One of the highlights of the third MINT Chinese Film Festival is the UK premiere of An Unfinished Film by Lou Ye.
It is described as “a must-watch film of our time” and is Lou Ye’s unique take on documenting the unfolding Covid pandemic.
The film festival runs over the weekend February 21 to 23 and is an award-winning social enterprise founded by Chinese film curator Yixiang Shirley Lin and Keswick Alhambra Cinema’s co-owner Dr Carol Rennie. Lou Ye’s film will be shown on February 23.
It is the first women-organised Chinese film festival in the UK focused on cross-cultural communication of Chinese cinema and the representation of women in films, supporting creators from the Asian country, women/non-binary film-makers and artists, as well as those from other under-represented groups.
Organisers are bringing more than 30 of the best Chinese and Asian films to Keswick featuring world premieres as well as the town’s first-ever Asian arts and craft market. There will also be a series of complementary cultural activities and lakeside walks involving those attending the festival and the whole town.
The festival gets underway with a “She” themed opening gala on February 21 at the Alhambra and it will feature two highly anticipated Chinese films, accompanied by drink receptions.
The gala will begin with the exciting European premiere of Chinatown Cha-Cha, a road trip documentary about a Chinese American senior dance group, with a question and answer session with director Luka Yuanyuan Yang and a swing dance performance after the screening. Following this, there will be a retrospective screening of Green Snake (1993) by Tsui Hark, a classic Chinese fantasy film, introduced by Dr Julian Ward from The University of Edinburgh. Another retrospective selection is Alice Wu’s love comedy Saving Face (2004) on February 22 which draws on the director’s own coming-out experience. On February 23, there will be a special 25th anniversary retrospective screening of Wong Kar Wai’s In the Mood for Love (2000) at 5pm, with a drink reception at 4.30pm in collaboration with Keswick Film Club.
Tiger Stripes, a horror feature by Malaysian Chinese film-maker Amanda Nell Eua has been selected as the late-night special screening, along with specially curated short film Woman, Snake and Love’s Bite.
The full list of film selections, festival programme schedule, and ticket information can be found at unicornscreening.com and at: @mintchinesefilmfestival on Instagram. Festival passes and tickets are both on sale at the Alhambra.
There will also be a broader Asian presence at this year’s festival with the feature film competition aiming to present quality Asian cinema to UK audiences including Desert of Namibia, directed by one of Japan’s most promising young directors, Yôko Yamanaka. It intricately and vividly portrays a young woman’s revaluation of her identity in the bizarre and ever-changing modern society.
Shahid, by Iranian director Narges Kalhor, blends documentary and fictional elements with a sharp political satire, tackling themes of legacy and societal resistance. And Cu Li Never Cries, the debut feature by Vietnamese director Pham Ngoc Lan, poetically intertwines the dynamics of a woman‘s life with the historical shifts in Vietnam.
Time to be Strong, a work by South Korean director Namkoong Sun, follows the journey of former K-pop idols on Jeju Island, exploring the sacrifices and hardships hidden behind the glamorous idol world.
Meanwhile, the C-Films in Focus will bring a selection of boundary-pushing new Chinese films that rarely can be found in UK cinemas, with a continued focus on emerging Chinese women film-makers while the short film competition will showcase a diverse selection of films.
