This Day, That Year

On Oct 14, 1993, the First Shanghai International Film Festival was closed as seen in this item from China Daily.

The award for best feature film that year went to Hill of No Return with Yang Guimei (right) as the leading actress. The award for best actor went to Jan Decleir, who stars in the Belgian film Daens, while Oh Jung-Hae (left), who stars in the Korean film

Sopyonje, took the best actress title. They were chosen from 164 films presented by 33 countries and regions.

After decades of development, the annual event has become one of Asia’s largest, becoming a major source of international communication in film.

The most recent festival was held in June, with more than 3,900 films from 112 countries and regions competing for Golden Goblet awards. The Iranian film Castle of Dreams was the big winner at the event, garnering best actor, best director and best feature film.

The film Inhale-Exhale, a coproduction of Georgia, Russia and Sweden, won the Grand Jury Prize, with its leading actress Salome Demuria taking the best actress award.

Because the country’s massive box office potential interests foreign filmmakers, Chinese movies are getting more notice at festivals overseas. China’s total box office last year exceeded 60 billion yuan ($8.5 billion), the second-largest after North America. That establishes the Chinese movie industry as a new engine for world cinema.

In February, Wang Jingchun and Yong Mei won Silver Bear awards as best actor and best actress in the Chi

nese movie So Long, My Son at the 69th Berlin International Film Festival. It was the first time both awards had gone to Chinese actors.

In 2017, Chinese animation Big Fish

and Begonia directed by Liang Xuan and Zhang Chun won the first prize of the full-length film category of the 15th Anilogue International Animation Festival.

China has picked Ne Zha, an animated blockbuster from director Yang Yu, as its entry in the best international feature film category at the 2020 Oscars.

An innovative take on a well-known work of classical Chinese mythology, the 3D animated film follows a boy born of the gods who finds himself a feared outcast because of a divine prophecy that says he will bring destruction to the world. The boy stares down a choice between good and evil before ultimately deciding to confront fate and become a hero.