Taiwan documentary festival opens in Bangkok

Bangkok, Nov. 20 (CNA) The Taiwan Documentary Film Festival in Thailand 2024 opened in Bangkok Tuesday night, showcasing a selection of 14 films ranging from documentaries to feature films at House Samyan through Nov. 24.

Organized by the cultural division of Taiwan's Ministry of Culture (MOC) in Thailand and Thailand's Documentary Club, the festival will also be celebrated in Chiang Mai in the north and Songkhla in the south.

All films feature Thai and English subtitles, making them accessible to a wider audience, according to the festival's Facebook page.

A 4k digital remastering of "Millennium Mambo" (2001) directed by Hou Hsiao-Hsien (侯孝賢) opened the festival, with tickets snapped up just a few hours after going on sale.

Addressing the event, Kuei Yeh-chin (桂業勤), head of the MOC's cultural division in Thailand, said this year's selection of films shares with the audience the latest movie trends in Taiwan, and that he looks forward to introducing Taiwan's film industry to the rest of the world.

Wiwat Lertwiwatwongsa, curator of the film festival, said this year's event is divided into three categories -- documentaries, feature films and science fiction.

Wiwat said he spent a lot of time time selecting documentaries focused on the theme of "boundaryless home" to tell the stories of people who make Taiwan their home or those who leave Taiwan to build their homes elsewhere, whether immigrants, laborers, artists or travelers.

Taking a scene from "A Performance in the Church" (2024) as an example, Wiwat said filmmaker Hsu Chia-Wei (許家維) successfully blends elements of Spanish colonization in Taiwan with art and music.

The film "From Island to Island" (2024) directed by Lau Kek-huat (廖克發) tells the story of Taiwan's people under Japanese colonial rule, while "Diamond Marine World" (2023) is about the life journey of a Taiwan businessman in Myanmar.

All the documentaries are stories about home or how people find their homes in a modern world, in which everyone is a global citizen who travels extensively, Wiwat said.

In addition to screening the films, Liao and Hsu will also attend a post-screening talk where they interact with the audience, he said.

Furthermore, another documentary "Absent Without Leave," directed by Liao and screened in a special session for foreign reporters at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand on Monday, gained a deep resonance with the viewers, according to Wiwat, who said attendees had an in-depth chat with Liao after the screening.