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The Hong Kong Film Gala Presentation is organised by the Asian Film Awards Academy (Afaa), in collaboration with the Singapore Film Society (Sfs), with financial support from the Cultural and Creative Industries Development Agency (Ccidahk), Film Development Fund (Fdf) and Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (Hketo) in Singapore.This programme showcases Hong Kong films across various regions in Asia, allowing audiences to explore the new generation of Hong Kong cinema and emerging talents. It also builds strong connections between Hong Kong filmmakers and the Asian film industry, promoting ongoing growth in the sector.

After successful screenings in Cambodia, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, and Dubai, the Hong Kong Film Gala Presentation will hold its grand finale in Singapore from November 20 to 24 at Gv Suntec City. The programme will showcase eight Hong Kong films, kicking off the Singapore premiere of The Last Dance, starring comedy legends Michael Hui and Dayo Wong. Anselm Chan,...

The film is out of the running due to a “conflict of interest” among the selection committee.

The producer of Hong Kong film A Light Never Goes Out has spoken out following the disqualification of the feature from the 2024 Oscars race.

The drama was submitted by the Federation of Motion Film Producers of Hong Kong for the international feature film category of the 96th Academy Awards in September. But when the Academy revealed the list of eligible titles last Thursday, A Light Never Goes Out was not included and the Federation is trying to figure out why.

Despite the outcome,...

Update — 6:34 am Pst: Crucindo Hung, chairman of the Federation Of Motion Film Producers of Hong Kong, has told local press that Hong Kong’s Oscars submission, A Light Never Goes Out, was disqualified due to a conflict of interest.

Hung said he had changed the 13 members of the selection committee earlier this year after receiving a notice from AMPAS that members couldn’t vote if they’d been on the Federation’s board for more than six years. However, one of the new committee members is also an actor in the selected film. Detecting a conflict of interest, AMPAS asked Hong Kong to submit another film, but the invitation was declined.

Kyrgyzstan also declined an invitation to submit another film this year when the country’s Oscars submission, Aktan Arym Kubat’s This Is What I Remember, was disqualified because it was released before the required window of December 1, 2022 to October 31, 2023. However,...

Every year since its creation in 1956, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) invites the film industries of various countries to submit their best film for the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film. The category was previously called the Best Foreign Language Film, but this was changed in April 2019 to Best International Feature Film, after the Academy deemed the word “Foreign” to be outdated.

The award is presented annually by the Academy to a feature-length motion picture produced outside the United States that contains primarily non-English dialogue. For the 96th Academy Awards, the submitted motion pictures must be first released theatrically in their respective countries between December 1, 2022, and October 31, 2023. The deadline for submissions to the Academy was October 2, 2023, and 92 countries submitted a film. The 15-film shortlist will be announced on December 21, 2023, followed by the official nominations on January 23, 2024.

Here are this edition's Asian Submissions for Best International Feature Film.

Screen is profiling every submission for best international feature at the 96th Academy Awards.

The 88 submissions for the best international feature award at the 2023 Oscars have been announced, and Screen has profiled all the entries below.

A shortlist of 15 finalists is set to be announced on December 21 with the final five nominees announced on January 24, 2024 The 95th Academy Awards will take place on March 10, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

The 88 submissions are down from last year when 92 films were in contentions. Four countries submitted this year but have not appeared on the final list - Cuba with Fernando Perez...

Anastasia Tsang studied in Paris at the Sorbonne University. Her cinema journey began with a short film “Marriage Sans Frontières,” presented at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. In 2018, she co-directed the TV series “Till Death Do Us Part.” “A Light Never Goes Out,” a movie revoking the Hong Kong neon signs nostalgia, but also dealing with loss and moving on, is her debut feature. On the occasion of screening at Five Flavours Film Festival, we recall our neon-related memories, discover the secrets of craftsmen and their craft, as well as the cultural significance of neons. We also wonder about the importance of bonding between generations, and the loneliness of post-covid times.

A Light Never Goes Out is screening at Five Flavours

Characters from your movie have beautiful and intimate memories connected with neon signs. So I am curious, do you have your special neon-related memory?

It's hilarious, but I've had a...

Left alone after the sudden passing of her husband Bill (Simon Yam), Mei Heung (Sylvia Chang) fights insomnia by spending night after night feeding coins into the slot machines in an arcade game hall. She is one of the few customers in this large, neon lit room that had long lost its prime. This specific atmosphere draws parallels with the film's story that centers around the slowly dying neon sign artcraft of Hong Kong.

A Light Never Goes Out is screening at Five Flavours

Neon lights have seldom been used as the backdrop of heart-warming dramas about love, solitude and longing, and more as the atmosphere-building coulisses for pulse-racing thrillers with dramatic outcomes. Anastasia Tsang takes the original approach in her drama “A Light Never Goes Out”, and makes the maximum out of Hong Kong's intensely colorful lights to create a dream-like world in which one woman finds her comfort and motivation to continue living.

Exclusive: Los Angeles-based distributor Orchid Tree Media has acquired North American rights to Anastasia Tsang’s A Light Never Goes Out, which is Hong Kong’s submission for Best International Feature at the Oscars. A theatrical release is being lined up in select cinemas.

Starring Sylvia Chang, who won best actress at Taiwan’s prestigious Golden Horse Awards for the role, the film revolves around one woman’s plight to save her deceased husband’s legacy in making neon signs, which once defined the cityscape of Hong Kong.

Here is a trailer for the film, which also stars Cecilia Choi, Henick Chou and Simon Yam.

The film will open on November 10 in New York and Los Angeles, followed by a platform release. The initial opening will focus on Chinese language-skewing sites such as Flushing (Regal Tangram) and Monterey Park (AMC Atlantic Times Square).

It will also play in competition at...

t is always a great joy to host the artists who are behind the making of the films that are in the festival line-up. It's an opportunity to confront the feelings and emotions and to deepen the contexts of what's happening on the screen. This year Five Flavours will be visited by artists from Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Indonesia. Come and meet them!

The Guests of the 17. Five Flavours Chihiro Ito

Director, novelist, screenwriter, playwright, and set designer. Before directing her feature debut “In Her Room” in 2022, she worked as a script writer. “In Her Room” (screened at the prestigious Film Lincoln Center in New York City) is an adaptation of Ito's book. In her work, Ito explores the relationships between people and the environment, the material and the non-material.

More about Side by Side

More about “in her room”

Makbul Mubarak

Makbul Mubarak started as a film critic.

Screen is profiling every submission for best international feature at the 96th Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2024 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

The 96th Academy Awards is set to take place on March 10, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (over 40 minutes) produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50%) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between December 1, 2022, and October 31, 2023. The deadline...

Screen is profiling every submission for best international feature at the 96th Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2024 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

The 96th Academy Awards is set to take place on March 10, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (over 40 minutes) produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50%) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between December 1, 2022, and October 31, 2023. The deadline...

Screen is profiling every submission for best international feature at the 96th Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2024 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

The 96th Academy Awards is set to take place on March 10, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (over 40 minutes) produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50%) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between December 1, 2022, and October 31, 2023. The deadline...

Screen is profiling every submission for best international feature at the 96th Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2024 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

The 96th Academy Awards is set to take place on March 10, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (over 40 minutes) produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50%) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between December 1, 2022, and October 31, 2023. The deadline...

Hong Kong cinema is associated with action films which most often bring to mind male protagonists. Most undeservedly so since, thanks to the characteristics of Hong Kong martial arts films, women have been successfully surmounting their male counterparts with training, agility, and wits in them for many decades. The masters, such as King Hu and Tsui Hark, were well-aware of it. They were among the ones who discovered outstanding artists whose roles were ahead of their times and set out new directions for the development of popular cinema.

Hong Kong is not just about action cinema, but also brilliant comedies and dramas, and sharp tales with social overtones, in which fascinating, complex female characters are also present. The Hong Kong Heroines section brings back strong heroines and the great roles of stars, including Cheng Pei-pei, Sylvia Chang, Cherry Ngan, and Maggie Cheung. The section presents Hong Kong cinema from the...

Nyaff unveils first wave of features from China, Hong Kong, Japan and beyond.

The New York Asian Film Festival (Nyaff) has unveiled the first wave of features for its 22nd edition and announced that Japanese actor Ryohei Suzuki will receive the Screen International Rising Star award.

Nyaff will run from July 14-30 at the city’s Film at Lincoln Center, with a programme of more than 60 titles, and Suzuki will be presented with the award recognising emerging talent from East Asia on July 15.

Suzuki has been acting on screen for more than 15 years, with a string of roles in Japanese...

MIFFest to open with the world premiere of ‘Eraser’.

Acclaimed Hong Kong filmmaker Johnnie To has been named jury president of the 6th Malaysia International Film Festival (MIFFest), which will also honour Taiwanese actress Sylvia Chang with a lifetime achievement award.

To will chair the festival’s competition jury, which also includes Vietnamese actress Truong Ngoc Anh, Japanese filmmaker Ryuichi Hiroki, Malaysian star Zizan Razak and Singaporean director Eric Khoo. To is a leading director of films such as Breaking News, Election, Exiled, Mad Detective and Drug War, and sat on the Berlinale international competition jury earlier this year.

MIFFest...

MIFFest to open with the world premiere of ‘Eraser’.

Acclaimed Hong Kong filmmaker Johnnie To has been named jury president of the 6th Malaysia International Film Festival (MIFFest), which will also honour Taiwanese actress Sylvia Chang with a lifetime achievement award.

To will chair the festival’s competition jury, which also includes Vietnamese actress Truong Ngoc Anh, Japanese filmmaker Ryuichi Hiroki, Malaysian star Zizan Razak and Singaporean director Eric Khoo. To is a leading director of films such as Breaking News, Election, Exiled, Mad Detective and Drug War, and sat on the Berlinale international competition jury earlier this year.

MIFFest...

Sony looks for ‘Love Again’, with Celine Dion’s first on-screen role.

Universal comedy sequel Book Club: The Next Chapter leads the openers at this weekend’s UK-Ireland box office, starting its story in 612 cinemas.

Directed by Bill Holderman and written by Holderman and Erin Simms, the film follows four best friends who take their book club to Italy for the girls trip they never had.

It is a sequel to 2018’s Book Club, also directed by Holderman, which Paramount released and which opened to £721,512 in 519 cinemas at a £1,390 average. The film finished on a £4.2m cume; The Next Chapter...

The widow of a sign-making craftsman vows to finish his last work in Anastasia Tsang’s drama, a fascinating idea, if conventionally executed

Hong Kong’s colourful neon signs were once a glittering symbol of the city’s vibrancy; now they are rapidly disappearing, replaced with cheaper options like LED lights. Vanishing alongside these jewels of the night are their creators, passionate artisans whose metier is now obsolete. Steeped in this atmosphere of nostalgia and loss, Anastasia Tsang’s feature debut is a heartfelt love letter to these forgotten craftsmen as well as a bygone Hong Kong whose light continues to linger amid socio-political change.

Grappling with generational differences, Tsang negotiates a well-intentioned but conventional plot that trades in familiar archetypes. Mei-hsiang (Sylvia Chang), the grieving widow of a master neon maker, clings on to his workshop, a sentimental attachment that stands in stark contrast to her level-headed daughter Prism...

Left alone after the sudden passing of her husband Bill (Simon Yam), Mei Heung (Sylvia Chang) fights insomnia by spending night after night feeding coins into the slot machines in an arcade game hall. She is one of the few customers in this large, neon lit room that had long lost its prime. This specific atmosphere draws parallels with the film's story that centers around the slowly dying neon sign artcraft of Hong Kong.

“A Light Never Goes Out” is screening at Udine Far East Film Festival

Neon lights have seldom been used as the backdrop of heart-warming dramas about love, solitude and longing, and more as the atmosphere-building coulisses for pulse-racing thrillers with dramatic outcomes. Anastasia Tsang takes the original approach in her drama “A Light Never Goes Out”, and makes the maximum out of Hong Kong's intensely colorful lights to create a dream-like world in which one woman...

Devastated by the loss of her skilled neon sign-making husband, a wife decides to carry on his unfinished dream of making neon signs. Simon Yam and Sylvia Chang star in this remarkable Hong Kong film. (Source: Tokyo International Film Festival 2022)

Check the review of the film

Film Review: A Light Never Goes Out (2022) by Anastasia Tsang

Directed by Anastasia Tsang, A Light Never Goes Out received its World Premiere at the Tokyo International Film Festival in 2022. It will be released in Hong Kong on April 13, 2023.

Left alone after the sudden passing of her husband Bill (Simon Yam), Mei Heung (Sylvia Chang) fights insomnia by spending night after night feeding coins into the slot machines in an arcade game hall. She is one of the few customers in this large, neon lit room that had long lost its prime. This specific atmosphere draws parallels with the film’s story that centers around the slowly dying neon sign artcraft of Hong Kong.

A Light Never Goes Out is screening at International Film Festival Rotterdam

Neon lights have seldom been used as the backdrop of heart-warming dramas about love, solitude and longing, and more as the atmosphere-building coulisses for pulse-racing thrillers with dramatic outcomes. Anastasia Tsang takes the original approach in her drama “A Light Never Goes Out”, and makes the maximum out of Hong Kong’s intensely colorful lights to create a dream-like world in...

The wait is over: Intl. Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR), set to kick off on Jan. 25, is returning for its first full on-site edition in three years.

“We are finally able to present the reshaped program as it was intended: in cinemas across Rotterdam. We find it incredibly encouraging to see that the number of accredited guests is similar to pre-covid editions,” says festival director Vanja Kaludjercic.

Alongside IFFR’s Tiger competition strand, which celebrates innovative and adventurous up-and-coming filmmakers, there are retrospectives of Judit Elek, Stanya Kahn, Arc and Japanese animator Yuasa Masaaki, as well as “Sunshine State,” Steve McQueen’s much-anticipated artwork, originally commissioned for the festival’s 50th anniversary back in 2021.

“It’s great to see that this extra time has allowed it to evolve into what it is today: a monumental two-channel video projection that will surely move all those who witness it,” she adds. “With this commission,...

Hong Kong’s government is introducing two new funding schemes under the Hong Kong Film Development Council (Hkfdc) aimed at boosting co-productions with other Asian countries and to support the production of streaming content in Hong Kong.

The ‘Hong Kong-Asian Film Collaboration Funding Scheme’ will hand out grants of up to HK9M (US1.15M) to a maximum of eight films that are co-produced by Hong Kong filmmakers and their counterparts in Asian countries. Applicants will be able to seek other investors in cases where the production budget exceeds the grant.

The ‘Content Development Scheme for Streaming Platforms’ will be conducted through a competition to select eight production teams to develop series for streaming platforms. Together with a script development fee, each winning team will be awarded a total of up to HK5.7M and will be free to strike deals with streamers or other parties for additional investment.

Click here to read the full article.

In a welcome return to normalcy, the Tokyo International Film Festival rolled out the full red carpet, all 541 feet of it, for the first time since 2019, once again welcoming guests from around the globe to a new venue for its opening ceremony on a brisk autumn evening in the Japanese capital.

The Covid-19 pandemic had kept international visitors away for the last few editions, but the opening of the 35th Tokyo festival felt like old times. More than one hundred overseas guests are joining the proceedings this year — some paying their own way to Tokyo as sky-high airline ticket prices drained the event’s budget — up from just eight at the 2021 edition.

The red carpet, which clocked in at almost two hours, snaked its way from Toho’s famed Godzilla statue in front of Hibiya Midtown to the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater. Once a fixture of Roppongi,...

Iranian action drama “World War III,” which won two awards at the recent Venice festival, will feature among the main competition titles at next month’s Tokyo International Film Festival.

The festival will operate as an in-person event with foreign filmmakers, media and other guests in attendance from Oct. 24-Nov. 2, 2022.

“World War III” is joined in the competition section by the world premiere of Milcho Manchevski’s “Kaymak,” Spanish director Carlos Vermut’s “Manticore” and Roberta Torre’s “The Fabulous Ones,” Michale Boganim’s “Tel Aviv Beirut,” and Youssef Chebbi’s debut film “Ashkal.”

The 15-strong competition also includes two Japanese films Imaizumi Rikiya’s “By The Window” and Matsunaga Daishi’s “Egoist” and two Japanese co-productions, Fukunaga Takeshi’s “Mountain Woman,” and Kyrgyzstan director Aktan Arym Kubat’s “This Is What I Remember.”

Winners from the competition section will be chosen by a jury headed by Julie Taymor, along with Joao Pedro Rodrigues,...

“Her Lullaby” from Hong Kong and “The Catch” from India were the winners of the top fiction prizes at the 2021 edition of the Hong Kong-Asia Film Financing Forum.

A total of 17 cash and in-kind prizes worth a combined Hk$1,200,000 were awarded at the conclusion of the three day project market, which was operated in parallel with the FilMart rights market.

Haf returned to its regular March slot after the 2020 edition was first delayed until August, and then went wholly online. The 2021 round showcased a total of 48 projects, including 20 works-in-progress.

Organizers report that 2021 edition attracted 7% more registered participants than the first virtual edition last year, and an substantial 80% increase in the number of online meetings arranged between producers and industry professionals.

“Learning from last year’s experience, our team has worked hard to come up with a more efficient and user-friendly online platform, and I am encouraged to see the market’s enthusiastic response,...

Line-up includes 10 docs and 11 fiction films, mostly from Asia, with several European productions and co-productions.

New works from filmmakers including Chang Tso-chi, Huang Ji, Pierre Sarraf, Tan Chui Mui and Jessey Tsang are among the 21 projects selected for the Work-in-Progress section (Wip) of this year’s Hong Kong Asia Film Financing Forum (Haf).

The Wip projects will be presented online alongside the main programme of Haf (March 15-17) and Hong Kong Filmart (March 15-18). Most are at the post-production stage, with several currently in production. The line-up includes 10 documentaries and 11 fiction films, mostly from Asia, with several European productions and co-productions.