Last week, the organizing committee of the 81th La Biennale Di Venezia has announced the finalists for each of the category in the world-renowned festival. This year’s festival will take place from August 28th to September 7th, and its main competition will feature Youth – Homecoming by Chinese documentarian Wang Bing, following young workers in the aftermath of factory layoffs, as well as missing child mystery Stranger Eyes, by Singaporean director Siew Hua Yeo.
Furthermore, The Poison Cat, written and directed by Guan Tian, will be compete in the Orizzonti Short Films Competition, and To Kill A Mongolian Horse, directed by Jiang Xiaoxuan, has been selected for the independent Venice Days section (Giornate degli Autori). I Am The Beauty of Your Beauty, I Am The Fear of Your Fear, written and directed by Malaysia’s Chui Mui Tan, has also been chosen for Miu Miu Women’s Tales, a special Venice Days series highlighting female perspectives.
In addition, two Chinese-language projects are featured in the Venice Production Bridge, the festival’s film market. If I See a Rainbow, the debut feature from director Zhao Hao about a woman trapped in an unfulfilling marriage, and Taiwanese director Chen Kuo-Ti’s film Love Before Sunrise, focused on 1930s writer Weng Nao, will both be in search of additional funding at the Venice Gap-Financing Market.
Beyond these participating films and projects, iconic Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi will serve on the jury for the main competition, and Hong Kong film curator Jacob Wong is a member of the jury for the “Luigi De Laurentiis” Venice Award for a Debut Film.
Banner image via Venice Film Festival.
