30 Films you cannot miss at the 7th Asian Film Festival Barcelona (Part 2)

By Asian Film Festival on October 22, 2019 • ( Leave a comment )

We continue with our list of films that you shouldn’t miss at the 7th Asian Film Festival Barcelona which will run from October 30th until November 10th, in Barcelona, Catalonia.

Selected Films:

Namdev Bhau: In Search for Silence by Dar Gai – India | 2018 – 84 minutes

Namdev Bhau is a 65-year-old chauffeur, who is tired of the noises in the obstreperous Mumbai City life and has completely stopped speaking. One day, decides to leave everything in search for ‘Silent Valley’ which boasts of a naturally occurring phenomena having almost a zero decibel sound level. On this journey he chances upon an exasperating 12-year old boy, who happens to be on his own solo expedition to the mystical “Red Castle”.

Screening:
October 30th (Wednesday) | Cinemes Girona | 18:00 pm

Trailer:

Ode to the Goose by Lu Zhang – Korea | 2018 – 122 minutes

Yun-young is an amateur poet who hasn’t had any success just yet. He had always been in love with his elder classmate’s ex-wife, Song-hyun, and when they get divorced, they engage a relationship. One day, they impulsively decide to visit the birthplace of Yun-young’s mother in a small port city called Gunsan. Here, they live in a guesthouse managed by a Korean man and his daughter, who never leaves her room.

Screening:
November 5th (Tuesday) | Cinemes Girona | 16:00 pm

Trailer:

Only The Cat Knows by Syoutarou Kobayasi – Japan | 2019 – 104 minutes

Masaru just retired and he and his wife Yukiko are expecting to have a quiet life with their cat, CHIBI, after their kids have left home. Yukiko feels that she was abandoned by her husband, who has never expressed appreciation for her years of support, let alone his love for her. One day, their loving cat CHIBI disappears. However, Masaru does not seem to care about it at all. His attitude triggers Yukiko to decide that it is time for them to divorce. After a long, intense discussion, Masaru confesses a story to her, which he has held in secret for years.

Screening:
November 3rd (Wednesday) | Cinemes Girona | 20:00 pm

Trailer:

Rona, Azim’s Mother by Jamshid Mahmoudi – Afghanistan | 2018 – 89 minutes

Azim, an afghan refugee, who works at the municipality at night, lives in Tehran along with his family. Being the head of the entire family and as the eldest brother, he arranges for his brother Faroogh’s family along with their mother to be smuggled into Germany. But at the last moment, Faroogh, shamefully makes his decision known to Azim that he’s not going to take their mother who is very attached to her grandchildren. Azim who feels lonely and is furious, finds out that his mother is in dire need of a kidney transplant, otherwise she’ll die in 2 months. During his search for a donor, he discovers that Iranians are not legally permitted to donate their organs to foreigners and he is the only donor although the doctor recommends him seriously not to do so. Now, he has to choose between his own life and his mother’s whom he has always claimed as the most important one in his life.

Screening:
November 8th (Friday) | Cinemes Girona | 20:00 pm

Trailer:

Signal Rock by Chito S. Roño – Philippines | 2018 – 127 minutes

Based on a true story and set in 1990s, the film follows Intoy, who lives with his family in the island of Biri, Northern Samar. The island’s tradition establishes that women have to leave the island to work, while men must stay on it. Therefore, Vicky leaves to work overseas while Intoy is left to take care of their parents. Due to the region’s taboos, Intoy has to contend his love on a woman, who will leave the island. And he also can’t reach his personal ambition to leave for work in Manila. When Vicky marries a foreigner thinking that it will solve on their family economic problem, Intoy can only get in touch with his sister by scrambling atop strange rock formations on the island, which are to only place where the inhabitants can get signal.

Screening:
November 10th (Sunday) | Cinemes Girona | 20:00 pm

Trailer:

Sincerely Yours, Dhaka by Nuhash Humayun, Syed Ahmed Shawki, Rahat Rahman, MD Robiul Alam, Golam Kibria Farooki, Mir Mukarram Hossain, Tanvir Ahsan, Mahmudul Islam, Abdullah Al Noor, Krishnendu Chattopadhyay, Syed Saleh Ahmed Sobhan – Bangladesh | 2018 – 134 minutes

“Sincerely Yours, Dhaka” is a wild ride through the streets of Bangladesh’s capital. A background actor who’ll do anything to be a star. Two young girls who are dying for a drink in a city where alcohol is illegal. A teenage gangster who’s drunk on power and a sound recordist who finds a dark secret. A bank scam sparks an attempted murder and a plumber adds fuel to a refugee crisis. Stolen cars, broken dreams, dysfunctional relationships. Ranging from bizarre, heartwarming to heartbreaking, the first ever anthology film made in Bangladesh takes us on a bittersweet journey through Dhaka City.

Screening:
November 5th (Tuesday) | Cinemes Girona | 12:00 pm

Trailer:

Song Lang by Leon Le – Vietnam | 2018 – 90 minutes

Saigon, 1980s. Linh Phung is the star of an itinerant cai luong company (traditional folk opera) and is heavily indebted to a lender called Dung, Thunderbolt. Despite apparently having nothing in common, the two engage in a video game relationship and discover that they have similar minds and multiple binding points. Linh Phung knows that a well-lived life is required to develop his art and Dung yearns for art to be able to live a life worthy of being lived. The story, rooted in fatalism and fatality, is inspired by the classical narrative structure of Vietnamese opera.

Screening:
November 8th (Friday) | Cinemes Girona | 10:00 am

Trailer:

Still Human by Oliver Siu Kuen Chan – Hong Kong | 2018 – 111 minutes

A paralyzed and hopeless Hong Kong man meets his new Filipino domestic worker who has put her dream on hold and came to the city to earn a living. These two strangers live under the same roof through different seasons, and as they learn more about each other, they also learn more about themselves.

Screening:
November 6th (Wednesday) | Cinemes Girona | 20:00 pm
November 10th (Sunday) | Cinemes Girona | 18:00 pm

Trailer:

The Crossing by Bai Xue – China | 2018 – 99 minutes

Studying in Hong Kong but living in Shenzhen, Peipei has spent 16 years in her life travelling between these two cities. To realize the dream of seeing snow in Japan with her bestie, Peipei joins a smuggling gang and uses her student identity to smuggle iPhones from Hong Kong to Mainland. Her family life and friendships begin to fall apart.

Screening:
November 8th (Friday) | Cinemes Girona | 18:00 pm

Trailer:

The Rib by Zhang Wei – China | 2018 – 85 minutes

While Chinese queer directors have explored trans characters and featured trans actors before, Zhang Wei’s “The Rib” is the first mainstream feature film to interrogate contemporary Chinese society’s transphobia. Trans woman Huang Yi braves coming out to her patronizing male roommate and her devoutly Catholic father, whose signature she needs for male-to-female surgery. Meanwhile, Huang’s defiantly proud post-op friend, Liu Mann, reminds us all that the greatest challenges are of the heart, not the body. The director of passionate, socially topical films Zhang Wei has created a queer-positive film that details patriarchy, heterosexism, and transphobia while following a father’s gradual recognition of his daughter’s struggle and his embrace of a new meaning for family.

Screening:
November 7th (Thursday) | Cinemes Girona | 12:00 pm

Trailer:

The Wall by Boonsong Nakphoo – Thailand | 2018 – 95 minutes

During the location scouting of his latest film, a stubborn filmmaker experiences many things. He sees reality in the present, reality in the past, dreams, what he expected things to be, and the mysterious dark side that he tries to hide and run away from it. Everything comes back and attacks him. In this film, Boonsong plays himself, his son plays him when he was a child, and his mother plays herself. This is another film that Boonsong tries to challenge the storytelling by crossing over fiction and documentary.

Screening:
October 31st (Thursday) | Cinemes Girona | 11:30 am

Trailer:

The Witch: Part 1 The Subversion by Park Hoon-jung – Korea | 2018 – 125 minutes

A young, blood spattered girl apparently fleeing a violent scene in a remote location is found and taken in by a kindly middle aged farmer and his wife. The girl has no memory and cannot remember her name, and the couple calls her Koo Ja-yoon. Ten years later, Ja-yoon is a bright young woman who participates in a TV talent show called Birth of a Star to earn money. However, as soon as she appears on TV, strange people approach her claiming to know her, but she doesn’t know them. That, coupled with the odd physical sensations she has been experiencing, Ja-yoon’s life is about to be turned upside down.

Screening:
October 31st (Thursday) | Cinemes Girona | 22:00 pm

Trailer:

This Little Land of Mines by Erin McGoff – Laos | 2018 – 64 minutes

No country deserves to be deemed “the most heavily bombed country in the world”, but if there’s one country that can be considered the least deserving, it’s the humble land of Laos. During the Vietnam War, the U.S. CIA secretly dropped 270 million bombs in Laos, one-third of which didn’t explode and kill innocent people today. But Lao people aren’t bitter; they are shockingly positive, forgiving, and resilient in the face of this challenge. This Little Land of Mines reveals the incredible, true stories of the Lao people as they work to clear 80 million unexploded American bombs in Laos.

Screening:
October 30th (Wednesday) | B The Travel Brand Xperience Barcelona | 19:00 pm
November 11th (Monday) | B The Travel Brand Xperience Barcelona | 19:00 pm

Trailer:

Three Husbands by Fruit Chan – Hong Kong | 2018 – 101 minutes

A wondrous prostitute lives with her three loving husbands and plies her trade while living on a boat in Hong Kong. With an overactive libido, she doggedly devotes herself to her work. With this film, the director Fruit Chan uses sex to satirise the state of the contemporary Hong Kong.

Screening:
November 7th (Thursday) | Cinemes Girona | 22:00 pm

Trailer:

Tracey by Jun Li – Hong Kong | 2018 – 119 minutes

Longtime character actor Philip Keung takes on his first leading role as Tung Tai-hung, a middle-aged family man at a crossroads in life. When a childhood friend passes away, Tai-hung finds cause to reflect upon his formative years, his unfulfilling marriage, and the inescapable truth of who he really is inside. The triumphant debut feature of Fresh Wave Film Festival alumnus Jun Li, presents a groundbreaking drama tackles the issue of gender identity with intelligence, humanity, and refreshing joie de vivre.

Screening:
November 7th (Thursday) | Cinemes Girona | 18:00 pm

Trailer: