Sylvia Chang, Green Wave

Source: Applause Entertainment Taiwan / FEFF

Sylvia Chang, ‘Green Wave’

The Far East Film Festival (FEFF, April 24-May 2) in Italy’s Udine has unveiled the full line-up for its 27th edition, which will honour Taiwanese actress and filmmaker Sylvia Chang with an honorary award.

Chang will receive FEFF’s Golden Mulberry for lifetime achievement award in recognition of a career spanning several decades. Daughter’s Daughter, for which she received an honourable mention at Toronto in September, will screen at the festival alongside a restored version of Tsui Hark’s comedy Shanghai Blues from 1984.

The festival will open with Green Wave, a Chinese father-son comedy drama directed by Xu Lei, which won the jury award and best actor for Xu Chaoying when it premiered at Pingyao in September.

The closing film is Ya Boy Kongming! The Movie, a live-action adaptation of the Japanese manga known locally as Paripi Koumei. Directed by Shuhei Shibue, the story centres on Zhuge Kongming, who is transported from ancient China to modern-day Tokyo and uses military tactics to transform his new friend Eiko into a music star.

They are among 75 films from 11 countries that have been selected for this year’s FEFF.

It includes 11 films from Japan such as black-and-white drama Teki Cometh, which won three prizes at Tokyo and best director for Daihachi Yoshida at the recent Asian Film Awards.

Green Wave is one of 10 films from China at the festival, which also includes Shao Yihui’s box office hit Her Story; and Tsui Hark’s martial arts feature Legends Of The Condor Heroes: The Gallants, which was acquired by Sony Pictures International Productions.

From South Korea, eight titles include Park Ri-woong’s mystery drama The Land Of Morning Calm, which debuted at Busan where it won three prizes including the top New Currents award, and E.oni’s romantic drama Love In The Big City, first seen at Toronto.

Among seven features from Hong Kong is the extended version of Anselm Chan’s The Last Dance, which became the biggest Hong Kong and Chinese-language film of all time at the local box office; and Philip Yung’s critically acclaimed family drama Papa alongside Donnie Yen’s The Prosecutor and Anthony Pun’s disaster thriller Cesium Fallout.

Further titles include Antoinette Jadaone’s Filipino drama Sunshine, which played Toronto and Berlin; Taweewat Wantha’s Thai box office horror hit Death Whisperer 2; and documentaries including Walking In The Movies about Korean film industry pioneer and Busan co-founder Kim Dong-ho.

Associated events include exhibition Mondo Mizuki, Mondo Yokai, featuring 100 original pages of artwork, magazines, books, video documents and texts to reconstruct the universe of legendary Japanese manga artist Shigeru Mizuki, which will be held from April 26 to August 30 at Udine’s Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art.

The festival will again be based at Udine’s Teatro Nuovo theatre and the Visionario cinema.

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