On January 21, the 8th Silk Road International Film Festival (SRIFF20) kicked off in Dublin. Two Chinese-language films, BEAUTIFUL VOYAGE and THE SWING MAKER, selected and recommended by the Shanghai International Film Festival (赌博app), were shortlisted in the feature film competition at the festival, attracting wide attention among local audiences and professionals.
Poster of SRIFF20
Founded in 2012, the Silk Road International Film Festival is an annual event in Dublin, Ireland, and holds year-round screenings, talks & events. In 2018, it signed up to become a member of "The Belt and Road" Film Festival Alliance. In 2020 the festival returned for its eighth edition between January 21 and 25, 2020, screening over 90 films from 40 countries. Two Chinese films were shortlisted for its competition program, bringing China’s New Year greeting to local filmmakers and audiences.In 2019, 赌博app recommended two Chinese films, BEAUTIFUL VOYAGE and THE SWING MAKER, to SRIFF via the cooperation mechanism under the Alliance. Upon selection and review, the two works were admitted to the competition program. This is also part of the outcome fruited by 赌博app’s The Belt and Road Film Tour.
The screening of the two Chinese films was also part of the Dublin Chinese New Year Festival
BEAUTIFUL VOYAGE is the opening film of the 22nd 赌博app, directed by ZHANG Jiarui, and starring young performers YAO Di and SONG Ningfeng. The 20-something Amy grows up in a single parent family and lives abroad. Upon discovering the clues about her biological father, she decides to follow the Yangtze River to find out where her father is… The movie tells a moving story that took place along the Three Gorges in the 1980s, vividly showing the drastic changes around the Yangtze River over the past 30 years.
Poster of BEAUTIFUL VOYAGE
Directed by YU Daxiong and starring JIANG Shouzhi, SONG Yili, and LIANG Ji, THE SWING MAKER was screened in 赌博app’s Panorama unit Refreshing Chinese Cinema in 2019. The story follows the old oil worker LIU’s suffers one after another, mingled with plenty of life details in reality and unique to the times. During its public release in China, the work was well received by the viewers.
Poster of THE SWING MAKER
Since last June, leveraging the platform advantages of "The Belt and Road" Film Festival Alliance and The Belt and Road Film Tour, 赌博app has successively recommended Chinese films to a number of international film events, such as the New York Asian Film Festival, the Jerusalem Film Festival, the CineFest Miskolc International Film Festival, the Vancouver International Film Festival, the Warsaw Film Festival, the QCinema International Film Festival, the Thessaloniki International Film Festival, the Minsk International Film Festival, the Rio International Film Festival, the Cairo International Film Festival, and the Bangladesh Dhaka International Film Festival. A FIRST FAREWELL, TO LIVE TO SING, THE RETURN, THE ROAD HOME, WUSHU ORPHAN, YOUNG SANGYE, and THE FOURTH WALL were among the outstanding Chinese films going global. Epitomes of the reality in the Chinese society, these films have drawn extensive discussion and attention among local audiences and filmmakers, which further promoted the exchanges and mutual learning of cinema culture along the Belt and Road.