Anthony Minghella and Carolyn Choa will direct a documentary about calligraphy in China. Photo: Adrian Bradshaw/EPA
In China, British producer Paul Raphael explains, not just anyone can become a calligrapher. You must serve a long apprenticeship. It takes two years just to learn how to crush the ink properly, and students are not allowed to take up their pens until they have learned the "art of the ink". Old masters go to the park in Beijing and Shanghai at 5am and create extraordinary art on the pavements. When the sun comes up, it just evaporates away.
In Cannes this week, Raphael announced he had recruited Anthony Minghella and Carolyn Choa to direct a documentary about calligraphy in China. Chris Doyle and Rain Li will shoot the film, which is being made as part of a series of feature documentaries to tie in with next year's Beijing Olympics. Mike Figgis and Phillip Noyce are among the other directors who have boarded the project.
As the Cannes marché draws to a close, Raphael's remarks about art on the pavement evaporating away take on an ironic resonance. Many of the films that have been announced over the past 10 days will never be made. Many of the films that have been made will never be seen. Many of the films that have been seen here will soon be forgotten.
Over the last decade, there has been a subtle shift in the market. In the 80s and 90s, Cannes was clogged with muscular thrillers starring the likes of Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren. Arthouse fare represented a relatively small part of the action. Now, that has changed. There have been dozens of sales companies here hawking movies from big-name auteurs. Buyers have been offered new pictures from Raoul Ruiz, Carlos Saura, Eric Rohmer and Michael Haneke. The problem is that there is an oversupply. The UK now has several new distributors ready to release the best arthouse fare.
Even so, they can't buy everything. If a film isn't in Official Selection, it often slips under the buyers' radars altogether. We may be in the era of the "long tail", but it can safely be predicted that lots of little gems will remain undiscovered or will have a shelf-life hardly longer than the calligraphers' art washed away at sunrise.
