Asian Films In 57th Berlin Film Festival

Five movies from East Asia won awards in the 57th Berlin Film Festival held from February 8 to February 17 this year. Most notable being Tuya's Marraige or Tuya's Wedding (图雅的婚事) by director Wang Quan-an and starring Chinese actress Yu Nan in the title role which won the most prestigious Golden Bear For Best Film Award. This movie looks really good and I hope that I will have a chance to watch it soon... You can find screen shots from the movie and Yu Nan and director Wang Quan-an at the Berlinale here.

Other East Asian films that won awards included:

South Korean film I'm A Cyborg But That's OK by director Park Chan-Wook and starring superstar Rain won the Alfred Bauer Prize (awarded to the most innovative film). Here's the trailer (unfortunately no subtitles) from Youtube (definitely looks like a quirky movie...):



Taiwanese film Spider Lilies (刺青) by director Zero Zhou Mei-ling and starring teen idols Rainie Yang & Isabella Leung won the Teddy Award for Feature Film. You can find a rather interesting short 3-minute clip of the movie with English subtitles here.

Hong Kong /China film Getting Home (落叶归根) by director Zhang Yang won the Ecumenical Jury Panorama Prize. Screen shots of the movie can be found here.

Japanese film Faces of A Fig Tree (Ichijiku no kao 無花果の顔) by director Momoi Kaori won the NETPAC Prize. You can find the official website of the movie here (in Japanese).

One thing that I noticed was that many of the expensive big-budgeted movies from China like Curse Of The Golden Flower and The Banquet were conspicuously absent from many prestigious award ceremonies (including the upcoming Oscars). Hmmm maybe this should signal something to the directors and producers there that its still the story that counts in a film and not the bombastic effects and lavish costumes ...

Tags: Berlin Film Festival, Berlin Film Awards, Berlinale, Golden Bear, Tuya's Marraige, Tuya's Wedding, East Asian Films, I'm A Cyborg But That's OK, Rain, Spider Lilies, Rainie Yang, Isabella Leung, Getting Home, Faces Of A Fig Tree.