Chinese-language films rise at VIFF

By Craig Takeuchi
Straight.com

Although the Vancouver International Film Festival has had a special program for Asian films since 1985, the VIFF will place special emphasis on Chinese cinema with an expanded Dragons & Tigers series this year.

Dragons & Tigers programming will be divided between long-time D&T programmer Tony Rayns, who will handle non Chinese language East Asian films, and newcomer Shelly Kraicer, who will oversee Chinese-language film programming. Kraicer is a Canadian film scholar who speaks Mandarin and has lived in Beijing for five years.

In a phone interview from Toronto, Kraicer spoke about how Chinese cinema is flourishing. "One of our focuses is on new documentaries because there's an incredible amount of vitality and creativity in the indie Chinese Mainland documentary scene." One such discovery was Bing Ai , an eight-year project by female director Feng Yan about a Chinese woman farmer living near the Yangtze River's Three Gorges dam project who refuses to move when ordered to. The film will have its world premiere at the VIFF.

The Chinese-language program will feature numerous North American and Canadian premieres and will include selections from Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Taiwan. Kraicer says films will range from big-budget features like The Sun Also Rises to zero-budget wonder (shot with a crew of four) Little Moth , about a young girl forced to beg on city streets.

Kraicer also spoke highly of Taiwanese film. "For a long time, people have been saying the Taiwan film industry is stuck, dead, and just producing a few famous art-house films for international audiences. And this year I was excited when I went to Taipei that there are all sorts of signs of revival in the Taiwanese commercial-film industry and among independent young filmmakers."

Chinese North American content includes Arthur Dong's documentary Hollywood Chinese and the Canada-China thriller/horror coproduction They Wait , starring Vancouver's Terry Chen.