The Virtual Greenhouse: Zoom in, Zoom out Zoom in, Zoom out is perhaps the recent Sinophone film that most unreservedly embraces pure fiction. Within its visual frame, the image undergoes a total invasion—the game, a new phenomenon and a new world, directly imparts an uncanny temperament to the image's otherwise stable narrative form. As a rare Chinese independent feature echoing the avant-garde "machinima" wave sweeping foreign film cultures, it confronts cinephiles with an

Arrested Memory: When plans collapse, absurdity becomes the only answer Arrested Memory is an absurd crime action film. It weaves together amnesia, trauma and coincidence to build a manhunt that seems out of control yet ultimately coherent. The lead character Lee, played by Ethan Juan, is a legendary detective who once dominated the police force. During an operation, he suffered trauma after his partner was killed. After developing Alzheimer’s disease, he gradually lost full

Film Review: Sabar Bonda — What May Bloom Within Ten Days After his father’s death, Anand has to return to his village for ten days. It is the rule. He cannot wear shoes, cut his hair or shave, and he must not go back to the city. He has to receive greetings, hugs and tears from every relative, along with the question that will come sooner or later: Isn’t it time you found a partner? Anand works at a call centre in the city. In his thirties, he is unmarried and has no plan to

Lightness and Solidity: On Kiyoshi Kurosawa We constantly encounter the weightless in Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s cinema: newspapers fluttering across the living room at the opening of Tokyo Sonata; Jun Fubuki standing alone against a wall, brushed by a breeze, at the beginning of Seance; the philosophical zombies coated in smooth silver paint inhabiting a realm of consciousness in Real; or the spectral media ghosts suspended in midair, inching toward the living, in Pulse. Conversely,

Cold War 1994 | This is not a police and gangster film, but a game of power The Poster of Cold War To be honest, judging solely from its promotional materials, Cold War 1994 can easily be mistaken for a conventional Hong Kong police and gangster film. I went into it wondering whether Hong Kong could still deliver innovative crime thriller works, only to find that what Cold War 1994 truly explores goes far beyond the simple premise of police arresting criminals—it delves deep

Improvisation - Meticulousness - About Nobuhiro Suwa *Exclusive Interview with a Film Star As a figure within the broadly defined "Rikkyo New Wave"—a movement originating at Rikkyo University in Japan in the early 1970s, which gained formal recognition and critical attention in Japan’s film industry throughout the 1980s and 1990s—Nobuhiro Suwa has long stood out as a distinctive auteur who has rarely received in-depth critical scrutiny. Unlike Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Shinji Aoyama

Rifts in Perception: Hirokazu Kore-eda’s The Sheep in the Box Today, we find ourselves in an era where discussing AI has become an absolute necessity. But why must we? Whether driven by an instrumental rationality aiming to maximize the potential of this novel technology within the high-speed machinery of modern society, or by an existential threat that demands protective measures to declare our sovereignty over life as artificial intelligence increasingly encroaches upon eve

Pride in Ordinary Times Beyond Trauma: Five Contemporary Chinese Queer Shorts For much of its history, queer Chinese-language cinema has often been understood through narratives of marginalisation, secrecy, and survival. From censorship and social stigma to familial pressure and legal precarity, queer lives have frequently appeared on screen through the lens of struggle. While these histories remain important, they are not the only stories that deserve to be told. Pride in Or

Modern Masturbation Allegory (2024) Director: Li Xinyi Duration: 24 min Language: English, Mandarin Subtitles: English Country/Region: United Kingdom With a bold and experimental visual language, Modern Masturbation Allegory turns its gaze directly towards the body itself. Combining personal footage, interviews, diary filmmaking, and experimental montage, it transforms masturbation—a topic long considered taboo—into an exploration of desire, loneliness, pleasure, and self-und

Christian (2024) Poster Director: Pan Chuqiao Duration: 11 min Language: Mandarin Subtitles: Chinese, English Country/Region: United Kingdom Through the perspective of a young Asian man living in London, Christian explores the complex intersections of sexuality, faith, race, and migration. Religion has long been framed as an opposing force within queer narratives. Rather than reproducing this binary, however, the film presents a nuanced portrait of an individual continually n

New Beijing, New Marriage (2009) Director: Popo Fan Duration: 18 min Language: Mandarin Chinese Subtitles: English Country/Region: Mainland China Filmed on Valentine’s Day in 2009, New Beijing, New Marriage follows two same-sex couples in Beijing as they prepare for their weddings and bring their celebrations into public space. Faced with curiosity, scrutiny, scepticism, and misunderstanding from passers-by, they present their love openly and unapologetically. Today, the docu

My Dear Dear Hom (2026) Director: Yue Ran Duration: 20 min Languages: Sichuanese dialects, English, French Subtitles: Chinese, English Country/Region: Mainland China, Switzerland After marrying her partner in Switzerland, filmmaker Yue Ran returns to China and turns her camera towards the long and candid conversations she shares with her mother. Deeply personal in nature, My Dear Dear Home establishes an inherent dramatic tension from the outset: on one side stands a daughter

The Night (2023) Poster Director: Jenny Zhang Duration: 34 min Language: Mandarin, Cantonese Subtitles: Chinese, English Country/Region: Mainland China The Night follows two young women as they gradually come to confront and affirm themselves under the pressures of social norms and family expectations. While the protagonists’ journeys reflect queer experiences familiar to many East Asian family contexts, the film refuses to remain confined within narratives of shame, repressi

Review of The Unbroken: Struck Matches and Things Ignited by Mistake & The lit match and what was mistakenly ignited This is a film about matches. Sukanta Bhattacharya, a Bengali poet, wrote a poem titled Deshlai Kathi. A single matchstick is not enough to burn anything down, yet it carries fire, embodying the tiniest yet most resolute will of a human being. The story of Adamya (The Unbroken) stems directly from this poem. Twenty-three-year-old Palash is a left-wing revolutio

Film Review of Macho Dancer: Neon Lights, Bubbles and Cheap Kisses Neon Lights, Bubbles and Cheap Kisses We tend to equate the body with desire and nudity with seduction. Yet in the desperate struggle for survival in Manila depicted in the film Macho Dancer, the body is the only asset, the only means of expression, and the only form of resistance available to people from the lower social strata. The film lays bare the sordid and seedy nature of the male stripper industry with

Blades of the Guardians: Wind Rises Over the Desert | A Convincing Action System # A well-established action system I had barely any expectations for Blades of the Guardians before stepping into the cinema. To some extent, this lowering of expectations has become my habitual mindset when watching domestic genre films released in recent years. Yet the movie boasts a rare caliber rarely seen nowadays: a level of refinement crafted with sincere and rigorous effort. The action se

Green Ray Screening | Brokeback Mountain 20th Anniversary Special Screening Director Ang Lee's Brokeback Mountain not only marked a major turning point in his creative career after Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, but also brought his prowess in cross-cultural storytelling, emotional dialectics and portrayal of human nature to new heights. Adapted from the novel by Annie Proulx, this work places his signature depiction of delicate emotions within a wholly different context: th

European Premiere of Aunt Jiang Director / Cinematographer / Editor: Zeng Tangni Cast: Jiang Fei, Zhang Yihan, Li Xinmiao, Yang Wenlong, Zheng Tianci, Zhang Shiyu Special Cast: Tian Yajuan, Zhang Fushan, Zhang Lijuan Music Performer: Ishibashi Miko Production Year: 2023 Film Genre: Documentary Production Country/Region: Chinese Mainland, Malaysia Language: Northeast Dialect, Mandarin Chinese Duration: 174 minutes Subtitles: Chinese and English Subtitles Film Synopsis A grassr

Colony Cannes Film Review｜Spectacle of Combat and Sacrifice *The Spectacle of Battle and Sacrifice "This will undoubtedly be the most commercially oriented film I have ever made so far... I am trying to draw on the strengths of Train To Busan and Hellbound to create an engaging movie." — Yeon Sang-ho #Box office and word of mouth As of June 1, 2026, the cumulative domestic audience admissions for Colony in South Korea have exceeded 3.47 million, ranking second on the annual d

Bitter Sweet Ballad (2023) Director: Liang Junjian / Tang Tao / Liu Zhangbolong Cast: Quan Yufei / Zhang Zhanhao / Wang Luyao / Feng Xiaoyun Genre: Documentary Production Country/Region: Chinese Mainland Language: Mandarin Chinese Runtime: 108 minutes At Beijing Dandelion Middle School, four choir students use singing to resist the instability of fate. Coming from different regions across China, they may be forced to leave school at any moment due to migration, economic hards