The New Zealand International Film Festival is coming to Christchurch in August and we recently chatted to the Festival Director, Bill Gosden about cinematic books that inspired him.
Bill said he was indebted to Dunedin Public Libraries where he had his unofficial film education while at high school. Titles that helped spur his interest in film included:
- Pauline Kael’s books of film criticism.
- David Thomson’s The new biographical dictionary of film, which he called “rewarding and provocative”.
- François Truffaut interviews with Alfred Hitchcock which he described as “hugely important when I was really young”.
Take a look at our collection of movie related resources to get some inspiration for your future-film-festival-directing endeavours. If you are more interested in watching films than curating them however, there are a bunch of films in the Festival that have literary connections. We’ve got a list of them on our website, as well as a list of upcoming film and TV adaptations and a huge list of books that have previously been filmed. Here are some of the highlights:
- Poets: Relationships are at the core of films about Friedrich Schiller and Elizabeth Bishop,
one set in 18th Century Europe and the other set in 1950s Rio. - Authors: Violette Leduc and New Zealander Jean Watson both are the focus of films this year. Aunty and the star people explores the “fascinating double life” of Jean Watson (author of Stand in the rain) who started a children’s home in Southern India.
- Photographers: Gavin Hipkins (NZ) and Sebastião Salgado’s photographic works come off the page and onto the big screen.
- Adaptations: Human capital, Under the skin and Snowpiercer give some thrills this year, but there are also some slower-paced choices on our list.
There are a lot more titles on our list. Let us know in the comments if we have missed any literary connections in this years Festival.
