Discoveries from Taiwan World Cinema

A-Way is a substitute civilian serviceman at physically and mentally disability Division. In this office, there are a lot of weird people and things. For A-Way, this is a bizarre but unforgettable memory…

In contemporary Taiwan, the aboriginal Ah-ming attempts suicide. When his life is saved by an old miner, Ah-ming is drawn into a journey back to his origins. Meanwhile, the miner's son, Ah-Chuan, finds a fugitive hooker who has returned from the lowlands. But Ah-Chuan only wants to integrate himself into mainstream society, in sharp contrast to the intentions and needs of those around him.

A mysterious woman kidnaps a sex doll, Natasha, from a brothel. They embark on a journey full of difficulties. She has no choice but to finish this mission, no matter what it takes.

Real Online plays a game with online games. The world of the game can be left if wished and the real world can enter the computer game. This is the world of the game Ideal Online. In this, figures walk round like the burly Charlie Boy and the spirited Cherry Lips. In this way, the real world is confronted with the logic of the game, in which for instance violence has a very different value and meaning than in the real world.

Xiaofeng is selling medicinal herbs in Longshan Temple, but is at first driven away by Taiwanese peddlers upset by the intrusion of a mainlander into their business. Later, Xiaofeng auditions for a radio station, where a young Taiwanese man is attracted to her and finds he is soon in competition with a photographer from a mainland family.

Classic slapstick comedy set in a Taiwanese apartment building.

Shiba San and Meow Chan, a hit children's show in which the two brothers act a dog and a cat respectively, has been sweeping through kids and thus bringing fame to the two. Though radiant on stage, they both have something on their minds. Shiba san has been secretly in love with a married man, while Meow chan miss his remarried mother and it confused him when she abandoned him. An journey later on will lead the two strays to confront their emptiness inside.

The documentary "Taiwan Alishan Forest Railway Journey" offers a diverse array of content, with every detail highlighting the distinct features of Alishan in Taiwan. It includes many impressive elements. In addition to employing the latest filming techniques, the team captured stunning landscapes and remarkable railway construction methods, such as the figure-eight design, Z-segments, horseshoe bends, and the restoration of a century-old steam locomotive. They even filmed the domestically produced cypress train, named Formosensis, which has yet to enter service. Both Japan’s NHK and Taiwan’s Public Television Service provided their award-winning teams and enlisted the participation of renowned Japanese composer Kiyoshi Yoshida and Golden Horse Award-winning actress Gwei Lun-mei for the Chinese narration, enhancing the documentary’s international appeal.

Jade is a 30-year-old reporter who is after the story that will make her career. It turns out that a series of fires have been plaguing the city and a scoop on this story is just the thing she needs.

A man chooses to leave the city and goes back to his hometown in the countryside. However, he finds that his dream of being a farmer is shattered as the property developers have flocked into this small town in Southern Taiwan. Consequently, the farmland is taken over by holiday homes and villas, which not only look incongruous in the landscape but have destroyed the serenity. A woman who left home lives in one of the villas. She has been trapped in the house both physically and mentally until she meets the man. Their encounter is about to change everything…

Taiwan horror / ghost story.

Yu Ting, a 16-year-old high school student, comes home one day to find a "sister" of her age, her cousin from Vietnam, her mother’s hometown. Yu Ting's mother has promised to get the underage girl to work in Taiwan under the disguise of her "adopted" daughter Yu Lan.

A family moves into a house. The handyman's son tells the brother and sister there is a family of vampires sealed up in the basement. After freeing and befriending the child vampire, he uses his vampire magic to take the daughter and the handyman's son into a comic book to save a princess from a cannibal witch doctor and tribe. The witch doctor (Wu Ma) changes into the monkey king and Dracula, among others. The kids counter with their own transformations. For instance, when the witch doctor changes into Jesus, the kids chase him with a crucifix. Meanwhile, in the real world, the vampire parents are hopping around trying to find their son.

Of the many unrealized projects Yang developed in the wake of Yi Yi, the one that came the closest to fruition was an ambitious animated martial arts movie inspired by his lifelong love of graphic novels and his friendship with Jackie Chan. Though production on The Wind was halted after Yang’s death, this brief assembly of completed scenes offers a glimpse of what might have been. Courtesy of the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute. – Film at Lincoln Center

Flourishing

To the Moon uses images and tropes from Greek mythology, literature, science, sci-fi space movies and politics to create an imaginary and dark new moon.

Taiwanese thriller.

A fish stuck in a fish pond does not have the luxury of swimming around freely. They are used to a mindless system of food being fed to them waiting to be weighed by the humans to see how much their worth.

A pretty nurse falls for her wheelchair-bound patient, and love triumphs over a series of misunderstandings caused by jealousy.

Vic, an unprosperous actor, is torn between his dreams and real life. A short film produced during Ang Lee's second year at NYU film school.

Mei Chi, an amnesiac following a car accident, deserts her family to hook with up Ah-Liang, a taxi-driver by day and pirate CD salesman by night; Fortune-teller Ren appears on the doorstep of a lotto store owner looking for more than just a place to stay; a sexy bar owner mocks the amorous advances of an impotent musician manqué driving him to seek solace in alcohol...

Grandma Peach lives alone, listening to the same radio program every day. One day, she tries the host’s secret for rejuvenation. Unexpectedly, magic happens. She becomes young again and meets a college boy. The chemistry between them bring them together but also tears them apart.

Eighteen years after a brutal massacre at the Shen residence, a group of strangers bound by fate are drawn back to Ignore Town by an unseen force, where they must face the haunting truth of their shared past.

A fantasy taiyupian

Her and I depicts an adolescent girl’s quest for love amidst her relationships with her boyfriend, mother and the world that surrounds her.

Shot by Chang Chao-Tang and cinematographer Christopher Doyle, The Boat Burning Festival captures the ceremony worshipping Wangye（王爺）, the local god of plague, held every three years in Sucuo Village（蘇厝） in Tainan（台南）, Taiwan. Chang timed the work to "Ommadawn", a Celtic-inspired progressive rock album by Mike Oldfield. Defying genre conventions and deviating stylistically from television or ethnographic documentary, the film testifies to the tense and complex coexistence of traditional rites, local folklore, and discourses about modernisation and identity in 1970s Taiwan.

A doctor tries to perfectly park his car exactly 33 centimeters away from the boundaries of the space.

The island is about to be submerged by the flood, but Jiao refuses to leave. She is still waiting for Guo, waiting for his promise of marrying her years ago. Jiao’s son, Xiong, has no choice but to come to bring her away from this drowning place. However, Jiao’s hopeless infatuation for Guo evokes Xiong’s memories of the old days...

In a journey of mountain climbing, a gay couple was not only stimulated by the curiousity for the future and desire, but also haunted by their past.

On this day, an elderly Taiwanese mother and daughter, accompanied by a Burmese volunteer, journey from a rural area to an urban animal crematorium, tenderly carrying the body of their beloved cat, in hopes of ensuring that its final journey is marked by peace and grace.

In the village, the boy offers help but is turned down by everyone. Later his friend asks him to help on their fish farm and take the motor to the neighbouring village afterwards. But he loses the key and is determined to find it although the tide is coming in.

About a child demon and three magic warriors fighting against some demons! One of the demons, a girl in red leaves the flame mountain and witnesses strange things going on in the world of the humans. However, she is free to cause even more confusion. She uses her special abilities like invisibility to fight wizards with other talents such as shape-shifting and enjoys herself tremendously.

After his twin dies as a baby, the protagonist's family has little hope for his survival. But as he grows older, he discovers baseball, and much to his father's chagrin, he begins playing. He will go on to be a star baseball player.

Combining ancient designs discovered on the Silk Road, and an enigmatic natural power called the Origin, Zhang Meng created Arti-C, a powerful mechanical man made of wood and metal. Having stirred up fears, he was accused of treason and slain — but not before entrusting the Arti to his son Mo, who controls the wooden robot, and his daughter Tong, a cocky swordswoman. The siblings, now grown, pursue a perilous quest across the desert in search of the legendary city of Loulan, where they hope to find the Origin at its source. However, with ambitious royal schemes afoot and a mysterious tribe guarding the Origin, the Zhangs’ goal will not be easy to achieve. In the battle to come, are they even on the right side?

In the late 1990s, young Yixuan grows up as a “latchkey kid” in Wanhua, Taipei. With his father busy driving a taxi, Yixuan spends lonely afternoons wandering local diners and Youth Park. In the park, he meets Liu Bin, a lonely chess master. Yixuan finds guidance and warmth in his new teacher, who challenges him to daily matches with a small wager. This bond bridges generations, revealing how love can emerge in unexpected places and how life, much like chess, unfolds in unpredictable ways.

Taiwanese movie

Two Martial art experts take on Canton, and the most notorious Triad overlord and his posse of vile fighters with devastating effect. A must for all kung fu fans! This is a foot to face action at its best.

Semi-naked Amazonian warriors defend their girls only island from from male pirates from the men only island.

Taiwan movie

“Universe Memory” is a sci-fi drama about a woman who meets her ex-husband during a cosmic event, realizing that they both have different versions of memories regarding their past. Their conversations explore the nature of memory, existence and reality.

Panay worked in the city as a journalist. One day, she found her tribe had been overdeveloped and changed by tourism. They were losing their land and their culture, so she decided to return home to bring back the abandon terrace. In this process, she found it's not only about the land, but also about who she really is.

Once a legendary assassin, JIANG Song vanished from the underworld, consumed by guilt. When his daughter’s life is threatened, he is forced out of retirement and reluctantly teams up with his former partner HAN Yan, with whom he has a falling out, to take down the heir of a corrupt political crime syndicate. But fate strikes back with brutal irony. Jiang’s attempt to save his daughter leads to her tragedy, driving him toward one final act—to break the cycle and finish what should have ended long ago.

Taiwanese movie