Panorama
Loud and Louder until the World is Heard
As women's stories are emerging from around the globe, female-themed films are increasingly being screened, with women’s voices being widely heard and recognized in various forms.
2024 marks the fifth year of the establishment of "Women's Voices" under Beijing International Film Festival (BJIFF). These voices will lead us into a world full of emotions and courage.
IT’S OKAY!
Highlights
Behind the emotional world of women hides a shining future star for Asia. High school student In-yeong, played by Lee Re, loses her mother in a car accident. She is kicked out of her home and has no choice but to hide out in the rehearsal room of an art troupe, accidentally discovered by the strict artistic director. By chance, they live together, and gradually build an emotional bond that goes beyond that between mother and daughter, and In-yeong finds hope and strength in life. The film was awarded the Crystal Bear of Generation Kplus - Best Film and nominated for the Grand Prix of the International Jury for the Best Film at the 74th Berlin International Film Festival.
Little Girl Blue
Highlights
Feel the most fervent love through from virtuality and reality.
This is a docudrama (documentary) filled with creativity and heartbreaking memories. Director Mona Achache studies and recalls her mother - Carole Achache, French writer, photographer and actress - through thousands of photographs, letters and tapes that manifest the way of her decease. The film was nominated for Golden Eye for the Best Documentary at the 76th Festival de Cannes.
When Marion Cotillard walks towards the wall of collage and starts to play the mother, her performance has been described as "a touching meta-portrait of the artist".
Birthday Girl
Highlights
A party of sadness and joy that the toughest female hearts can be felt.
The film tells the story of Nanna, who has been divorced for years and is finally able to spend time with her daughter, but an 18th birthday party becomes a turning point in the fate of the mother and the daughter. Michael Noer continues his harsh narrative style in his new film, where a tragedy lies beneath the hilarity of a cruise ship.
This is not just a film about a mother-daughter relationship, but an exploration of motherhood, courage, and justice. Danish actress Trine Dyrholm, who gained notoriety for her role in the films of Dogme 95, plays a tough mother who must face the harsh truth of what has befallen her, and she brings a number of touching, powerful, and inspiring contents.
Andrea’s Love
Highlights
An exploration of the emotional swirls and fissures in families through the camera. This new film, directed by the acclaimed Spanish director Manuel Martín Cuenca, continues to explore the complicated family relationships in the wake ofHalf of Óscar and La hija. In this film, the 15-year-old girl named Andrea insists on finding answers to her father's disappearance from their lives. The film won the Best Director and the Best Script at the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.
In this small, quiet, and beautiful town, let’s follow Andrea in her search for the "absent" love. In fact, she is also searching for a way to define her own identity: It's like a small slice of society. The young actors and actresses, in their first performance in a film, are natural and brilliant.
Borrowed Time
Highlights
A prose poem of water vapor. The boiling soup in a pot, the silence and sultriness before the typhoon approaches, and the lush lychees in the summer, all of which are the "beauty of life" that director Cai Jie wants to bring to the audience in Borrowed Time. The film tells the story of a girl from Guangzhou who is looking for her father in Hong Kong, China. Along the way, the filmy life in South China and the girl's thoughts are all revealed to the audience. It is like a boat in an ancient poem, floating afar without any disturbance.
The film was selected for the Rotterdam International Film Festival, Pingyao Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon International Film Festival, Busan International Film Festival, Hong Kong International Film Festival, and other major international film festivals, and awarded the Best Director for Work-in-Progress LAB (WIP) at the 6th Pingyao Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon International Film Festival.
May December
Highlights
Todd Haynes’ version of Persona. The actress Elizabeth’s portrayal of Gracie is highly vivid. Trapped in the turmoil from a marriage featuring a huge age gap, she has to face unexpected changes in this seemingly perfect home. The film won several nominations, such as Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and Golden Palm of the Festival de Cannes.
Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore contribute terrific performances in the film, just like twin sisters looking in the mirror whotry to reveal the truth about their marriage as they play and are played.
Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry
Highlights
Each and every stunningly beautiful frame that constitutes a great epic of a woman's life. Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry tells the love story of a woman who remains a child until the age of forty-eight in a remote Georgian town. The heroine Etero is seemingly living a dust-like life. However, under the lens of director Elene Naveriani, her life blossoms out of the dust and becomes a great epic of hers alone.
The film was selected for the Directors' Fortnight at the 76th Festival de Cannes and nominated for the European Actress at the 36th European Film Awards.
Killing the Violet
Highlights
Just rip off the band-aid and confront the trauma of the women from East Asia. On a normal day, a stranger breaks into Sumire's apartment, which makes her peaceful life start to fall. Through delicate images and profound performances, the story explores how people face trauma in the East Asia that tends to suppress and hide true feelings.
The film is the work of a new Chinese director Zhang Yu at her graduation from Tokyo University of the Arts, with her teacher Nobuhiro Suwa in the role of the writer's father. The Lion Sleeps Tonight written and directed by Nobuhiro Suwa was screened with great acclaim at the 8th BJIFF. Killing the Violet was granted People's Choice Award for Crouching Tigers - Best Film at the 7th Pingyao Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon International Film Festival in 2023.
Ripples
Highlights
A volcanic eruption at the bottom of the sea of the mind. The new novel by Naoko Ogigami for Kamome Shokudô and Close-Knit, continues to focus on the lives of middle-aged women in East Asia with keen eyesight, presenting the seemingly calm but repressed emotions under currents.
Yoriko Sudo, played by Mariko Tsutsui, meticulously rakes her Kumansui garden into ripple shapes every day, as if it were a metaphor for the layers of ripples in her life, as every tiny thing is affecting her life and slowly overwhelming her. Her emotions are intertwined with the ongoing effects of the earthquake and nuclear pollution on the residents of the surrounding area - not just in her life, but from the unseen changes.
Till Love Do Us Part
Highlights
A scroll of emotions through the eyes of a young Chinese female director. The feature debut of young director Li Ran was shortlisted in the Competition 1-2 Award for Best Film at Warsaw International Film Festival in 2022 and nominated for the People's Choice Award of Hidden Dragons - Best Film at the 7th Pingyao Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon International Film Festival in 2023.
Li Ran once studied at the School of Law, Tsinghua University and received her master's degree from the Faculty of Law, University of Amsterdam. However, she left her original career path to study film art at the Film and TV School of Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (FAMU). The film represents a profound exploration of the emotional landscape of modern Chinese society, outlining the twists and turns of love, the challenges of life, and a woman's journey to find herself. With her unique realism, she presents us with a moving story about the female in modern society.
Like Winds, Like Weeds
Highlights
A picture of grandmother, a daughter, and a grandson living in a foreign land and a journey to set soul free. Caught between her demented mother and her rebellious son, the heroine is like a cargo ship in deep water, drifting back and forth between her hometown and the city amidst the waves of the time. The film, combining women's lives with the development of the times, portrays the living conditions of women in modern society and highlights the sadness where homesickness is hidden in the memories of hometown.
The film is Zhang Fan's feature debut, shortlisted for Golden Coconut for Best Feature Film at the 5th Hainan International Film Festival and the Best Narrative Feature at the 17th FIRST International Film Festival.
May
Highlights
Who can dance with May in the witty poetry?
May, which caused a frenzy at the Shanghai International Film Festival with the Asian New Talent Award for Best Director, is truly a "legend of love" – Chen Yumei a woman living the southern suburb of Shanghai, travels halfway across the city every day in search of a dance partner, commenting on every old man she "dates" with her sharp and spicy language.
This is a documentary in Shanghainese. The tough, free, and vigorous character Chen Yumei in the film manifests a great vitality and leaves us an impression of an aging and real life, tainted with sadness right after laughter.
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