On October 15, 2023, the jury nomination list for the 36th China Golden Rooster Awards was announced. Five films that received industry praise and audience love at the Beijing International Film Festival were selected and received multiple nominations from the jury of this year’s Golden Rooster Awards. These five films are “Back to Tibet” and “Chasing the Moon”, which were shortlisted for the “Tiantan Award” main competition unit of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival, and won five “Tiantan Award” awards at the 13th Beijing International Film Festival. The film “The Light of the White Tower” won the most notable film award in the “Focus on the Future” section of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival. The film “Space Exploration Editorial Department” was awarded the Project Venture Capital Award of the 10th Beijing International Film Festival. The film “Rattle-Dong-Dong” is one of the “Excellent Projects in Production”.
“Back to Tibet” received 6 nominations at the 36th China Golden Rooster Awards, including Best Small and Medium-Cost Feature Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Music, and Best Editing.
“Back to Tibet” premiere at the 12th Beijing International Film Festival
Slowly unfolding in detail, “Back to Tibet” paints a poetic picture of life and the vitality of Tibetan culture in the vast Tibetan area. Here, the Han young man Lao Kong (played by Song Yang) and the Tibetan compatriot Jigme (played by Jinba) have a sincere friendship and eventually become mutually trusting friends. Intentionally or unintentionally, off the screen, the director duo Chen Guoxing and Lahuajia jointly developed a new look of Tibetan films from the Sino-Tibetan perspective inherited from their personal experience, broadened the expression space of the “Tibetan New Wave”, and injected the main theme genre into Tibetan code. The precise control and touching interpretation of the characters by the two actors Song Yang and Jinba made this sincere friendship spanning time and space vividly appear on the screen. Before its debut at the Beijing International Film Festival, “Back to Tibet” rarely appeared. When it arrived on the big screen at the Beijing Film Festival from Tibet, it received applause and praise from the audience and the industry. We look forward to “Back to Tibet” starting again!
The film was shortlisted for the “Tiantan Award” main competition section of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival and screened in the “Chinese Power” section of the 13th Beijing International Film Festival.
“Back to Tibet” crew
Attending the opening red carpet of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival
“Chasing the Moon” was nominated for Best Small and Medium-Cost Feature Film and Best Actress at the 36th China Golden Rooster Awards.
Teacher He Saifei
At the premiere of “Chasing the Moon” at the 12th Beijing International Film Festival
“Chasing the Moon” directed by Qiao Liang incorporates the stage art of Yue Opera into the big screen, recalling the intertwined life of the famous Yue Opera actor Qi on and off the stage. It is among the modern films shortlisted for the “Tiantan Award” of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival. It has a unique temperament, especially Jiangnan charm. In the play, Teacher Qi’s image in the Yue Opera “Flying to the Moon” is chic and comfortable, but her life outside the stage is filled with family joys and sorrows that she is unable to face. Teacher He Saifei is a Yue Opera performing artist, and her role as Teacher Qi, a famous Yue opera actress, is the best part of the film. There is an inseparable relationship between the actor and the character Teacher Qi, and between Teacher Qi and his Shaoxing Opera character. Watching this play within a play, the play has been going on for years.
The film was shortlisted for the main competition unit of the “Tiantan Award” of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival.
“Chasing the Moon” cast
At the entrance ceremony of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival Awards Ceremony
“The Light of the White Tower” was nominated for Best Actress and Best Cinematography at the 36th China Golden Rooster Awards.
In the era of globalization, mobility is full of opportunities but also brings identity anxiety and self-hesitation. Everyone seems to be a wanderer in the city. “The Light of the White Tower” tells the story of Gu Wentong (played by Xin Baiqing), a food writer who lives alone, who accidentally meets photographer Ouyang Wenhui (played by Huang Yao) and wanders the streets and alleys of Beijing, keeping each other’s lonely souls company. Their respective painful pasts are revealed bit by bit through the space in the film. Zhang Lu’s films have always touched the pulse of drifters. The protagonists travel from here to there, looking for fragments of self-healing. This film seems to be the best partner for Beijing and the Beijing International Film Festival. It embodies the nostalgia of Beijing natives and the Beijing of foreigners. “The Light of the White Tower” is a film poem for all urban wanderers, and will be released nationwide on October 27!
“The Light of the White Tower” director Zhang Lu, actor Xin Baiqing
At the awards ceremony of the 13th Beijing International Film Festival
The film won five awards for Best Screenplay, Best Actor, Best Cinematography, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Artistic Contribution Award in the main competition section of the 13th Beijing International Film Festival’s “Tiantan Award.”
“Light of the White Tower” award-winning poster
“Universe Exploration Editorial” received 4 nominations at the 36th China Golden Rooster Awards, including Best Small and Medium-Cost Feature Film, Best Screenplay (Original), Best Director’s Debut, and Best Actor.
“Space Exploration Editorial Department” crew
In the “Focus on the Future” section of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival
“Space Exploration Editorial Department” uses a mockumentary to tell the story of Tang Zhijun (played by Yang Haoyu), a middle-aged and frustrated editor-in-chief of a science fiction magazine, who searches for extraterrestrial civilizations. In the end, he comes to the truth that has trapped him for many years. As a film with the label of “science fiction”, director Kong Dashan found a new way to present his infinite imagination of the distant universe through realistic rural visuals and fantastic sound effects. This film is extremely romantic and is an ordinary person’s reflection on the thirty-year-old universe. The persistence of the ideals of the year will eventually have an echo. However, it also depicts a cruel reality, which is the middle-aged dilemma of an untimely man. Under the double limit, it finally leads to a seemingly unsolvable philosophical proposition “Why do humans exist?” This youth film masterpiece completed its departure from the Beijing International Film Festival, and it is also the best encounter in the Beijing Film Festival’s journey of exploring and exploring more possibilities in film.
The awards ceremony for the “Focus on the Future” section of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival
The film won the Most Watched Film Award and the Most Watched Actor Award in the “Focus on the Future” section of the 12th Beijing International Film Festival, and was screened in the “Chinese Power” section of the 13th Beijing International Film Festival.
“Rattle” received 5 nominations at the 36th China Golden Rooster Awards, including Best Children’s Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Cinematography, and Best Editing.
Bai Zhiqiang, director of “Rattle, Dong, Dong”
At the 10th Beijing International Film Festival project venture capital site
When the rattle is shaken, it may be the childhood happiness of the southern children, but it is also the happiness of a left-behind child named Maodou and Gou Ren (played by Hui Wangjun), a middle-aged truck driver who has never met on the yellow land of northern Shaanxi. The most touching “father-son love” between them. “Rattle” is director Bai Zhiqiang’s first challenge to a feature film. Previously, he has been using his works to record China’s rural scenery and ordinary people living on this land. “That kind of fatal reality is the biggest highlight of the movie,” Bai Zhiqiang once said to himself. Natural light, long lenses, non-professional actors, and rural scenes in northern Shaanxi constitute the “plain” appearance of the film, while the concern and carefree companionship for ordinary people in rural China are the film’s inner emotions. The sincere heart of the film will eventually arrive People’s hearts are the softest.
The film was awarded the “Excellent Project in Production” by Project Venture Capital of the 10th Beijing International Film Festival.
The Tenth Beijing International Film Festival Project Venture Capital
“Back to Tibet” is adapted from real people. During the filming, half of the scenes were filmed at an average altitude of 5,000 meters. The poetic life scenes in the vast Tibetan area vividly appeared on the screen. “Chasing the Moon” especially shows the charm of Jiangnan. The stage art of Yue Opera blends with light and shadow to stage the drama of life. “The Light of the White Tower” will be released nationwide on October 27. It won multiple “Tiantan Awards” at the 13th Beijing International Film Festival and was shortlisted for multiple overseas film festivals. “Space Exploration Editorial” won the “Most Watched Film” and “Best Actor” at the 12th Beijing International Film Festival, and it was hard to get a ticket when it was screened at the 12th Beijing International Film Festival. “Rattle” is director Bai Zhiqiang’s first challenge to a feature film. It truly sheds tears. “Goodness” and “beauty” flow in the touching plot and the land of northern Shaanxi. It is called the Chinese version of “Summer of Kikujiro” by the audience. We look forward to five outstanding films winning at this year’s China Film Golden Rooster Awards! Excellent works must have echoes, and treasures will always shine! I hope that more films will be able to meet the Beijing International Film Festival and the big screen in the future, starting from the Beijing Film Festival!
