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Berlin NewGen Chinese Film Festival
SPEAK UP
Berlin NewGen Chinese Film Festival was launched by a group of young filmmakers and amateurs based in Europe, which aimed to find a new generation of filmmakers who could present the future of Chinese films and encourage the ambitious creation which emerged Sino-culture and society. New Gens focuses on youngsters who are struggling to survive in the metropolises or are trapped in a small town. The social patterns and the living conditions of people are the focal points of the lens of young filmmakers, regardless of region, gender, age, race and cultural background.
Speak Up is the theme of the first edition of NewGen, expressing the vision that “every voice deserves to be heard”. Nearly 200 short films were submitted over two months, and a jury consisting of seven filmmakers and artists finally selected six winners.
In winter 2022, NewGen officially joined ACCE as one of the major members as well as an essential part of the future programmes for young filmmakers, which aims to help them build up more high-quality projects.
Jury Members
CRISTIANO BORTONE
Chairman of The Jury
Producer, director, film activist. Representative works: Rosso Come il. Cielo(2006), Maria, Him Schmeckt’s Nicht. (2009). Co-founder and managing director of the association of producer Bridging the Dragon.
黄茂昌
PATRICK MAO HUANG
Film producer and distributor, representative works: The Road to Mandalay,The Name Engraved in Your Heart, The First Parting, Suburban Birds, etc.
SIRKKA MÖLLER
As a festival selector, she has selected films for festivals such as the Sheffield International Documentary Festival and is a member of the selection committee for the Panorama section of the Berlinale.
GERHARD DRESSEL
As a theatre director, actor and playwright, his work in collaboration with Nanjing University on Faust 3 (2012) has been successfully performed in many countries around the world.
相梓
LISA ZI XIANG
Film director and screenwriter, whose debut feature film A Dog Barking at The Moon was selected for the Panorama section of the Berlinale 2019 and won the Teddy Bear Jury Prize.
范坡坡 POPO FAN
POPO FAN
As a queer director, author and activist, he participated in the Berlinale Berlin Talents in 2017 and is a member of the jury of the Teddy Bear Award at the Berlinale in 2019.
黄悦
YUE HUANG
As the curator of CineCina New York Chinese Film Festival, he set up Fangtan Culture in 2019 and invested in producing films, including A New Old Play.
Award-winning films
Best Short Film
Hair Tie, Egg, Homework Books
Director: Runxiao Luo
Comment from the Judge：
School and family scenes are dull and repetitive, and the events that make up the plot are common. However, with sophisticated techniques and explicitscenes, Luo Yunxiao builds up the daily life of a young girl into a heart-stopping journey of growing up. Headtie, Egg, Homework Books exemplifies what a great short film should look like. Particularly commendable are the actors’ performance and the composition and precise movement of the cinematography,and the impressive long shots and lighting at the end.
——Producer Patrick Mao HUANG
Best Screenplay
Normal
Directer: Xingyu Ye
Comment from the Judge：
This bold, smart, vivid and insightful mockumentary has a well-constructed narrative structure with humorous dialogues and appropriate turning points, and more importantly, the satirical and contemporary value of the story. The political metaphors behind the film are seemingly simple but worth a deep analysis.
——Directer Popo FAN
Best Artistic Contribution
When You Look at me
Directer: Shuli Huang
Comment from the Judge：
The image, full of innate genius, with the intricate off-screen sound design and such appropriate editing, creates an interesting sense of dislocation between sound and picture to accurately convey the creator’s intentions. —— Director,Popo FAN
New Perspective
Shanghai Reset
Directer：Qiao Hu
Comment from The Judge:
Using an accurate and discreet visual language, Shanghai Reset works well in evoking an anti-utopian reality of the pandemic… With the proper references to Blade Runner 2049, the film manages to present an innovative texture of film in five minutes.
——Sirkka Möller, Selector of Panorama section, Berlinale
What Can I Hold You With
Director：Di Shen
Comment from The Judge:
We may not be able to embrace each other, but I have bought a globe on which I can see my daughter, my nephew, my homeland and you. This short film leads us with grace and tenderness into the heart of an Afghan businessman. Love is the only thing we can rely on in this post-epidemic world when we feel lost. The story naturally happens with many coincidental moments which effectively prove the ability of the mise en scène of a director.
—— Director Lisa Zi XIANG
Jury Prize
The Elusive Joy of Labor
Director：Miao Yu
comment from The Judge:
By capturing outstretched palms, stiff body languages and peculiar expression, the film exposes an invisible but violent system of labor. It silently debunks the deception that “labour brings freedom”and makes all those trapped in this system smile helplessly. / and makes all those who are trapped in this system to laugh of complicity though bitterness.
—— Yue HUANG, curator of CineCina
NewGen Moments
Photograph albums
Moviemento Kino, Kottbusser Damm 22, Berlin-Kreuzberg
🕖 The 3th – 6th November, 2022
© SUN Haoyang
This year's NewGen Berlin Chinese Youth Film Festival invites audiences to "Speak up", offering them a diverse and heterogeneous range of possibilities to perceive, re-identify and reflect on the various realities of the Sino-world and Sino-cinema. NewGen believes that the zone exists where the wordless communication between the cinema and the individuals could still happen with the interpenetration and expansion of each other, which plays an irreplaceable role in shaping individual and collective spirit and for the rethinking and reconstruction of society.
—— NewGen Team
