“Crossing Salween” to be shown at the 4th Annual Myanmar Film Festival of Los Angeles
“Crossing Salween,” a 20-minute short film, will be shown at the 4th Annual Myanmar Film Festival of Los Angeles which will be held at Downtown Independent Theater on November 19 and 20.
Irish film producer Gary Moore said the film, based on a Karen girl who flees the fighting in Burma, is a story that also throws light on the reality of Karen life and the lives of Burmese in general.
The film stars 11-year-old Karen refugee Ronnachai Mai Whittio, or Mai for short, who Moore found through “street casting”––searching for talent among non-professionals to play the lead role, as happened with the casting of slum children in the 2008 Hollywood hit, “Slumdog Millionaire.”
Moore said the young girl was “a natural” for the part. He visited the Thai-Burmese border region, and on his return to Ireland wrote a short story, titled “Ko Reh,” the name of its central character, a 9-year-old Karen girl who flees into the jungle when the Burmese army burns down her village and slaughters the inhabitants. With the aid of a mysterious hunter, she sets out on an arduous trek to safety over the border in Thailand.
Humanity, not politics, is the main thrust of both the pilot and planned full-length feature film that Moore’s Dublin-based film company, Red Rage, hopes to make.
Crossing Salween – short film
20 min | Karen w/English subtitle | 2010
Director: Brian O’Malley
Producer: Gary Moore (Red Rage Films)
Writer: Brain O’Malley based on a short story by Gary Moore
Dir. of Photography: Richard Kendrick
Starring: Thanawut Dum Kedsaro, Danai Tung Thiengtham and Ronnachai Mai Wijitto
sources: www.redragefilms.com & www.mizzima.com
