that, but I realize it was because I was so sick that I
couldn't feel anything. In a way, it was a blessing because everyone
remarked that I was so confident.
On Day 6 of Sundance, I got to see my first and
only other movie. We had so much work to do during the festival that I
didn't have time to see any other films. I went to the Echo Theater to
see this movie and I sat in the 6th row. I looked back and saw how
huge the theater was. I saw the filmmakers on stage and how tiny they
looked and then I thought "Oh my God" and I started crying.
It was a delayed reaction.
Sundance was also great because we had amazing
publicists. Between Bai Ling and Treach, we got and continue to get so
much press and that's something I never really imagined. Everything
that has to do with the film, I felt like I've been preparing myself
for it over the last 10 years. I put in my 200% and I know what I need
to do and I just do it. But the press, publicity, interviews and
screenings, that was something that I had no idea about. In that
sense, Sundance was pretty overwhelming. Sitting in a suite and having
20 minute interviews, all the traveling to festivals, the audience
Q&As and even after Q&As, people standing in line to talk to
me…that people care that much and respond that personally thrills me
so much. MORE
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© 2004 Indican Pictures
(l.
to r.) Genie (Wu) and Michael (Treach) in Face
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What impact do
you want Face to have? Do you think about it in those terms?
Not that specifically. I don't know if I can say
impact because that's a little ambitious. I do have certain goals. I
want to be able to tell stories that are universal and that entertain
and move people. With Face showing in different festivals around the
world, people are telling me that certain aspects of the film are so
much like their family and they relate to the story even though it's a
different culture because they have similar problems. That's something
I really like to see, not with just Face, but with all my other future
projects.
Have you
decided on your next project?
I have a few features, but the one I'm
contractually doing is an urban martial arts, romantic comedy film.
I'm co-writing it and I'm attached to direct it. I have a project
that's an adaptation of a novel. I have another script that I'm
writing on my own that I'd like to do independently. That's my pet
project.
What words of
advice would give someone looking to make it in the film business?
I don't think I'm in a position to tell anyone
anything like that yet.
Hmmm…let's
see…You successfully completed your first feature; you got
phenomenal talent to work with you; and you have received critical
acclaim, so you definitely have something to say.
Luck has a lot to do with it and I'm really
grateful for that. I think there are so many people who are talented,
who have been educated well at film school, who have good stories to
tell, who are diligent and who may have worked even harder than me,
but they didn't have the kind of good fortune that I received.
My motto for the last several years has been
"Do your best and leave God the rest." The most important
thing is to try to maintain your equilibrium and not let the
superficial things get to you whether it's the super highs - the
awards, the acclaim or the Sundance 500 person premiere - or the lows
-which is that all the films that got less hype or critical acclaim
all got better offers. Whatever highs or whatever lows, they are all
based on subjective and unpredictable factors. It's really important
to keep things in perspective.
M
March 2005
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