Monthly Archive: January 2025

Amid a rain laden final round, David Plenderleith emerged top for the second edition of the I&M Bank sponsored- Serena 63 Golf Series at the Lake Victoria Serena Golf Resort and Spa, Kigo.

During was during the grand finale of the second season held on Saturday, 30^th November 2024.

Taiwan’s Golden Horse Film Project Promotion (FPP) has unveiled a selection of 63 titles for its 2024 project market from directors including Kiwi Chow and Hsieh Pei-ju and producers such as Fran Borgia and Sylvia Chang.

The diverse line-up comprises 38 in-development, 13 work-in-progress film titles and 12 series, and marks the first time the entire selection has been revealed in one announcement.

Scroll down for full list of WIP titles

The projects will be presented at the Golden Horse event, which will take place in Taipei from November 18-20. In addition to a large delegation from Taiwan, there are also projects from Southeast Asia, mainland China and international collaborations that involve Japan, the US, Canada, Ireland and Brazil.

The selection showcases a mix of acclaimed and emerging directors including Chow, Hsieh, Lau Kok-rui, Lou Yi-an, Tang Yi, Yan Xiaolin, Yeo Joon-han and Yeo Siew-hua, and renowned producers such as Borgia, Chang, Stefano Centini, Jeremy Chua, Patrick Mao Huang and Liao Chin-sung.

The 13 WIP projects are either in production or in post-production. Several are from Taiwan, including noir road film Running Wild, directed by Wang Yi-ling and executive produced by Liao Ching-sung; Blind Love directed by Chou Mei-yu and starring Ariel Lin, who is also an executive producer; Before The Bright Day by director Tsao Shih-han and executive producer Yee Chih-yen, which revisits the experiences of growing up in the 1980s; and period suspense film Where The River Flows, a true story directed by Lai Chun-yu.

A further five WIP projects bring regional perspectives: Malaysian filmmaker Yeo Joon-han’s dark comedy You Are Here; Singaporean director Ang Geck Geck Priscilla’s Ah Girl, which looks at the separation of parents through a child’s eyes; Ng Hiu-tung’s No Time For Goodbye, the story of a Hong Konger seeking asylum in the UK; Wong Ka-ki’s I Heard That They Are Not Going To See Each Other Anymore, a fantasy romance that explores the alienation and confusion of urbanites; and black magic horror film Kong Tao by Malaysian directors Yong Choon-lin and Goh Pei-chiek.

Rounding up the WIP section are four documentaries: One Day In The Future by Jiang Xuan-nian and Ji Hang, an exploration of gender diversity and family; Mok Kawn-ling’s A Thousand Winds, which documents social movements in Hong Kong; Wang An-min’s The Rover, a story about mountain guides; and Wild Road by Chen Chiao-wei, a deep dive into the troubling situation facing wild animals.

In-development

The 38 in-development projects include directors and screenwriters who are previous winners or nominees of the Golden Horse Awards. They include Wake Me Up When The Mourning Ends by Lau Kok-rui, winner of Golden Horse Award for best new director for The Sunny Side Of The Street; Water Of Immortality by Lin Chun-yang (Eye of The Storm), which portrays the touching story of sculptor Huang Tu-shui and his wife; revenge horror The Room Raising Children’s Soul by Chang Yao-sheng (A Leg); and Snake In The Dreamscapes by Lou Yi-an (Goddamned Asura), a story of three past-life dreams uncovering three murder mysteries.

Further titles include The Cat Out Of The Bag by Wang I-fan (Get the Hell Out), about a girl’s quest for revenge; You Are Wanted by Jim Wang (Cha Cha For Twins), based on a true story about a fugitive who accidentally becomes a teacher and helps a dropout girl; Soul in Chinatown by Jevons Au (Trivisa), in which a fake exorcist gets caught up in a cross-border exorcism; and Festival by Yan Xiao-lin (Carp Leaping Over Dragon’s Gate), which exposes the suspicious nature of human beings through a series of brutal murders in a rural village.

Several in-development projects distinguish themselves as comedies. These include God’s Lie In The Wonderland by veteran Hong Kong producer Roger Lee and director Kris Li, who uses a bizarre aquatic monster as a metaphor for the absurdities of real estate; Grannies Revenge by Hsieh Pei-ju (Heavy Craving), which sees a women’s avengers squad seek justice from their unscrupulous husbands; Western Trust Family by Remii Huang (Let’s Talk About CHU), an absurd comedy about a family whose plans to move up in life cause their lives to blow up; horror film My Ancestors: PUA Masters, the directorial debut of The Tag-Along producer Chen Shin-chi; Aoharu Point by Chiang Chin-lin (Café·Waiting·Love), an adaptation of the Japanese novel of the same name about a fantasy campus romance; and Tales Of Yokelan From Malaysia by Tang Yi (Cannes short film Palme d’Or winner All the Crows In The World), in which a 70-year-old widow in New York finds a second chance at love.

The in-development section also presents projects that address social issues through the crime and horror genres. Far End Of Heaven by Tsao Jui-yuan (Seqalu: Formosa 1867), and executive produced by Golden Horse Award-winning actress Sylvia Chang, tells the story of a father and son on a wilderness escape; Truth In Quarters by Boi Kwong (Geylang), explores society’s interpretation of truth through a bizarre murder case; The Day Before Tomorrow by Lee Yi-fang (Little Blue) depicts the stress that the education system puts on students; Will You Please Reply, Please? by Jeffrey Poon recounts the disillusionment of speculators in post-1997 Hong Kong; Stranger by Japanese director Kenichi Ugana is a new type of horror story fuelled by the curses spread through online communities; The Right Choice is a romantic thriller by Thai director Eakasit Thairaat; and Isolation, in which Golden Harvest Award winner Yu Chih-chieh uses a zombie crisis amid the cross-strait tension to highlight the perspective of residents on Taiwan’s offshore islands.

Several renowned documentary directors tackle various issues. The Songs From Within by Elvis Lu (A Holy Family), focuses on the cultural identity of indigenous youth; Chu Hsien-che’s The Boat unravels a long-buried historical injustice; To Unpathed Waters by Waro Hsueh (E.Sha Age) chronicles the pilgrimage of a whitewater kayaking adventurer; Exodus from China’s Li Wei (Silence In The Dust) portrays young people’s confusion about freedom in the post-pandemic era.

Two animation features join the in-development lineup: Boy A-Nee-Gu Gets Into Trouble Again! by Jack Shih, adapted from the writings of Luo Yi-jun, and The Dog That Lost His Home by Chen Qiang, in which five people who lost their families look for a way to end the war.

Series titles

The 12 series projects mark the fifth edition of the series section. Among the fantasy and sci-fi titles are Super Cat, produced by Golden Horse Award-winning director Huang Hsin-yao, which deconstructs the world through the fantastical experiences of 10 delivery workers; Islanders by co-directors Yao Hung-I, Shen Ko-shang, and Wu Mi-sen, which blends AI technology with traditional folklore and social issues; Survival Guide for Doomsday Kids by Kiwi Chow and his team behind Beyond the Dream, tells the survival story of two siblings in a world where all adults have perished; Reincarnated As A Character In A Taiwanese Soap Opera, But I Can’t Speak Taiwanese!, produced by local TV drama queen Elsie Yeh; Lin Han’s Shining Again follows an anti-fan who travels back in time to prevent an idol from debuting; and Fairies Tales is adapted from the fantasy-romance novel by Chang Man-chuan.

Crime and suspense are also a focus. The Fundamentals by Yeo Siew-hua, whose latest film Stranger Eyes is the first ever from Singapore to compete in Venice, uncovers the darkness of a cult through a series of decapitation murders; Godless by Chen Kuan-chung (The Victims’ Game) delves into the inner world of a female perpetrator; and The Grinning Goat by Ho Cheuk-tin is adapted from a bestselling novel about college students who accidentally stumble into an alternate dimension.

The award winners for the Golden Horse Film Project Promotion be announced on November 20.

WIP Projects

Running Wild (Tai)
Dir. Wang Yi-ling
Exec pro. Liao Ching-sung
Pro. Kuo Bo-tsun, Wang Yi-ling
Prodco. Film10 Production, Ltd.
Logline: Three people embark on a mysterious journey of no return. As their world blurs and they lose their innocence, what’s left is the sobering impact of reality and survival. 

Blind Love (Tai)
Dir. Chou Mei-yu
Screenwriter: River Wu
Exec pro. Ariel Lin, Patrick Mao Huang
Pro. Chen Pao-ying
Prodco. Chou’s Entertainment Ltd.
Logline: A rebellious young man, Tian-Han, loves a mysterious woman, Xue-Jin. Unaware she’s his mother, Shu-Yi’s former lover, and accidentally stirred up his mother’s past and his family.

One Day In The Future (China) Documentary
Dir. Jiang Xuan-nian, JI Hang
Pro. Vincent Du
Prodco. Memorize Film Production Company
Logline: A Chinese lesbian couple embark on a journey to find a sperm donor and fulfil one’s parents’ wish for a grandchild. Can they gain acceptance for a child with two mothers?

You Are Here (Malay)
Dir. Yeo Joon-han
Exec pro. Jment Lim
Pro. Boris Kalaidjiev, Franck Priot, Yeo Joon-han
Prodco. Amok Films Sdn. Bhd.
Logline: A 50-year-old comedy filmmaker struggles to survive past his “use by” date.

Ah Girl (Sing)
Dir. Ang Geck Geck Priscilla
Exec pro. Ang Geck Geck Priscilla, Frank Smith
Pro. Lie Kai-yee, Charlyn Ng
Prodco. Aggregate Films, Infocus Asia Pte. Ltd. (IFA Media)
Logline: Seven-year-old Ah Girl is asked to choose between living with Mum or Pa, a decision that will change her life forever. 

Before The Bright Day (Tai)
Dir. Tsao Shih-han
Exec pro. Yee Chih-yen
Pro. Lin Shih-ken, Ou Yang Sing
Prodco. Life Scenery Films
Logline: In 1996, the Taiwan missile crisis and presidential election caused societal upheaval, triggering Zhou’s turbulent coming-of-age. 

A Thousand Winds (HK) Documentary
Dir. Mok Kwan-ling
Exec pro. Choi Sin-yi
Pro. Choi Sin-yi
Prodco. Till We Meet Productions
Logline: After the protest in Hong Kong, four wounded individuals coped with imprisonment, farewells and trauma as if they were plotting the trial of youth and the fate of the city. 

No Time For Goodbye (HK)
Dir. Ng Hiu-tung
Pro. Teddy Robin Kwan
Prodco. Viavix Media Limited
Logline: A car mechanic finds an unexpected connection with an art teacher as they seek asylum in Britain after fleeing the post-social unrest in their home city of Hong Kong. 

The Rover (Tai) Documentary
Dir. Wang An-min
Exec pro. Hung Chun-hsiu
Pro. Wang Chi-chieh
Prodco. Lao Nai Image Production Co., Ltd.
Logline: A-Gong, despite not loving mountains, spent half his life in them, becoming a legend without summiting peaks. Can he escape the human hustle?

Wild Road (Tai) Documentary
Dir. Chen Chiao-wei
Pro. Mocy Tsao, Ma Huai-shuo
Prodco. Modern Planet Production Ltd.
Logline: Here, we feel the joy of saving lives and the sorrow of omnipresent death. Can we truly coexist with wildlife?

I Heard that They Are Not Going To See Each Other Anymore (Tai-HK-UK)
Dir. Wong Ka-ki
Exec pro. Ng Ka-leung
Pro. Chen Ping-chia
Prodco. Ping Film Production, Haven Productions Ltd.
Logline: In Taipei’s dreamscape, Tao’s incomprehensible love for Shin drives her to create painful memories. When Melih, burdened with self-blame, longs to connect with the perpetually drunk Ping.

Where The River Flows (Tai)
Dir. Lai Chun-yu
Pro. Eric Xie Xiang-yu, Ivy Hsu, Lin Shih-ken
Prodco. Where the River Flows Co., Ltd., Bole Film Co., Ltd.
Logline: Taiwan’s first female dismemberment case: a decorated general falsely accused, the protagonist investigates amidst pursuit by secret agents, uncovering a tragedy shaped by the historical currents. 

Kong Tao (Malay-Sing-Thai)
Dir. Yong Choon-lin, Goh Pei-chiek
Exec pro. Chiah Choon-hang
Pro. Chiah Choon-hang
Prodco. Mega Films Distribution Sdn. Bhd.
Logline: Hexing isn’t a legend but a bone-chilling cultural truth. A whispered curse, a lifetime of remorse. When greed awakens, retribution follows until the bitter end.

Minky Momo is dead. Long live Minky Momo. After episode forty-six scarred children of Japan with the magical girl’s death via truck, the series still had seventeen episodes to go, well beyond the original slated episode count of fifty. That means that the writers had to figure something out relatively quickly – should the focus be on Momo growing up as the child of her Earth parents? Should it pretend that she never died and treat her death as a nightmare? Or should it try to do something different and essentially reboot the story as a metaphor for Momo coping with her death?

If you guessed the last one, you’re on the right track. While episodes forty-seven and forty-eight are clip shows, allowing everyone to get the series back on track, the remaining fifteen episodes focus on new adventures for the Fenarinarsan princess. It begins with her royal father mourning the death of his child. He’s by a pond in Fenarinarsa when he notices some strange, diamond-like stones he’s never seen before in the water. He fishes them out and brings them home, where the queen suggests trying to fit one into the crown’s center, left empty by Momo’s death. When he does, the gem is drawn into the crown, and compressed into a laser disc that begins playing scenes of a slightly different Momo. Neither parent knows what’s happening, but as the adventures continue, a dark force creeps ever closer – a nebulous black fog that eventually gains a face and a purpose. By episode fifty, we can see a strong implication that the scenes they’re watching alongside us are somehow Momo’s dreams in infancy; the king notes that Momo is still a baby in her reincarnated form.

This opens the door for what these episodes truly do: giving both Minky Momo and the viewers a way to process her death. Momo died with her mission unfulfilled; Fenarinarsa remains adrift from Earth, and its position as the guardian and source of dreams and wonder is still at risk. Momo was fully aware of the importance of her mission, even as she acted like a typical child, playing her way through her encounters. The suggestion is that she carries guilt from having died before completing her task, and now as an infant, she has no real way to work things out – she can’t exactly talk them through, after all. Therefore the dark cloud, later named “Nightmare,” is representative of her guilt and fear that she has done irreparable harm, while her adventures can all be seen as her working through what’s happened to her.

The primary way we see this is in the amount of deaths Momo encounters in her dreams. In episode fifty-one, Momo meets an actor known for doing his own stunts; he’s suffering from a terminal illness and ultimately dies offscreen. Momo must process the fact that she helped him fulfill his dying wish and that he is gone, living on only through his films. In the next episode, a penguin at the aquarium loses her chick, and Mocha has to help the mourning mother – who ultimately forgets her chick when she meets a handsome male penguin. This speaks to Momo’s fears of replacement; yes, she’s now the baby of her Earth parents for real, but she’s also a human, not a magical princess. Does that mean her Fenarinarsan parents will replace or forget her like the penguin replaced her chick? These fears are addressed in the following episode when Momo helps a woman change her tragic past by getting her aboard a ghostly version of the train she never caught the first time around; by helping Cecilia, Momo is thinking about how she can redo her own life and change her fate into a happy ending as she does for Cecilia.

The other throughline in these episodes is the Devil Queen, AKA the evil queen from Snow White. Episode fifty strongly implies that Snow White is dead (as far as the queen and dwarves know, and she does die in the early Grimm version), and Momo attempts twice to disguise herself as Snow White to assuage people’s feelings. The Devil Queen then becomes Aunt Devil, a woman trying to atone for what she did, primarily by selling good-tasting apples from the Fairy Tale Forest and using the profits to benefit others. Aunt Devil could represent Momo’s desire to help others even though she’s now an ordinary human, a dream of finding a way to still make a difference in the world even without her magic powers.

All of this, naturally, is almost undone when Nightmare catches up to her. The final three episodes of the series are dark, with episode sixty-two being genuinely scary as Nightmare picks off Momo’s friends and family one by one, forcing her to doubt herself and all of the good she did before her death. It’s not a spoiler to say that she and her friends do ultimately triumph (the statute of limitations on spoilers is certainly up after forty years), Still, it’s not an easy journey for Momo, emotionally. She has to come to terms with the end of her old life and embrace her new one, and so do we, as viewers. It’s a hefty lesson, even for the after-school special era of children’s entertainment (to say nothing of the toy-selling era), but one that I do think works.

Alongside the recurring character Aunt Devil, Momo is also joined by a pink dragon named Kajira, whom she meets during a tongue-in-cheek episode about Momotaro that the anime addresses in English as Peach Boy. Kajira, who looks like a pink Spike from the original My Little Pony franchise, does serve a very important purpose. For most of the series, he’s simply chompy comic relief, chewing his way through everything he can get his mouth on while highlighting the production values with his ever-changing size. Momo’s new outfit is cuter than her old one – her vest is now a hoodie, which works well – and her new transformation has 100% less butt, looking more like the light show transformation of the later magical girl series. Her transformations continue to have an amusing degree of specificity – at one point she notes that she’s a jet pilot, not a regular pilot, and therefore can’t fly an old biplane. And of course, there are still the issues of a piece of media from a less enlightened time; episode fifty-one has a pretty horrific stereotype of a First Nations man (complete with saying “how” as a greeting).

Fairy Princess Minky Momo takes more twists and turns than were probably originally intended. Momo’s death and these episodes that help her to process it may not be out of line with other international children’s media of the 1980s, but the turning point that was episode forty-six left an indelible mark on the series’ ending. It’s a must-watch for anime historians, but also a good, if not occasionally bizarre, story in its own right.