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    China’s Pingyao Film Festival Announces Full Line-Up; Opening Film ‘A River Without Tears’ & ‘Yellow Earth’ Restoration

    By Liz Shackleton,

    2024-09-07
    https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=4Nvq7h_0vNzbTzc00

    Pingyao International Film Festival (PYIFF) has announced the line-up for its eighth edition, including its Crouching Tigers and Hidden Dragons sections, and opening film A River Without Tears.

    The festival also announced that it is screening a restored version of Chen Kaige’s award-winning Yellow Earth , to mark the 40th anniversary of the film, one of the first major titles of China’s Fifth Generation movement, which won a Silver Leopard at Locarno as well as best cinematography for Zhang Yimou at Nantes Three Continents Film Festival.

    Opening film A River Without Tears , the second feature of female director Liu Juan, is the story of a father who insists on finding out the truth of his daughter’s suicide. Executive produced by Chinese auteur and Pingyao festival founder Jia Zhangke, the film will also screen as one of 12 titles in the festival’s Hidden Dragons section for emerging Chinese filmmakers (see full list below).

    Meanwhile, the Crouching Tigers competition for emerging international filmmakers includes the China, Asia and international premieres of several films that have been making waves on the international festival circuit – including Matthew Rankin’s Universal Languag e, which is Canada’s submission for the Best International Feature category of the Oscars, Magnus Von Horn’s The Girl With The Needl e, Astrid Rondero and Fernanda Valadez’ Sujo , and Neo Sora’s Happyend (see full list below).

    Seven films are receiving Gala screenings at the festival including Patricia Mazuy’s Visiting Hours , Roberto Minervini’s The Damned , Hiroshi Okuyama’s My Sunshine and Hong Kong filmmaker Yon Fan’s Crossing Years . Other sections include Made-in-Shanxi for films from the province where the Pingyao festival is held, and a special presentation of He Jianjun’s Huang Denglin .

    Chen’s Yellow Earth will screen in a Retrospective section of classic films entitled “Earth” which will also screen restored versions of Auguste Francois’ Images De Chine , Satyajit Ray’s Pather Panchali and Gaston Melies’ The Ruins Of Angkor , among other classic titles.

    Pingyao is taking place in a new time slot this year – moving from its usual October timing to run ahead of the Busan film festival. Marco Mueller, who co-founded the festival with Jia, quit last year and is currently artistic director of Taormina Film Festival in Sicily, Italy.

    The festival announced earlier this year that Lin Xudong has been officially appointed as artistic director, overseeing a programming team that includes Naoki Kamiya and Junko Fukatsu for foreign-language films, Wu Jueren for Chinese language films, and Song Jia for shorts. Pingyao has also launched a film fund, Wings International, to support five non-Chinese film projects each year.

    Pingyao International Film Festival 2024:

    HIDDEN DRAGONS:

    Hello, Spring (China) [Debut]
    Dir: Ma Lanhua
    Asian Premiere

    Village Music (China)
    Dir: Wang Lina
    World Premiere

    A Song River (China) [Documentary]
    Dir: Zhu Xin
    World Premiere

    Karst (China) [Debut]
    Dir: Yang Suiyi
    World Premiere

    Chinatown Cha-Cha (China) [Documentary, Debut]
    Dir: Luka Yuanyuan Yang
    World Premiere

    Floating Clouds Obscure The Sun (China) [Debut]
    Dir: Shen Tao
    World Premiere

    A River Without Tears (China)
    Dir: Liu Juan
    World Premiere

    True Love, For Once In My Life (Hong Kong, China) [Debut]
    Dir: Siu Koon Ho
    World Premiere

    Reflections In The Lake (China)
    Dir: Zhai Yixiang
    World Premiere

    Betwixt And Between (China) [Debut]
    Dir: Zhou Quan
    World Premiere

    Stars And The Moon (China)
    Dir: Tang Yongkang
    Asian Premiere

    Green Wave (China)
    Dir:  Xu Lei
    World Premiere

    CROUCHING TIGERS:

    Savanna And The Mountain (Portugal, Uruguay)
    Dir: Paulo Carneiro
    Asian Premiere

    Universal Language (Canada)
    Dir: Matthew Rankin
    Asian Premiere

    Good One (US) [Debut]
    Dir: India Donaldson
    China Premiere

    Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed (Argentina, Spain, Portugal)
    Dir: Hernán Rosselli
    Asian Premiere

    Christmas Eve In Miller’s Point (US)
    Dir: Tyler Taormina
    China Premiere

    The Girl With The Needle (Denmark)
    Dir: Magnus Von Horn
    China Premiere

    Sujo (US, Mexico, France)
    Dirs: Astrid Rondero, Fernanda Valadez
    China Mainland Premiere

    The Story Of Souleymane (France)
    Dir: Boris Lojkine
    Asian Premiere

    I Saw Three Black Lights (Colombia, Mexico, France, Germany) [Debut]
    Dir: Santiago Lozano Álvarez
    Asian Premiere

    My Summer With Irène (Italy, France)
    Dir: Carlo Sironi
    International Premiere

    The Sparrow In The Chimney (Switzerland)
    Dir: Ramon Zürcher
    China Premiere

    Happyend (Japan, US)
    Dir: Neo Sora
    Asian Premiere

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