Taiwanese production wins short film award at Swiss festival

Zürich, Aug. 16 (CNA) A Taiwanese short film recently won a special short film award at an annual film festival in Switzerland, where it received the honor of being subtitled in three European languages.

Made by Taiwanese director Angel Wu (吳承筠), "Force Times Displacement" (工) won the Medien Patent Verwaltung AG Award at the 78th Locarno International Film Festival, which was held in Switzerland Aug. 6-16.

The 12-minute short film was one of 40 shorts selected to participate in the "Pardi di Domani" (The Leopards of Tomorrow) section of the festival tailored to feature short- and medium-length films making international premieres.

According to Enrico Vannucci, one of the members of the section's selection committee, the festival received 4,500 entries from all over the world for the Pardi di Domani section, meaning that only 1 percent of the entries were selected.

Force Times Displacement was one of 20 of the selections to be featured in the section's international competition, in which the Taiwanese production won the Medien Patent Verwaltung AG Award.

As the winner of the award, the Taiwanese film got subtitled in Italian, German and French by Swiss organization Medien Patent Verwaltung AG.

Besides its premier and second screenings on Aug. 15, the short was also shown on Aug. 16 for a third time on the final day of the Swiss festival.

The plot of the 12-minute film is described in the festival's intro as centering on "a factory driven by endless ambition, a mysterious wooden idol grants every wish for success. A young worker devotes himself to it -- until a hidden room reveals a different world and sparks a desire for change."

It is a mixed medium piece using video images, animation and stop motion to convey its story and scored using the Taiwanese two-string version of an Asian moon lute to add to its mystical tone.

Initiated in Locarno, Switzerland, in 1946, the annual festival screens films from features to documentaries in both competitive and non-competitive formats.

The most notable awards given out at the 2025 edition of the festival were to the likes of Hollywood actresses Lucy Liu and Emma Thompson as well as stunt master Jackie Chan (成龍) for their illustrious careers and contributions to cinema.