Introduction

We make a book about the current situation of Asian documentaries. As opposed to how Asian documentaries were advancing every day, the reality was that there were no books that properly focused on those documentaries. The other committee members all agreed that it would be meaningful if AND could publish a book that could show the history and the current situation od Asian documentaries, rather than an academic book.

This book will be of help to many people who are interested in documentaries. With the support and encouragement for Asian documentaries, I hope that we can meet again with another book that will show the much advanced state of Asian documentaries in the future.
-HONG Hyosook,
Director of Asian Cinema Fund & Programmer, Busan International Film Festival-


Who is an expert in Asian documentaries? Probably no one is. We, however, don't see that as an issue, but it is rather a treasured phenomenon. It's not possible to learn everything about Asian documentaries from only one expert. There's no authority here. To cover the diversity of Asia, we need different perspectives from different professionals.

The large landmass of Asia makes it diverse, and that is a treasure. When we, that is a treasure. When we, the AND Committee, decided to compile a book dedicated to Asian documentaries, we also decided to take that divesity as a benefit.

We, thus, come to a conclusion: despite the diversity found in Asia. its documentaries usually are difficult to approach, thus, invisible, not appreciated and rarely discussed. It is a common difficulty found throughout Asian countries. We hope that this book ca be of help in bringing out the problem and improving the situation.

There's an old saying in Chines that goes, \"throwing a brick in hope of drawing out a jade.\" which means that to be the first to contribute something no matter how humble it, is, the great ones will follow. I sincerely hope that this book will be the brick that draw out jades and also knocks open the door to Asian documentaries.
Jane H.C.YU
-Festival Director Taiwan International Documentary Festival-




Editors:

HONG Hyosook
HONG Hyosook was the founder of Women Film Group and was a representative of Seoul Visul Collective. As a documentary cinematographer, her works include Doomealee, A New School is Opening, On-Line: An Inside View of Korean Independent Film, and Reclaiming Our Names. She began to work at Busan International Film Festival(BIFF) sice 1997. Currently, she is the programmer for BIFF's Wide Angle section and the Director of the Asian Cinema Fund(ACF).

Jane H.C. YU
One of the founding members of AND, Jane H.C YU is a veteran programmer and film critic. Now, she is the Festival Director of Taiwan International Documentary Festival, and also the founder and director of BOOK MEETS FILM Forum for Taipei Int'l Book Expo. She has written and translated many books on films including a biography of the award-winning editor titled The Cinema Magician-Chen Po-Wen's World of Cinema.

Gulnara ABIKEYEVA
Dr. Gulnara ABIKYEVA is a renowed film critic, the author of 7 books about Kazakh and Central Asian cinema, and the Artistic Director of Eurasia International Film Festival.

ZHANG Xian Min
ZHANG Xian Min is a professor at Beijing Film Academy and promotes Chines independent cinema. He has featured as an actor in ZHANG Ming's Rainclouds over Wus han(1994) and LOU Ye's Summer Palace(2004), wrote and translated film-related books and directed 3 documentary films. Recently, he organized the China Documentary Film Festival(CDFF) and The 3rd China Independent Film Festival.

Gargi SEN
Gargi Sen is curator, distributor, exhibitor and producer of documentaries and is the founder-director of Magic Lantern Foundation. She is currently based in the UK as an International Fellow of the Clore Leadership Programme and working with the Learning Department at the Tate galleries, UK.

Supriyo SEN
Supriyo SEN is an internationally acclainmed, prolific filmmaker who has won over 36 international awards. He was a journalist before making films in 1995. His works combine different modes of the documentary such as the expository, the observational, the reflexive, the interactive, the subjective and the poetic.

Budi IRAWANTO
Bu야 IRAWANTO is Director of Jogja-NETPAC Asian Film Festival(JAFF), a premier Asian film Festival in Indonesia. He is also a lecturer of film studies at the Department of Communication Studies, Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia.


Mohammed ATEBBAI
Mohammad ATEBBAI is an Iranian film figure involved in internatinal distribution of Iranian films for the past 25 years. He has wrote about Iranian cinema for Iranian and Internatinal media.

FUJIOKA Asako
FUJIOKA Asako is the Director of Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival Tokyo Office. She is a distributor of Asian films like Bingai (Dir: FENG Yan, China) and Bilal(Dir: Sourav Sarangi, India) in Japan and is active in supporting Japanes cinema overseas. She has organized workshops for young Japanese and Asian documentarists since 2009.

Putri Tasnim Mohd ARIF
Putri Tasnim Mohd ARIF gives lectures on Genre Studies, Script Analysis, Academic Writing and Researche Writing in the Faculty of Film, Theater, and Animation at Puncak Perdana Campus, UITM Malaysia. She also writes telefilm scripts for ASTRO. Her goal is to write and director more films especially in the psychological dram genre. Her interest is to be able to write poetically and philosophically without sounding funny.

Ed delos Santos CABAGNOT
Ed delos Santos CABAGNOT is a writer and film course teacher who has been writing columns and articles since the mi-70's. He is quite active in introducing and promoting cinema of the Philippines. In 2007, he was awarded Asian Public Intellectuals Fellowships Grant by the Nippon Foundation for his researche entitled Changing Landscaps, Changing Cinema of Asia. He is now writing on philophy and the Filipino film entitled, Heidegger's Being and Time & Manuel Silos' Biyaya Ng Lupa.

LEE Seung-Min
LEE Seung-Min is a documentary film theorist who gives lectures in universities. She has published serveral articles and books about documentary films including A Study on 'Me-in-the-text-as-filmmaker' in Korean Independent Documentary Films in 2008 and A Study on Distribution of Korean Documentary Film in 2010.

Chalida UABUMRUNGJIT
Chalida UABUMRUNGJIT studied film from Thammasat University and film archiving from University of East Anglia, UK. She has supported independent film through Tai Short Film and Video Festival where she served as the Fsetival Director since 1997. She has worked for a long time with the Thai Film Foundation and now serves as the Deputy Director of the Film Archive, Thailand.

Interview
Emad BURNAT, Davy CHOU, NAOI Riyo, Eliane RAHEB, Byamba SAKHYA, TAN Pin Pin, Mazhar ZAIDI, FENG Yan, Ji Dan, XU Tong, KIM Dong-ryung, PARK Kyoung-Tae, PARK Bae-il

Preface HONG Hyosook
Introduction Jane H.C.YU

PART 1 The Landscape
Central Asia _Gulnara ABIKEYEVA
China_ZHANG Xian Min
India_Gargi SEN and Supriyo SEN
Indonesia_Budi IRAWANTO
Iran_Mohammed ATEBBAI
Japan_FUJIOKA Asako
Malaysia_Putti ARIF
The Philippines_Ed delos Santos CABAGNOT
South Korea_Lee Seung_Min
Taiwan_Jane H.C.YU
Thailand, Vietnam, and Cambodia_Chalida UABUMRUNGJIT

PART 2 Viewpoints
Emad BURNAT_Palestine
Davy CHOU_Cambodia
NAOI Riyo_Japan
Eliane RAHEB_Lebanon
Byamba SAKHYA_Mongolia
TAN pin Pin_Singapore
Mazhar ZAIDI_Pakistan
FENG Yan, Ji Dan, and XU Tong_China
KIM Dong-ryung, PARK Kyoung-Tae, and PARK Bae-il_Korea

Appendix
AND(Asian Network of Documentary) Fund Projects