Sixty-five entries from 30 nations have been selected for this year’s Kaohsiung International Film Festival’s Short Film Competition, organizers said on Thursday.
The organizers said they received 3,203 submissions from 93 nations and that after a four-month selection period, 65 were picked to compete for the total prize pool of NT$1.1 million (US$35,680).
Some of the 65 have been entered in other international film festivals, including the Cannes Film Festival, the International Film Festival Rotterdam, the Locarno International Film Festival, the Short Shorts Film Festival & Asia and the Busan International Film Festival, the statement said.
The Kaohsiung festival is divided into international and Taiwanese categories, with 20 selected for the Taiwanese category, including one by Ying Liang (應亮) — an independent Chinese filmmaker in exile in Hong Kong — that was entered in this year’s International Film Festival Rotterdam.
Also in the Taiwanese category is Jiejie by Taiwanese-American director Fiona Feng-I Roan (阮鳳儀), which was one of the three finalists at the HBO Asian Pacific American Visionaries short film competition.
Others in the Taiwanese category are Scissors and the Cat, a short documentary by director Hou Chi-jan (侯季然), and Magician on the Roof, starring actress Wu Ke-xi (吳可熙).
The 45 short films in the international competition include Australia’s All These Creatures, Brazil’s The Orphan, Poland’s Tremors and Italy’s Magic Alps.
To encourage domestic film producers, four new awards have been added to the Taiwanese category, while a new award in the international division is to be handed out for a film from Asia, the organizers said.
Screenings at the Kaohsiung International Film Festival are to be held from Oct. 19 to Nov. 14 at the Kaohsiung Main Public Library, Cinemark Theaters and the Kaohsiung Film Archive.
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