‘Secret of Leader’ explores changing Central Asian world
BUSAN: Written and directed by Farkhat Sharipov of Kazakhstan, The Secret of a Leader screened its world premiere at the Busan International Film Festival ( BIFF).
There it competes in a field of nine for the newly created Kim Jiseok Award, honouring the director who passed away last year and remembering his passion to discover new talent across Asian cinema.
In its 23rd year, the Busan film fest has grown to take on many roles, and it takes its responsibility of being the “single representative event” for Asian film seriously, such as with its Window on Asian Cinema section. This year that window has cracked open a little more on Central Asia, with a dozen of the 324 films at the festival coming from that former Soviet region.
“Now it’s a really happy, happy time for Kazakh cinema,” Sharipov told newsmen in an interview immediately after his premiere, speaking in Russian. “Because we have a lot of films going out every year, and a lot of new private companies are making commercial films, as well as epic films, co-productions and festival films.”
“At this moment we are growing,” he continued. “In comparison to (the small) Kazakhstan population (of 18 million), it’s pretty much good.”
The Secret of a Leader is no sunny portrait of Kazakhstan. It shows the moderate, majorityMuslim, former Soviet republic in a state of flux and soul searching.
The script was originally based on a self-help book popular in Kazakhstan and Russia, but strayed far from that material. Now the film takes its name from the motivational leadership-building workshop whose opening seminar begins and final session ends the movie. Stuck in the mid-levels of a big bank in Almaty, main character Kanat’s life changes between the seminars upon his initial run-in and subsequent meetings with old classmate Danika.
The self- assured Danika plays the role of “fairy godfather” to Kanat.
The bigwig goes from reminiscing on their drunken school days to dragging Kanat into his lascivious world of corporate power and to alcoholfuelled karaoke sessions with women half their age whose time is being paid for. The contrasts in the lives Kanat leads — at the office, at home where he stays with his ailing mother, as a semi- estranged father and husband and in the late nights with Danika — betray the uncertainty in his life.
Through Kanat, cinemagoers sees a society becoming slave to its burgeoning capitalism, or a free market being corrupted by Soviet cronyism.
The director explained, “It’s like a parallel which goes together with the main hero of the film, who is also looking for himself. He’s going to this leadership training trying to find himself, trying to find the formula for a happy life. He tries to find himself and the country also, like in the way of selfidentification.”
Sharipov spoke in English to add, “He also tries to change, and he don’t know how, what he want to change. And also we see the country, we want to change something, but we don’t know what.”