These are fifteen short films you shouldn’t miss at the 26th ifva Festival, which will take place from February 24th until March 14th (2021) at the Hong Kong Arts Centre.

About the festival:
ifva was founded by the Hong Kong Arts Centre in 1995. Over the years, ifva has established itself as Asia’s pioneering force in short film, animation and media arts, by providing a unique and professional platform for Hong Kong and Asian creative talents to unite, exchange and promote their works.

Selected Films:

In a world where everyone’s head is made of a balloon, Balloon man passes through different balloons where some float and some do not. Going into his office, he starts to work. But what kind of job does a balloon has?

Screening Date:
March 13th, 2021 (Saturday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 2:30 pm (with Q&A)

At midnight, two kids, instead of falling asleep, start their journey to travel to lots of imaginary worlds. They turn into animals, fly into the sky, and have fun under their beloved blanket. They also talk about the present and the future.

Screening Date:
March 13th, 2021 (Saturday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 2:30 pm (with Q&A)

A man and a woman take their seven-year-old daughter to the hospital. The man can’t afford to buy his daughter’s expensive drugs and she is on the verge of dying. Her mother makes an unexpected decision to buy her daughter’s medicine.

Screening Date:
March 12th, 2021 (Friday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 7:30 pm (with Q&A)

The pandemic makes us grounded. I am bored by the everyday routine where there are only beginnings but no end.

Screening Date:
March 6th, 2021 (Saturday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 2:30 pm (with Q&A)

30 years after 1989, how do witnesses to the June 4th Tiananmen massacre come to terms with their own memories, and how do their memories affect their lives today? At the same time, Hong Kong gradually confronts the explosion of the Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill Movement.

Screening Date:
March 4th, 2021 (Thursday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 8:00 pm (with Q&A)

Yan is an illegal second child born under the one-child policy. To avoid being punished by the government, Yan’s parents hid their older daughter in the countryside and raised Yan as a girl. Now a young adult, Yan struggles with his gender identity and is being treated as an outcast in a conservative society. His sole escape is drifting his father’s old taxi through abandoned parking lots.

Screening Date:
March 12th, 2021 (Friday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 7:30 pm (with Q&A)

A transgender female dancer, Shin-mi, gets a call from the Military Manpower Administration.

Screening Date:
March 12th, 2021 (Friday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 7:30 pm (with Q&A)

Home, and a Distant Archive is a poetic portrait of four Hong Kong women in London, who volunteered to retrieve and digitise the UK records about Hong Kong, and their thoughts on diaspora and their home. The film is resonant, poetic, deeply personal, yet expansively reflective, bringing a sharp relief to the current political and existential moment.

Screening Date:
March 4th, 2021 (Thursday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 8:00 pm (with Q&A)

Her long-known male friend confesses his love for her, but she doesn’t provide him an answer because of her disappointing past experience. But she actually likes him, so she tries to look for the answer to the question of “what is love”. How will it all end?

Screening Date:
March 6th, 2021 (Saturday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 2:30 pm (with Q&A)

A young barista and music-video star puts aside her many interests to run in Hong Kong’s 2019 district council election. She fights both a pro-establishment incumbent and her own disdain for human interaction.

Screening Date:
February 28th, 2021 (Saturday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 2:30 pm (with Q&A)

Mina is locked in the Juvenile Detention Centre for murdering her own father. The real killer is her mother, who has asked her to admit the crime, hoping there will be a pardon for a minor. Mina’s birthday is getting close, which means she could be executed as an adult murderer. She escapes the prison to prove her innocence, but she finds out something new about about her mother’s life.

Screening Date:
March 12th, 2021 (Friday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 7:30 pm (with Q&A)

One night in the life of a taxi driver during the anti-extradition law protests in Hong Kong.

Screening Date:
March 4th, 2021 (Thursday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 8:00 pm (with Q&A)

After being diagnosed with terminal cancerand feeling hopeless, solitary Old Chan wants to end his life. His grandson Ka-chun whom he hasn’t met for years brings him an abandoned old dog. The two meet at their final stage of life bringing warmth to each other. Although lives can’t be reversed, the old dog at least help Chan and Ka-chun to re-establish their long-lost relationship and leave some pleasant memories.

Screening Date:
February 27th, 2021 (Saturday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 2:30 pm (with Q&A)

Viral Kids is about the trending stories of five different street children who have their own past and dreams but being hindered and exploited by an unknown force behind the online platform.

Screening Date:
February 27th, 2021 (Saturday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 2:30 pm (with Q&A)

From the vast expanse of land and sky comes a wild child with a camel into the city. They encounter a policeman who tries to establish communication through language without success. As the policeman learns more about the child, the latter inspires him to find his long-lost freedom.

Screening Date:
February 28th, 2021 (Saturday) | Hong Kong Arts Center | 4:30 pm (with Q&A)

For more information about the festival and the programme please visit: ifva Festival