The Centre for Chinese Studies@Singapore University of Social Sciences (CCS@SUSS) and Singapore Film Society (SFS) are delighted to announce that the 10th Singapore Chinese Film Festival (SCFF) will be held from April 29 – May 8, 2022. This year’s venue partners include Golden Village, Oldham Theatre, and Shaw’s online platform KinoLounge.
The festival will feature a total of 52 films, with 45 films categorised under the three segments: Chinese Panorama (16 feature films), Documentary Vision (six documentaries) and Chinese Shorts Showcase (23 films). The other seven films are categorised under two specially curated segments: Farewell To Li Hsing, and Restored Classics (three classics). Among the 52 films, 28 feature films and 24 short films, will be screened physically at Golden Village and Oldham Theatre, including nine feature films and three short films that will also be screened online at Shaw KinoLounge.
There will also be two panel discussions and 17 post-screening Q&A sessions. The panel discussions will be held in a physical venue, with the speakers joining via digital platforms. Audiences in the cinema can interact with the filmmakers on the big screen.
SCFF 2022 opening film is a compilation of four short films. Titled Chinese Shortcuts: Where is Home? it tells stories of the protagonists’ past, present, or upcoming scattered lives – an often discussed topic in the Chinese film industry. These works have also received recognition at international film festivals and are as follows:
i) Day Is Done (China) won the 71st Berlin International Film Festival Silver Bear
Jury Prize (Short Film).
ii) Poem Of Pakistan (Hong Kong) won the 2021 Kaohsiung Film Festival Asian New
Wave Award.
iii) My Sister (Taiwan) won the 2021 Taoyuan Film Festival Taiwan Award Jury
Special Prize, and Rising Star Award.
iv) Can You Hear Me? (Taiwan) won the 27th ifva Awards Special Mention (Asian
New Force Category).
The closing film Lan Yu is a 2001 award-winning film by Hong Kong Director Stanley Kwan. It explores the universal theme of love through the relationship of two gay men in Beijing. After the screening, Director Kwan will interact with the audience virtually in the cinema.
In Chinese Panorama, catch 16 of the latest and best Chinese language films from across the world. From Hong Kong, romantic comedy Far Far Away takes the audience to remote corners of Hong Kong and explores a different side of Hong Kong by following the footsteps of the male protagonist as he chases love; Take The Bad With The Good explores the topic of sexual rights and sex education among the disabled in Hong Kong and features Hong Kong actor Wong He as the lead; May You Stay Forever Young examines the struggles behind the 2019 Anti-Extradition Law protests through a group of teenagers and social workers trying to prevent a young girl from committing suicide; and Madalena is self-directed by Macau-based female director Emily Chan.
From Taiwan, City Of Lost Things is a family-friendly animated film focusing on the issues of recycling,; Increasing Echo explores a couple’s midlife marriage crisis; Goddamned Asura is a psychological drama in which Director Lou Yi-an deftly juxtaposes life in digital gaming and reality to present the complexities and consequences of choices in today’s society; Moneyboys is a thoughtful and moody tale of a gay hustler who cannot let go of his past; Listen Before You Sing is based on a true story that tells of a choir conductor without any musical background, a music teacher, and a group of tone-deaf students working together to prevent their school from being abolished; and Echo brings us back to Lishan (Taiwan) in the 1990s with spectacular scenes of its quiet yet lyric mountains and forests. Set against this backdrop, the film depicts the lives and struggles of farmers dealing with cheap imports and high production costs.
From China, Are You Lonesome Tonight? stars Taiwanese heartthrob Eddie Peng and Sylvia Chang as the male and female leads, and tells the story of a humble
repairman whose mundane life is upended by a tragic accident; and Mama, an independent film, depicts the memory of a 12-year-old girl about her family and village during the 1990’s.
And from Malaysia, Layla Zhuqing Ji’s Victim(s) is a tale of Chinese high-school
bullying in Malaysia. Inspired by a true story, it takes the case of a teenager
on trial for the cold-blooded murder of a classmate to determine the
broader accountability for such headline-grabbing incidents.
SCFF2022 will also present three films using filmmakers as the subject in focus, namely, Striding Into the Wind, Ripples of Life, and Barbarian Invasion. There will also be a panel discussion, Tales of Filmmakers, where guest filmmakers share the charms and brilliance of such films.
Under Documentary Vision, a selection of six featured documentaries will shine the spotlight on the most talked-about topics in our times. This segment includes, from Hong Kong, Ode To Book People, which highlights the aspirations and struggles of three independent bookshops: ACO Books from Hong Kong, City Book Room from Singapore and Moontree House from Malaysia; A Life In Six Chapters focuses on famous left-wing writer Xiao Jun, who is also known as one of the great writers of Chinese modern literature.
From Taiwan comes Crossing’s End, which documents two families implicated in a murder case in 2002 and discusses the sufferings, endurance, and faith of the two parties involved in the murder case; while No Man Is An Island documents how Taiwan’s first quarantine hotel emerged from anxiety and unease during the COVID-19 pandemic and how they overcame challenges faced in the vaccination process. China’s Father will be screened alongside Singapore short film From There To Here: both have grandsons, granddaughters, and grandfathers as the focus of the films, but while Father tells the story of kinship through the director’s lens, From There to Here uses an interview format to convey her grandfather’s sense of nostalgia as an early immigrant to Singapore.
The Chinese Shorts Showcase consists of the best short films selected from major film festivals. This segment features 23 films, presented in four categories under Chinese Shortcuts (including Where is Home?) and two categories of Documentary Shorts.
The second panel discussion, Independent Chinese Cinema: Present And Future Challenges, will help raise awareness and understanding of independent Chinese cinema. 4. Farewell to Li Hsing pays tribute to eminent Director Li Hsing, who passed away in August 2021. The festival formed a special bond with the late director since his last visit in 2015. Farewell to Li Hsing remembers this legend through the screening of Keep On Walking: The Man And His Higher Course, a documentary on the man himself, and three of his restored titles.
Finally, Restored Classics showcases three classic films that were recently restored in 4K – these include Taiwanese animated film Grandma And Her Ghosts (1998), and Dust Of Angels, a film about Taiwanese gangs released in 1992. Local audiences will have the pleasure of watching the latter on the big screen after 30 years.
Singapore Chinese Film Festival 2022 Tickets, schedule and full line-up available here
Bakchormeeboy 
I remember there was a lot of hype about Lan Yu 20 years ago. How it’s the first mainstream Chinese gay movie and all that. Would be good to watch that again.
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