Wei Shujun’s Only The River Flows was presented with Best Film in the Fei Mu Awards at this year’s Pingyao International Film Festival (PYIFF, October 11-18), while Inside The Yellow Cocoon Shell, directed by Vietnam’s Pham Thien An, won Best Film in the festival’s Roberto Rossellini Awards.
The Fei Mu Awards recognise up-and-coming Chinese filmmakers selected in the festival’s Hidden Dragons section. The Roberto Rossellini Awards are presented to films in the Crouching Tigers section for emerging international filmmakers.
Both Only The River Flows and Inside The Yellow Cocoon Shell premiered at this year’s Cannes film festival, the former in Un Certain Regard and the latter in Directors Fortnight where it won the Camera d’Or.
Geng Zihan won Best Director in the Fei Mu Awards for A Song Sung Blue, which also premiered in Cannes Directors Fortnight. Luc Besson, who was in Pingyao with Dogman, one of two ‘Pingyao Surprise’ films along with Ning Hao’s The Movie Emperor, presented Geng with the award.
Best Actress in this section went to Lyu Xingchen for her performance in Liang Ming’s Carefree Days, while Zhang Yu picked up Best Actor for Hao Feihuan’s Records Without Words. The Fei Mu Jury Award went to Dance Still, co-directed by Qin Muqiu and Zhan Hanqi, while Special Mentions went to Li Binbin’s The Night Rain South Township and Li Pu’s Undoing Time.
In the Roberto Rossellini Awards, Best Director was presented to Mongolian filmmaker Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir for City Of Wind, while the Jury Award went to French director Marie Amachoukeli’s Ama Gloria. Special Mentions were awarded to Iranian filmmaker Behrooz Karamizade’s Empty Nets and Moroccan filmmaker Abdellatif Masstouri’s Hounds.
Among other juries, the Youth Jury Award went to Carefree Days, with Dance Still picking up a Special Mention. The Tong Ye Award was presented to Xu Lei’s Ask The Mountain and the Cinephilia Critics Award went to Only The River Flows.
PYIFF also presented its Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon East-West Award to veteran Chinese director-producer Huang Jianxin, with his 1986 film Dislocation screening at the festival.
The International Contribution to Chinese Cinema Award went to programmer, media consultant and publicist Norman Wang who was involved in bringing films such as Zhang Yimou’s Raise The Red Lantern and Chen Kaige’s Farewell My Concubine to international attention.
The awards were announced following the screening of closing film Fei Yu’s Football On The Roof during Pingyao Night on October 16, while the festival runs until October 18.