BLACK Premiere at Fantasia and in theatres from July 31st!

Evokative Films would like to highlight the Canadian Premiere of BLACK at Montreal’s Fantasia International Film Festival, which will precede its theatrical release. The premiere will take place on July 22nd at 7pm and will be hosted by Lead Actor and French rapper MC Jean Gab’1, Director Pierre Laffargue and Co-producer Lauranne Bourrachot .

Black, a Senegalese bank-robber born and raised in France, is getting over a disastrous heist in which he lost nearly all of his men. He’s seriously thinking of going straight when his cousin Lamine calls him from Dakar: a briefcase full of contraband diamonds has just been deposited in the bank where he works. Thinking this will be an unbelievably easy coup, Black assembles a new gang and quickly flies to Africa. What they haven’t planned, however, is that they are far from being the only ones interested in that briefcase. The corrupt director of the bank, an arm dealer suffering from suppurating psoriasis, a gang of mercenaries from Chechnya and an Interpol agent are also set to get their hands on those diamonds.

After its World Premiere in the Fantastic Fest section of the SXSW Film Festival, this heist film filled with action, peppered with comedy, blaxploitation influences and African mysticism and paced to a funky soundtrack seduced both the audience and critics. A screening at the Seattle International Film Festival followed in June. In August BLACK will be screening at the Toronto After Dark Film Festival and London’s Film4 FrightFest. BLACK was released in French theatres today.

Posted in Theatrical Releases

Sion Sono’s HAZARD on DVD from July 14th!

Canadian lovers of the Japanese cinema provocateur Sion Sono will finally have the chance to see his New York adventure HAZARD on DVD. Written and directed by Sion Sono (SUICIDE CLUB, NORIKO’S DINNER TABLE, STRANGE CIRCUS, EXTE: HAIR EXTENSIONS, LOVE EXPOSURE), the film debuted Joe Odagiri (ADRIFT IN TOKYO, RETRIBUTION, SHINOBI), now a Japanese star actor, as well as Jai West (LOVE EXPOSURE, BIG BANG LOVE, JUVENILE A) and Motoki Fukami (CROWS: EPISODE 0).

Shin is a Japanese university student longing to escape his meaningless existence. One day he discovers a book titled "Dangerous Ways to Walk the World" which talks about the hazards of New York City. Shin immediately jets off in search of danger and adventure, but he isn’t prepared for the harsh realities of the city. After being mugged for eveything he's got, Shin is befriended by Lee and Takeda, two Japanese-American punks who school him in the ways of crime. It's not long before Shin joins them and starts taking on all comers; robbing, stealing, and celebrating his new found freedom in New York City.

An anarchic adventure taking place in the pre-Giuliani New-York of 1991, HAZARD was filmed on location with a small budget, often with guerilla-style camerawork. Although filmed in 2002, it was only released domestivally in Japan in 2005 and was programmed in a few festivals, such as the New York Asian Film Festival and the Fantasia International Film Festival, in 2007.

The DVD features Japanese and English dialogue with optional English and French subtitles. A Making-of (in Japanese only) and an Exclusive Video Interview with Sion Sono, produced by Evokative Films, are included as extra features. The packaging includes a booklet with an interview with the Director and a foreword by Chris MaGee, founder of the Toronto J-Film Pow-wow blog, specialised in Japanese films. In accordance with the innovative vocation of Evokative, the DVD packaging is an environmentally-friendly and elegant digipack made of 100% recycled materials and wrapped in a 100% biodegradable cellophane.

It is to be noted that Sion Sono’s latest opus, the 4-hours-long LOVE EXPOSURE, will have its Canadian Premiere on July 11th and 12th at the Fantasia International Film Festival. This film was celebrated at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival, where Sono was awarded the Caligari Film Award and the Fipresci Prize. This week the film also won the Grand Jury Prize at the New York Asian Film Festival.

Posted in DVD Releases

Fantasia: Evokative Films's favorite event of the year!

Montreal’s Fantasia International Film Festival, North-America’s largest genre film festival, is an absolute must for Evokative Films. Attended since its first years by its founder, Stephanie Trepanier, who also collaborated to three recent editions, Fantasia is at the roots of the distribution company, the essence of it passion and inspiration. Evokative Films was founded so that the Fantasia audience could see the films they love, year-round.

We are thus extremely happy to benefit from a marked presence amongst the programming of this 13th edition of the Fantasia Festival: BLACK by Pierre Laffargue will be presented as a Canadian Premiere; ROUGH CUT by JANG Hoon will also be presented as a Canadian Premiere; DAYTIME DRINKING by NOH Young-seok will be presented as a Montreal Premiere; ADRIFT IN TOKYO will be presented at Fantasia Under the Stars; and Evokative will participate in a conference of the festival.

BLACK
Black, a Senegalese bank-robber born and raised in France, is getting over a disastrous heist in which he lost nearly all of his men. He’s seriously thinking of going straight when his cousin Lamine calls him from Dakar: a briefcase full of contraband diamonds has just been deposited in the bank where he works. Thinking this will be an unbelievably easy coup, Black assembles a new gang and quickly flies to Africa, where he’s never set foot. What they haven’t planned, however, is that they are far from being the only ones interested in that briefcase. The corrupt director of the bank, an arm dealer suffering from suppurating psoriasis, a gang of mercenaries from Chechnya and an Interpol agent are also set to get their hands on those diamonds.

BLACK will have its Canadian Premiere on July 22nd at 7pm in the Hall Theatre, with the lead actor and French rapper MC Jean Gab’1, the director Pierre Laffargue and the producer Lauranne Bourrachot attending. After its World Premiere in the Fantastic Fest section of the SXSW Film Festival, this heist film filled with action, peppered with comedy and mysticism and paced to a funky soundtrack seduced both the audience and critics. Following its upcoming French release on July 15th, BLACK will see Canadian theatres from July 31st.

ROUGH CUT
Gang-pae is a mobster who dreams of becoming an actor. Soo-ta is a star actor who tends to have a bit of a bad attitude, especially with his co-stars, who keep getting beaten up on the set. Now nobody wants to work with him and it's threatening his current film's production. A chance encounter brings the two together and Soo-ta convinces Gang-pae to come and play the role of, well, a mobster. Gang-pae agrees with the condition that the film's fight scenes have to be real, no pretend bullshit.

Co-written and co-produced by the brilliant KIM Ki-duk, ROUGH CUT is directed by his protégé JANG Hoon. Last week the actor SO Ji-Seob was honored with the Rising Star Asia Award at the New York Asian Film Festival, where the film had its North-American Premiere. This film-within-a-film that gets reality and fiction muddled-up, delivers great characters and packs the punches was one of the great successes at the Korean box-office in 2008. Evokative Films acquired the film just recently at the Cannes Film Market and plans to release it theatrically in the winter of 2010, following its Canadian Premiere on July 25th at 6:30pm in the Hall Theatre.

DAYTIME DRINKING
On a drunken night out with his friends, a broken-hearted young man gets swayed into going to the countryside for a group getaway. But when he gets there, he finds that not only have none of the friends have showed up, but the tiny seaside town is shuttered - no shops are open, no tourists are around, the beach is freezing, and there’s no cell phone signal. Unable (and reluctant) to return to Seoul, he finds himself in the company of some very unusual locals and, subject to the rigid rules of Korean drinking culture, on an increasingly strange odyssey nursing a never-ending hangover.

This humorous road-movie, filmed on a micro-budget where the Korean director NOH Young-seok assumed most production duties, distinguished itself in more than 20 International film festivals over the last year. Montrealers will finally have the chance to see this cinematic feat on July 10th at 5pm in the Hall theatre and on July 28th at 3pm in the J.A. DeSève Theatre.

FANTASIA UNDER THE STARS
From July 13th to the 18th, the Fantasia Under the Stars event will offer outdoors screenings at Peace Parc, located beside the Society for Arts and Technology (SAT). Evokative Films is proud to participate to this event by offering a free screening of one of last edition of Fantasia’s leading popular and critical success, ADRIFT IN TOKYO, on July 18th. The screening will begin at 9pm and will be preceded by live musical and visual performances.

CONFERENCES OF THE FANTASTIC WEEKEND OF QUEBEC SHORTS
As part of this second edition of the Fantastic Weekend of Quebec Shorts, the Fantasia Festival will offer a series of four conferences intended for budding directors, newcomers trying to breakthrough in the entertainment industry and anyone interested in the creative arts. On July 26th at 1pm in the J.A. DeSève Theatre, Stephanie Trepanier will participate in the Conference on Movie and DVD Distribution in Quebec, along with Andrew Noble (Filmoption International), Izabel Grondin (director and distributor), a representative for the Régie du Cinéma du Québec, Michel Garceau (Superclub Vidéotron) and a representative for Magra Multimédia. The conference is free and will be followed by a cocktail.

FANTASIA’S FILMS AT EVOKATIVE FILMS
Evokative’s programming is intrinsically linked to Fantasia’s. Last year, we presented THE KILLER (LE TUEUR) by Cédric Anger, with the actor Grégoire Colin attending (DVD now available), as well as ADRIFT IN TOKYO by Satoshi Miki (DVD available in august), from whom the latest quirky comedy INSTANT SWAMP will be presented at the festival this year. CRYING FIST, which was presented by RYOO Seung-wan at Fantasia in 2005, is now available on DVD. HAZARD, presented by the Japanese cinema provocateur Sion Sono in 2007, will be available on DVD on July 14th. His most recent opus, LOVE EXPOSURE, will have its Canadian Premiere this year at Fantasia. Finally, a second acquisition at the Cannes Film Market, I’M A CYBORG, BUT THAT’S OK by PARK Chan-wook, precedes THIRST in the director’s filmography, which will have its North-American Premiere during Fantasia’s opening weekend.

The Fantasia International Film Festival will take place from July 9th to the 29th. Its programming includes more than 115 feature films and 200 shorts. We are looking forward to attend this 3-weeks movie marathon every day, to see favourites from this year’s festival circuit again along with the always-enthusiastic Fantasia audience, and discover new cinematic gems and oddities!

Posted in Events, Special Screenings

HANSEL & GRETEL on DVD from June 9th!

The South-Korean dark fantasy HANSEL & GRETEL, the 3rd DVD title of the Evokative Collection, will finally reach Canadian lovers of Asian genre films on June 9th. Written and directed by YIM Phil-Sung (ANTARTIC JOURNAL), the film stars CHEON Jeong-myeong and the young actors SIM Eun-kyung, JANG Yeong-Nam and JIN Ji-hee. A stellar crew contributed to the film, including Production Designer RYU Seong-hie (THE HOST, A BITTERSWEET LIFE, OLDBOY, MEMORIES OF MURDER), Cinematographer KIM Ji-yong (A BITTERSWEET LIFE) and Composer LEE Byung-woo (THE HOST, A TALE OF TWO SISTERS).

When Eun-soo crashes his car on a country road, he meets a young girl who leads him to her beautiful house in the middle of the forest, where he is welcomed by her parents and two young siblings, who appear to be the picture of the perfect family. The morning after, when he tries to get back to his car, the forest seems never-ending and inevitably leads back to the house. Soon Eun-soo realizes he’s trapped in the kids’ gloomy fairy-tale alternate reality, a world no other adult has managed to escape alive before him.

HANSEL & GRETEL got attention on the International film festival circuit after being winning a Special Mention at the Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival (Pifan) and more recently winning the Best Film Award of the Orient Express section, as well as a Special Prize in the Fantasy Competition of the Fantasporto International Film Festival. The film also played at the Seattle International Film Festival, the London Film Festival and the Gerardmer Fantastic Film Festival, amongst many others. In Canada, HANSEL & GRETEL had the honour of being chosen as the Closing Film of the Dragons and Tigers section at the Vancouver International Film Festival, to follow with the Toronto Reel Asian Film Festival and the Calgary Underground Film Festival. The film was released theatrically through the months of March and April in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver.

In accordance with the innovative vocation of Evokative, the DVD packaging is an environmentally-friendly and elegant digipack made of 100% recycled materials and wrapped in a 100% biodegradable cellophane. The packaging includes a booklet with an exclusive Director’s note and a foreword by Calum Wadell, Contributing Writer at Fangoria and SFX Magazine. The DVD features English and French subtitles, a Making-of, Interviews with the Director and Cast, a Behind the scenes featurette, a look at the set design, Recommendations from other Korean Directors, the Original Korean Trailer and TV Spots, as well as Two shorts from YIM Phil-sung: BRUSHING and BABY.

Posted in DVD Releases

Cannes acquisitions: I'M A CYBORG, BUT THAT'S OK and ROUGH CUT!

It was a very busy 10 days at the Cannes Film Festival for Evokative, with a lot of screenings and even more meetings. We'll see the pay-off of this over the next weeks and months, but we already have great news for you: ROUGH CUT and I'M A CYBORG, BUT THAT'S OK, both Korean titles, were finally picked up!

Co-written and co-produced by the great KIM Ki-duk, ROUGH CUT (also called A Movie is a Movie) was directed by his protégé, JANG Hoon.
Gang-pae is a mobster who dreams of becoming an actor. Soo-ta is a star actor who tends to have a bit of a bad attitude, especially with his co-stars, who keep getting beaten up on the set. Now nobody wants to work with him and it's threatening his current film's production. A chance encounter brings the two together and Soo-ta convinces Gang-pae to come and play the role of, well, a mobster. Gang-pae agrees with the condition that the film's fight scenes have to be real, no pretend bullshit. The table is set for a movie-within-a-movie that gets reality and fiction muddled-up, delivers great characters and packs the punches.

I'M A CYBORG, BUT THAT'S OK was acclaimed director PARK Chan-wook's last film before THIRST, which was just part of the Official Competition at the Cannes Film Festival.
Young-goon is a girl who’s a bit mentally deranged: she firmly believes she’s a cyborg, see. Refusing to eat “human food” that would bog down her system, she frequently electro-charges herself with a transistor radio thinking that’s the only way to keep her going. That lands her in a mental institution, where she catches the eye of Il-soon, another in-patient who thinks he can steal other people’s soul. But Young-goon’s health is rapidly deteriorating, so Il-soon will have to make her accept her humanity and convince her to eat before she gets a system breakdown. An absolutely original romantic comedy, I'M A CYBORG, BUT THAT'S OK marked a departure from the style of PARK Chan-wook's Vengeance trilogy.

Both films will get releases on 35mm prints before their DVD releases, dates will be worked out soon. ROUGH CUT will also be part of the programming of the upcoming New York Asian Film Festival and Fantasia Festival.

Posted in Acquisitions

Evokative Films has a brand-new website!

Evokative Films is thrilled to present its brand-new website, still available at www.evokativefilms.com.

The new website now features pages for every film that detail all pertinent information (release dates, credits, synopsis, festival and awards and reviews). The News section keeps the old blog-based version of the website alive in a new context. The Media Room section offers trailers and a selection of downloadable pictures of all films for media use. Finally, the Store section makes it possible for film fans across Canada and the globe to acquire all Evokative Films DVDs and related film products. Every elements of the website are available both in English and French.

Evokative Films, following it innovative mission, is now one of the very few film distribution companies in North America to have its own webstore. The website was designed by Robert McLarty at Philosophy Factory (www.philosophyfactory.ca), an interactive studio based in Toronto. The result was achieved by his creation of a custom-designed web CMS program.

This new website strengthens Evokative Films’ web presence, already well established with a Facebook page (with one of the best fan counts of all films distributors in North America on Facebook) and a Twitter profile.

Posted in Events

CRYING FIST on DVD from May 5th!

CRYING FIST (JUMEOGI UNDA), the 2nd DVD title of the Evokative Collection, will finally reach Canadian cinephiles on May 5th. This boxing drama from acclaimed South-Korean Director RYOO Seung-wan (ARAHAN, CITY OF VIOLENCE) stars CHOI Min-sik (OLDBOY, LADY VENGEANCE) and RYOO Seung-bum (ARAHAN, BLOODY TIE).

Jobless, besieged by creditors, and abandoned by his wife, the once silver medalist Tae-shikn (CHOI Min-sik) has sunken to street hustling, becoming a human punching bag. Meanwhile, young Sang-hwan's (RYOO Seung-bum) delinquent ways land him behind bars. Both men look to boxing to turn around lives gone astray, aiming for the amateur title, ultimately pitting them against each other, but more importantly, against themselves.

This critically acclaimed film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs section in 2005 and followed with many other prestigious festivals such as the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, the New York Asian Film Festival, the Fantasia International Film Festival, the Melbourne International Film Festival, the Vancouver International Film Festival, the San Diego Asian Film Festival, the Hong Kong Asian Film Festival and the Oslo International Film Festival. CRYING FIST won such awards as the FIPRESCI Award at the Cannes Film Festival; the Best Actor Award for CHOI Min-sik and the Silver Fantasia for Best Asian Film at the Fantasia International Film Festival; the Best Supporting Actress Award for NA Mun-Hee and the Best Editing Award for NAM Na-Yeong at the Grand Bell Awards; and the Best Director Award for RYOO Seung-wan at the Pusan Film Critics Association Awards.

In accordance with the innovative vocation of Evokative, the DVD packaging is an environmentally-friendly and elegant digipack made of 100% recycled materials and wrapped in a 100% biodegradable cellophane. The packaging includes a booklet with an exclusive Director’s note and a foreword by Nicolas Archambault, programmer at the Fantasia International Film Festival. The DVD offers special features such as English and French subtitles, a making-of, highlights of the film, a photo essay, the original Korean trailer and TV ads, as well as the 55-minutes original soundtrack composed by BANG Jun-suk.

Posted in DVD Releases