Friday, May 23, 2008

"Needle Through Brick"

My brother, a rather fascinating individual (and I think the sort of protagonist Nick Hornby would love to write about in his prose), is an archaeologist and current professor at the Univerity of Singapore. A doctor of philosophy (from Oxford, no less. I even got to go to commencement. Which, after a brief address, was delivered entirely IN LATIN. I gather a stint at a seminary might have prepared one for the afternoon of ancient Tridentine traditions), he has traveled the world extensively (six continents, no less) and hasn't resided in the US since 1997, attending Oxford, spending his summers working on an archaeological project in Marcham, UK. He also spent considerable time in Jordan, Nablus (in the West Bank), Kuching and now in Singapore.

Prior to his position in Singapore, he spent a year working in Kuching, Malaysia, along with our two other brothers (apparently I would have been included had I not been in college at the time; well, at least I got to go over for a visit). It was during his stay here he worked on his film, a piece that examines "the struggle for survival of traditional art and culture in the face of a rapidly changing and modernizing world. The documentary is told from the perspective of time-honored Chinese Kung Fu masters living in Borneo, East Malaysia."

My brother has been working endlessly on this film since it wrapped shooting several years ago. He's made many trips to Brooklyn to work on post-production with his producing partners. Well, the hard work appears to have finally paid off. The film is currently in contention among with several other films, all of which are competing as part of MyFestival @ the Seattle International Film Festival. Voted by viewers on the website, the film with the most votes will be screened on the final night of the actual festival.

2 comments:

Esther said...

Wow, pretty interesting, and I'm not even a big kung fu fan! But I bet your brother doesn't have your encyclopedic knowledge of musical theatre!

Kevin Daly said...

I'm not that big into kung fu myself, but I figure, if this can help him in any way, why not?

That being said, he and my brothers are not fans of the musicals. At all. Though he did buy "Everything Was Possible" for me one year for Christmas.