Water wins Best Film at Bangkok Fest

Indian-born director Deepa Mehta was celebrating today after her problem-plagued film Water finally found its way to success, winning Best Film at the Bangkok International Film Festival.
Water, which focuses on the plight of castigated widows in Gandhi-era India, was nearly abandoned by Mehta after protests by Hindu organisations halted filming and then became the centre of a bitter tug-of-war at the festival.
The director received death threats and was forced to shelve the movie in 2000 after Indian authorities shut down filming amid protests by Hindu outfits. She finally shot the film in Sri Lanka five years later.
In Bangkok, organisers said a Thai studio had tried to pull Water from the competition as part of a boycott of the festival being staged by the nation’s film industry group which claims it was not properly consulted over
the event.
But Mehta insisted the film be shown and produced a contract giving her rights to show Water at any festival, the event’s director Craig Prater told.
A jury led by Australian director Fred Schepisi  awarded the prize which Princess Ubol Ratana of Thailand presented to Mehta and Canadian David Hamilton at a star-studded awards ceremony in the capital last night.
Water has already proved a smash hit in Canada, where Mehta now lives, having opened five film festivals and grossed almost two million dollars at the Canadian box office since November.
South Korea’s Park Chan-Wook won his second successive Best Director Award at the festival yesterday for his mystery thriller Sympathy for Lady Vengeance. He shared the directing prize last year for Old Boy which also won him the 2004 grand jury prize at Cannes in 2004.
The Golden Kinnaree awards — named after a half-woman, half-bird mythical Thai creature — are not considered among the most prestigious in the movie world, but last year’s big winner, Spanish movie The Sea Inside, went on to win the Oscar for Best Foreign-Language Film the following month.
The only entry in this year’s competition to be nominated as Best Foreign Film at next month’s Academy Awards is Tsotsi, which won a Best Actor award for 21-year-old South African actor Presley Chweneyagae.
Desperate Housewives star Felicity Huffman, meanwhile, won Best Actress
for her role as a pre-operative transsexual in Transamerica, a performance that also has her in the running for an Oscar next month.
Some 15 Golden Kinnarees were handed out at the red carpet event which included Hollywood actors Christopher Lee and Willem Dafoe.
Vietnamese film Bride of Silence by Doan Minh Phuong and Doan Thanh Nghia won Best Film in the ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations) category.
French screen icon Catherine Deneuve was presented with a career achievement award, while Wouter Barendrecht and Michael J. Werner’s company Fortissimo Films received a Golden Kinnaree for contribution to Asian cinema.
Veteran Thai action star and stunt man Sombat Metanee also received an honorary award.