The Lucky Woman(2020)

The Workers Cup(en)

Inside Qatar’s labor camps, African and Asian migrant workers building the facilities of the 2022 World Cup compete in a football tournament of their own.

Island in Between(zh)

The rural Taiwanese outer islands of Kinmen sit merely 2 miles off the coast of China. Kinmen attracts tourists for its remains from the 1949 Chinese Civil War. It also marks the frontline for Taiwan in its escalating tension with China.

Personale(it)

Folding towels, straightening out sheets, taking bathrobes out of the dryer, stripping beds, cleaning up vomit. Fluffing pillows—making a dent for elegantly turned-up corners—and endless scrubbing, cleaning and clearing up messes. Behind the scenes of a hotel in the Italian Dolomites, the staff do everything they can to serve the guests and prevent complaints. The hotel has four stars, and a fifth is in sight.

My Life with the Wave(zh)

In order to pursue a life different from the past, two musicians with different backgrounds leave Taipei. One is Tz-Fan Hsu, the head of the band, The Last Wave, and the other is Thomas, the driving force behind Sheng-Xiang & Band. The two landed in Kaohsiung to start a new musical life.

Perdus entre deux rives, les Chibanis oubliés(fr)

Bitter Sweet Ballad(zh)

This is a story about youth with music. It all happens at the Dandelion School, Beijing’s first middle school specifically established for the children of migrant workers. Every year when new pupils arrive, Ms. Yuan Xiaoyan, who has worked in the school choir for eight years, would choose a group of music-loving first-years with solid musical foundations to join the choir. A new group of children join the choir while those who have advanced to the second year have to discuss with their families their future choices. For choir members, their music career in middle school will eventually stop due to the pressure of high school entrance examinations and the inevitable parting. But along this journey accompanied by music, they have been savoring the joys and sorrows of their youth, burying them deep in their hearts, and transforming them into growth-promoting nutrients.

Between Pudukkottai & Singapore(ta)

This short documentary features poet N Rengarajan, a migrant worker from Pudukkottai, India who sustains a practice of poetry as a way of life while working in the construction sector in Singapore. The film, structured around three of his poems, seeks to visually mirror the rhythm and tone of his writing. Together, verse and visuals strive to draw attention to the poet's acute illuminations of the realities of migrant life.

Border(zh)

In the middle of the strait between Kinmen and Xiamen, China, there are patches of sea filled with floating styrofoam and endless sand pilfering across the border. Huge business opportunities, and even greater land reclamations have scarred the beauty of the original rural landscapes for the sake of “ The Chinese Dream"—a dream that places economic achievements above all else.

Youth (Spring)(zh)

This film was shot between 2014 and 2019 in the town of Zhili, a district of Huzhou City in Zhejiang province, China. Zhili is home to over 18,000 privately-run workshops producing children's clothes, mostly for the domestic market, but some also for export. The workshops employ around 300,000 migrant workers, chiefly from the rural provinces of Yunnan, Guizhou, Anhui, Jiangxi, Henan and Jiangsu.

Archiving Time(zh)

In Taiwan, there is a group of people participating in this race against time. They are hidden inside the film archive of New Taipei City’s “Singapore Industrial Park”, where the 17,000-plus film reels and over a million film artifacts have become their spiritual nourishment. Day after day, they shuttle back and forth inside, carrying their doubts, their learnings, and their faith. What they are doing is awakening these long-neglected film reels, then piecing together the no-longer-existent social atmospheres and lives of distant pasts recorded on them. And spending time in this archive has become everyday life for these film archivists and restorers.

Flowers of Taipei: Taiwan New Cinema(zh)

With Taiwan remaining in the grip of martial law in 1982, a group of filmmakers from that country set out to establish a cultural identity through cinema and to share it with the world. This engaging documentary looks at the movement's legacy.

Taiwan: A Digital Democracy in China's Shadow(fr)

One Country, Two Systems? No Way! say the youth of Taiwan. But China under President Xi Jinping wants more than ever to bring the island of Taiwan back into the fold, just like Hong Kong. Can the burgeoning democracy on China’s doorstep, driven by digital technology, resist the Middle Kingdom’s advances? To China Taiwan is a breakaway province that must return to the fold. To its 24 million inhabitants it is a sovereign state with its own constitution and democratically elected leaders. Now that Hong Kong has been brought into line, Taiwan remains determined to stand up as a vibrant, young democracy. But it won't be easy. Since the Sunflower Movement in 2014 when the young came out to prevent an economic agreement with China, citizen groups have been fighting for the transparency of institutions.

Brothers of the Night(de)

Soft boys by day, kings by night. The film follows a group of young Bulgarian Roma who come to Vienna looking for freedom and a quick buck. They sell their bodies as if that's all they had. What comforts them, so far from home, is the feeling of being together. But the nights are long and unpredictable.

Our Time, Our Story(zh)

Richly illustrated with film clips and interviews, OUR TIME, OUR STORY tells the still-evolving story of the Taiwanese "new wave," from its rise in the early 1980s, as the island was democratizing after decades under martial law, through growing international recognition and domestic debate in the 1990s. Spearheaded in its early years by such filmmakers as Edward Yang, Ko I-cheng, Hou Hsiao-hsien and Wan Jen, the movement revitalized Taiwan cinema through low-budget experiments that emphasized personal stories, political reflection and stylistic invention. Said filmmakers, writers and actors like Wu Nien-jen and Sylvia Chang, even "second wave" directors Tsai Ming-liang and Lin Cheng-sheng provide fond reminiscences and retrospective insights in this compelling account of one of the most distinctive national cinemas of the last quarter-century.

Late Life: The Chien-Ming Wang Story(en)

The first and only Taiwanese player for the New York Yankees, Chien-Ming Wang held many titles: American League Wins Leader, World Series Champion, Olympian, Time 100 Most Influential, and The Pride of Taiwan. He had it all - until a 2008 injury forever altered the course of his career. Late Life: The Chien-Ming Wang Story - named after the late sinking action on his signature pitch - follows the rise and fall of the international icon as he fights his way back into the Major Leagues through endless rehab programs and lengthy stints away from home, carrying the weight of the world on his battered shoulder. A poignant and intimate account of Wang’s steadfast quest, Late Life tells the story of a man who is unwilling to give up and unable to let go.

The Art of Nôm(en)

The Art of Nom explores an ancient and nearly extinct Vietnamese script called Chu Nom and the five scholarly artists known as Zenei, Gang of Five. The beauty, heritage and emotion of the Chu Nom characters inspire Zenei’s art. The film also examines Vietnam’s culture, history, customs, and the social impact of rapid modernization in a changing world. Art of Nom follows Zenei through their research and explorations that takes them far off the beaten path. They enter hidden library chambers of Buddhist pagodas to examine original Nom scriptures and woodblocks preserved by monks through the centuries. Led by renowned artist Le Quoc Viet, Zenei is a collective of avant-garde calligraphers forging a new path, merging contemporary visual expression with a nearly extinct script. Zenei elevates art and history to a new level of experience.

Wandering Peddlers(zh)

Resulting pic blurs the line between documentary and fiction as Yanagimachi explores the lives of a couple of groups of peddlers, and they appear to act out their personal dramas for the camera.

Landscape of our Body(vi)

As queer trans and gender non-conforming children of the Vietnamese diaspora, we are fragmented at the crossroads of being displaced from not only a sense of belonging to our ancestral land, but also our own bodies which are conditioned by society to stray away from our most authentic existence. Yet these bodies of ours are the vessels we sail to embark on a lifetime voyage of return to our original selves. It is our bodies that navigate the treacherous tides of normative systems that impose themselves on our very being. And it is our bodies that act as community lighthouses for collective liberation. Ultimately, the landscape of our bodies is our blueprint to remembering, to healing, to blooming.

The Islands(zh)

This documentary film follows the journey of former student activist and current political staffer Chen Ting-hao after his decision to escape the cynical politicism of Taipei City to the political backwater of Matsu, an island group administered by Taiwan less than a dozen kilometers off the coast of China. The narrative follows Ting-hao as he reflects on how his political idealism fits in with everyday political reality and ponders Taiwan’s complex political landscape, Taiwan’s relations with a meddlesome yet surprisingly indifferent China, and the perspectives of Matsu residents on Taiwan-China affairs.

The Charcoal People(pt)

This deeply human documentary examines the subject of environmental destruction, highlighting the impoverished migrant workers who are chopping down the Amazon rainforest to create charcoal for pig iron production used primarily in the automobile industry. The film examines the children and elders and their daily lives and work as they burn timber in igloo-looking huts, their bodies charred gray for $2 a day, struggling to survive.