Shown at this year’s Busan International Film Festival, Tribeny Rai’s debut feature, Shape of Momo, is a wonderful piece of writing. A powerful film that listens closely to the hidden struggles of women living within the limits of tradition. The narrative centres on Bishnu, a 32-year-old who abandons her city job and returns to her…
Category: Film
Sylvia CHANG Receives BIFF x CHANEL 2025 Camellia Award at the 30th Busan International Film Festival
Taiwanese filmmaker Sylvia Chang has been awarded the 2025 Camellia Award for her groundbreaking contributions across generations and roles, paving the way for Asian women in cinema. The Camellia Award, presented by CHANEL in partnership with the Busan International Film Festival, honors women whose cultural and artistic impact shapes the film industry. At the 30th…
30th Busan International Film Festival: “Dear Stranger” Review
Tetsuya Mariko’s Dear Stranger begins not with the disappearance of a child, but with the erosion of a marriage. Kenji (Hidetoshi Nishijima: Drive My Car, Serpent’s Path), a Japanese architecture professor in New York, and Jane (Gwei Lun-Mei: The Wild Goose Lake), a Taiwanese-American puppeteer who has put her art aside to raise their young…
30th Busan International Film Festival: “Hana Korea” Review
For many North Korean defectors, crossing the border is not the end of a story but the start of another kind of struggle. Frederik Sølberg’s Hana Korea, co-written with Sharon Choi, goes straight into that fraught second chapter. The film is a great story of adaptation and loss: how the comforts of a new country…
European Women Filmmakers Take Stage at the 30th Busan International Film Festival
European Film Promotion (EFP), a consortium of 37 national film organizations, is devoted to bringing the richness of European cinema and its creators to the attention of the international film industry and press. This year in Busan, EFP will back 69 European titles invited to the festival, alongside the participation of 19 global distributors connected…
BFI London Film Festival 2025: A Strong Year for Asian Cinema
The 2025 BFI London Film Festival has announced a particularly rich programme, one that emphasising its role as a global event for daring, ambitious as well as diverse cinema. Among the many highlights, Park Chan-wook’s No Other Choice is probably one of the year’s most anticipated Gala selections. The darkly comic thriller follows a desperate…
82nd Venice Film Festival: “The Sun Rises on All of Us” Review (2)
The Sun Rises on Us All, (Chinese title: Ri Gua Zhong Tian), offers a more nuanced interpretation of the story. The title comes from an ancient Cantonese opera and calls to mind themes of forgiveness and reconciliation after hardship. This ties closely to the plot, in which Meiyun (Xin Zhi-lei) and Baoshu (Zhang Song-wen), once…
82nd Venice Film Festival: “Praying Mantis” Review
Praying Mantis is an 18-minute hand-drawn animation short film co-directed by Hong Kong director Yonfan and Taiwanese filmmaker Joe Hsieh, breaking his six-year silence. The film merges Yonfan’s expertise in portraying complex female characters with Hsieh’s recurring motifs of lust and death, telling the story of a mother who sacrifices herself entirely for her child…
82nd Venice Film Festival: “Girl” Review
Girl was the directorial debut of SHU Qi. It was undoubtedly one of the most anticipated films at the 82nd Venice Film Festival. Girl marked SHU Qi’s first step into directing. It captured immense attention at the event. SHU Qi is a regular presence at Cannes, Berlinale, and the Venice Film Festival. Her first arrival…
82nd Venice Film Festival: “The Sun Rises on All of Us” Review
One of the benefits of seeing films at their very earliest screenings, before they’ve even been unveiled to the world at a splashy festival premiere, is being able to experience them truly blind. In the case of The Sun Rises On Us All, the latest film from Chinese auteur Cai Shangjun, which just premiered in…
VIEW OF THE ARTS 