Strasburg Film Festival short Delicacy follows a culinary connoisseur whose desperation to try an exotic dish leads him and a chef to go on a hunt for a rare animal.
Delicacy will be shown on Saturday, November the 10th, 10:30 AM at the Grey Lotus Studio. Tickets can be found on the film’s event page.
Director Biography – Jason Mann
Jason Mann is a New York based American filmmaker known for directing and co- writing The Leisure Class which was produced by Matt Damon & Ben Affleck, along with Peter & Bobby Farrelly, in association with HBO, Miramax, and Adaptive Studios. Mann is the winner of the new revival of HBO’s Project Greenlight, an 8-episode docu-series following the making of a feature film. His short film Delicacy premiered at the Telluride, Tribeca, and Austin film festivals. Mann received an M.F.A. from Columbia University in New York for film directing, as well as a bachelor’s degree in film production from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. As an undergraduate, he made a short film called On the Revolutions of Heavenly Spheres which garnered awards for Best Film and Best Director from the university. The film played at festivals such as Palms Springs, the Boston Film Festival, Newport Beach and many others.
Director Statement
The collaborators I found for the production of this film and their enthusiasm made the entire process such a tremendous pleasure. Our group is an impressive international assembly. The producer and I – as well as the 2nd camera assistant – are from the United States. Our cinematographer is from Belgium. Our casting director is from Sweden. The costume designer is from Greece. One of the production designers is from Russia. One of the make up artists is from South Africa. Our production manager and the rest of the cast and crew are from England. Our sound designer in New York is from Australia. And the co-screenwriter, the one responsible for conceiving this wild idea for a film, is from Canada. This film could not have been made without all of their amazing commitments, as well as the support of my professors in the MFA Film Department at Columbia University.
It’s funny to observe how different audiences react to this movie. When it premiered at the Telluride Film Festival, it had two screenings. One was in the evening, with an audience mostly in their twenties and thirties. That audience had no trouble picking up on the movie’s humor. The second screening, on the other hand, took place in the morning – I think it was around 11 AM. That audience consisted primarily of people in their sixties and above. And they didn’t seem to find it funny at all. It’s something of a cultural phenomenon that a movie can be perceived by some as a dark comedy and by others as just a weird drama. But maybe that’s emblematic of a cultural shift. Younger generations are becoming so saturated with media that they are moving further and further away from being able to take anything completely seriously. Whether this shift is positive or negative, Delicacy may very well be a product of that kind of over saturated mindset.
