All About Us Film Festival 2022

EVENT DESCRIPTION

Organized by Hong Kong Arts Centre, All About Us Film Festival 2022 will be held from 28 to 30 October at Hong Kong Arts Centre Louis Koo Cinema, with screenings of feature films and shorts focusing on the issues of foreign workers in Asia, and short films produced by local ethnic minority youths. As the flagship programme spearheaded by Hong Kong Arts Centre, ifva has always been keen to promote the creation of short films and moving images. In addition to the professionally renowned ifva Awards and Festival, ifva also organizes the “All About Us” creative media education programme for ethnic minority youths since 2009, with numerous short films made and produced over the years and groomed many creative talents and actors. The project evolves into the “All About Us Film Festival” since last year, as the first ethnic minority film festival in Hong Kong.

This year, All About Us Film Festival features several award-winning foreign works which focus on ethnic minorities and foreign workers in Asia. The opening film is 2022 Sundance nominated Free Chol Soo Lee, followed by two screenings of ifva Asian New Force alumni directors, including the short film selection of Berlin Film Festival Audi Short Film winner Singaporean director Chiang Wei-liang, and short films of 59th Golden Horse nominated Taiwanese director Tseng Ying-ting and Malaysian director Lau Kek-huat. Hong Kong director Brian Hung will present his documentary feature Djembe in the 13 Streets, alongside selected All About Us student creative videos. On top of cinema screenings, a series of community screenings will also be held to break down. This is a precious chance for members to speak for diversity and break down the boundaries and stereotypes of race, language, and gender.

Asian Works that Focus on Foreign Workers Local Pieces to Break Through Stereotypes
The film festival opens with the 2022 Sundance Film Festival nominated documentary Free Chol Soo Lee, which focuses on the wrong murder conviction of a Korean immigrant in 70s San Francisco and how it eventually ignited an unprecedented social movement.

The Unbearable Homecoming: Short Film Selections of Chiang Wei-liang will be screening three shorts from the Singaporean director. Known for his minimalistic cinematography and narrative structure to depict his care for humanity, the programme includes his Berlin International Film Festival Audi Short Film award-winning piece Anchorage Prohibited which expresses the pain of separation, Nyi Ma Lay that documents an attempted suicide with one single long shot, and Nothing in the Cries of Cicadas that depicts the absurdity of how the dead has to make their way for the living in a country where land supply is scarce.

Among the two screenings of Drifting Strangers: Foreign Workers in Taiwan, ifva Shorts Selection features Taiwanese director Tseng Ying-ting’s Tea Land, and Malaysian director Lau Kek-huat’s Nia’s Door, with both directors nominated for Best New Director and Best Documentary Short Film at the 59th Golden Horse Awards respectively. Both pieces focus on the daily lives and happenings of foreign workers in Taiwan. There will also be a screening of Taiwanese director Tseng Wen-chen’s The Lucky Woman, a documentary feature that presents the life of runaway migrant workers, showing how they risk their life working illegally, hoping to better support their families and change their futures. The film is an official selection in the 2022 Taiwan International Documentary Festival among other international documentary festivals.

The two screenings of Everyday Hong Kong Lives of Ethnic Minorities attempt to bridge the distance between the mass and the ethnic “minorities” by breaking various stereotypes about them. Hong Kong director Brian Hung’s documentary Djembe in the 13 Streets bridge the distance between Africa and Asia; while three short films produced by All About Us students depict the everyday episodes of people living in Hong Kong, some young souls lose track of their meanings of living, while some turn their imagination into moving images.

On top of cinema screenings, the film festival will be organising thematic community screenings with various organisations, bringing moving images and documentaries of ethnic minorities to the different corners of the city.