"When the wind in the wilderness blows over the plateau again", from July 23rd to July 31st, the 17th FIRST Youth Film Festival was held in Xining City, Qinghai Province.

The FIRST Youth Film Festival participates in the current Chinese youth film industry in the form of a film festival. According to the registration data, among the main competition units of this year’s Youth Film Festival, 877 effective registration films finally entered the review process, including 110 feature films. There are 52 feature-length documentaries and 715 short films. Among the gender distribution of the directors of the participating films, except for 2% of creators whose gender was kept secret, male directors accounted for 67% and female directors accounted for 31%. In terms of the age distribution of creators, post-90s creators still accounted for the overall Half of the number, creators born after 2000 rose to 23%.

FIRST Youth Film Festival event site

In the overall observation of the submitted films, the judges of FIRST believed that among feature films, "the north is still desolate, and the love in the south is mostly damp." Under the constraints of objective action conditions and low-cost production, the theme landscape of some films It presents a trend of confinement and closure, returning more to a single-space production mode, which tests the creator's narrative ability and audio-visual breakthroughs in a limited space. The character creation in the film is also full of universal anxiety and uneasiness. In terms of creative themes, family, married life, and emotional relationships constitute the core narratives of most films. The inner care of individual life experience is still the beginning of creation. A kind of difficulty in caring about reality.

According to the evaluation of the pre-selection jury of the FIRST main competition, looking at the selection of motifs this year, an attitude towards the intergenerational cognition of homeland and identity is gradually emerging. In the theme narrative, the rural landscape is still a favorite topic for creators. , from family to campus, from village to city, there is a complex emotion of gazing at the homeland again after leaving, and the strong emotional expression also brings a clearer attitude and position; and on the issue of identity, gender has also become an unavoidable issue. The expression center of escape, and the current gender image is no longer an invisible writing with undercurrents. Women's issues or a gender perspective in a broader sense have become an important strategy to fight against institutionalized expression.

In the short film section, this year's short film pre-selection review has been increased from three to five for the first time, and the short film ecology has been reviewed more carefully. Short films have definitely become an important outlet for creators to explore styles and narratives. Live-action short films have a more flexible and vigorous entry point of view, providing diverse samples of genres, themes, forms and styles. Due to the limitation of production threshold and effective time investment for animated short films, most of the submitted films are mature creators with certain creative experience.

Screening scene

Short Films: Expanding the Possibilities of Images with a Pioneering Attitude

At the official welcome dinner of the film festival, Chen Chong, the chairman of the jury, quoted the words he wrote 20 years ago to share the soul tremor he experienced when shooting his directorial debut: "Every morning is so new, and every evening is so sad .Every cloud, every stream, every flower brings me some kind of omen, hidden pain and anticipation. It is only now that I understand why people call the first work the 'first work', it is the first time in love Naked."

The ordinary world will always take on a new look through the lens of a creator with vitality. Different from the detailed foreshadowing and polishing of the feature film story, it is easiest to see the occasional but vigorous creative passion described by Chen Chong in the short film. The short film expands the possibilities of images with a pioneering attitude, and also develops various styles of images with its free and experimental genes.

In the 17th FIRST Youth Film Festival, a special "Pioneering Creation Unit" was set up to reward the creative spirit of daring to explore and practice. This year, a total of 17 short films were shortlisted for the Pioneering Creation Unit.

In terms of film aesthetics, these short films form a variety of short film languages full of tension through the comprehensive application of narration, editing, sound and music. Materials are disassembled and reassembled to bring unexpected audio-visual experience.

"Perfect City: The Bravest Child" starts from the physical properties of paper and metal, looks back at the relationship between parents and children, uses symbols to construct a mapping relationship from physics to physiology, and points to the hidden corners of the family. In "Ping Pong", with the movement of table tennis as a clue, all things fall endlessly in a cycle, which is a metaphor for the fate of personal will being crushed under the pressure of contemporary society. "One, Two" uses minimalist dialogue and images to tell the secret struggle of an unknown woman, creating a world-wide isolation situation, and pointing directly to the alienation and discipline of reality. "If the Bus Goes the Wrong Way" incorporates performance elements into real images, deconstructs the pseudo-documentary form playfully, and reveals a certain operating mechanism of the modern social order.

"One, Two" poster

Some creators go deep into the inner world of individuals with an introspective attitude and keen insight. Through the subtle capture of the state of the characters, it presents the living conditions and emotional experience of contemporary individuals. "A Night for a Walk" focuses the camera on a man and a woman walking on an empty street in the early morning, describing the situation of contemporary people facing the "end times"; A state of alienation and emptiness of urban youth, and a heart that both rejects and longs for intimacy. "Flight Tracks of Birds" tries to reproduce memories with images, but in the excavation and reconstruction of memories, it obtains a "reality" that is completely different from reality, and then returns to the attention of individual life and experience. "Imitating Antiques Today" puts the individual perspective on the drone, and establishes occasional communication with others on the way to explore the unknown.

"A Walking Night" poster

"It's an Antique Day" poster

Search up and down in the mixed world of multiple elements, and complete the integration of form and content. "Ants" uses theater dance to activate the language of the film, perceives the emotion of space from the rhythm of the body, and expresses the awakening of the individual and the eternal desire for freedom. "A Dream within a Dream in Another Mirror" uses film and 3D printing technology to make people feel empathetic about the world of the visually impaired. "Pictures of Life" shifts the narrative subject from people to paintings, places paintings in alienated fields, and observes various social landscapes. "A Situation" explores the position of media carriers in the public discourse system, and thinks about the deep reasons why facts and truths are constantly dismantled and reorganized in the jumping back and forth between the real world and photographic lenses. "Memory Channel" combines the game medium with film narrative, tells a story of healing psychological trauma through immersive games, and reminds people to cherish the beauty and warmth of current life.

"Ants" poster

"Picturesque" poster

The changeable form develops a ambiguous image space. The pictures presented with different senses, rhythms and frame sizes extend the short film to capture the perspective and endless imagination of the world. "Thirteenth Night" breaks the logic of audio-visual narrative, uses a single voice narrative to hit the audience's perception threshold, explores human nature and society in private phone narratives, and reproduces a strange reality that is close to the ear and immersive. In "Lullaby", the lives of a mother and daughter are constructed in the form of split-screen images. The juxtaposition of the two images changes from independence to integration, which also reveals that the relationship and emotion have changed from opposition to reconciliation. "Emperor of Nine Dragons" reproduces the style of Hong Kong-style thriller comedy in a completely changing context of the times, conveying contemporary themes. "Screen" uses novel materials to endow the screen and images with a real body, and completes the exploration of the relationship between the subject and the object in the interaction between the senses and materials.

"Emperor of Kowloon" poster

"Silver Screen" poster

Main Competition Unit: Highlighting Women's Creations

A total of 13 feature films were shortlisted for the main competition. These feature films explored in different directions and to varying degrees in terms of artistic intuition, text writing and technical control.

Among them, the most prominent feature is the creation of female subjects. The three-hour "I hope people will last forever" delicately depicts the different fates of a pair of twin sisters in the process of urban-rural migration. In "Cangshan", a small town that changed its name has become a symbol of a forever lost hometown. The female protagonist who has been divorced for many years is doing housekeeping work in Shanghai while taking care of her mother with dementia and her rebellious son in puppy love. She also writes a story of survival in a foreign land and a difficult journey in pursuit of spiritual freedom; as a film directed by a woman The new work, "Crossing the Devil City", focuses on history. The superposition of various types of elements enhances the visibility and presents the unique consciousness of a specific era and a specific group of people.

"May I Live Long" Poster

"Cangshan" poster

With regard to female creations, FIRST judges believe that perhaps because of the extremely limited female identities in the social structure, the social imagination expressed based on identities is also limited, so the display and resistance of women's plight has also become stagnant. In this sense, the more you try to define women's films clearly, the more likely you will fall into the shackles of performing "female consciousness" with images, and this is what is most worrying. Women's films lose their own discourse productivity and become a conceptual limitation. It is always difficult to break stereotypes, and it is always dangerous to fight prejudice. Women's films are not only a reshaping of gender ritual diversity and subjectivity, but also an innovation of the traditional political aesthetic expression of film history.

The three female-themed works mentioned above also received different evaluations. Among them, "May I Live Long" won the best feature film at the 17th FIRST Youth Film Festival. In the interweaving of the characters, the story meticulously portrays the typical image of women in an era. Director Qin Tian introduced: "I will still insist on making films that I have to express and should express. I will continue to see those new problems encountered and solved in the process of huge urbanization that leave their hometowns and continue to migrate. Ordinary people who still insist on living in their own ordinary world and keep struggling."

In addition, in addition to female themes, dialects are used in films such as "Longevity", "Going to the Racecourse", "Army", "I Hope for a Long Time", and dialects seem to have become a major killer for independent creation. Qualitative not only delays the meaning of images, but also transforms regions and spaces into a meaningful form of textual presence. Dialect not only shows a kind of resistance expression, but also opens up different viewing perspectives.

Destiny emerges from the mystery of life and death. "Going Away by Boat" uses a boat connecting the hometown and villages with life, death, marriage, and marriage as a metaphor for the traditional way of life. spiritual destination and spiritual freedom. "Junjun" uses handheld photography, single point of view and long shots to restore the life of a person in the dilemma of being "eliminated". The silent gaze is another kind of respect and concern. With a high concentration of realistic mirror language and fragmented stream-of-consciousness narration, "Long Days" shows the wonderful journey a child goes through in one day. Group pressure and the invisible suppression of nature by school education make the film full of childishness and sadness.

"Long Days" poster

For creators, genre elements are like ladders and bridges, helping a story climb out of bottlenecks and obstacles. Introducing genre elements at the level of overall narrative is an organic means to endow images with kinetic energy. "Kidnapping Maohuhu" tells the story of two "fools" and a group of "smart people". In the combination of comedy and horror elements, the development of the play turns around. Behind the absurd and magical plot and the appearance of black humor, there are also reflections on social history. As a "Screenwriter's Story of Survival in the Movie Circle" full of tension and bright spots, "Galaxy Writer" cleverly created a dual situation inside and outside the play, which is very watchable.

"Galaxy Writer" poster

Film is an art that needs to be believed, and performance is one of the most important sources of credibility. Good performance provides the audience with a way to enter the film world emotionally. "Fudu Youth" focuses the camera on the narrative space of the foreign worker-inhabited area in Malaysia, showing the hard life of the bottom-level "surplus" who lack social identity. Wu Kangren also expressed his wonderful performance in "Fudu Youth" Won the Best Actor in the 17th FIRST Youth Film Festival. "The Best Encounter" shows the marginal situation and life problems of the mentally handicapped group by showing the efforts of a group of people for a life that cannot be born.

Wu Kangren won the best actor award.

Documentary feature film: circumstantial evidence of history

The feature-length documentary shows the characteristics of diversity, and its multi-distance perspective becomes a window to extend the multi-dimensional landscape of reality. Real images have a unique and charming charm. They not only provide a rare historical circumstantial evidence, but also provide image archives with social value for contemporary life history.

The five documentaries shortlisted for the 17th FIRST Main Competition all reflect the life and destiny in the social gaps through multiple perspectives and abundant creative energy. The creators or documentary directors who have been cultivating for many years, or observers from scholars, teachers, journalists, writers and other fields, when paying attention to different aspects such as family history, youth, disease, education, etc., they all consciously focus on relevant aspects. The gaze of "Boundary" deeply excavates the subtle reality under the appearance.

In the year of Lizhi, when love and career were both on the right track, a cancer brought life to a standstill. In the year of fate, the injury of his wife and the death of his father also caused waves in the peaceful life. Kong Weineng, the director of the documentary "Not Old" shortlisted for the 15th main competition, returns with his life experience this time. Also around the topic of cancer and life, the documentary "Longevity" focused on the conversation between himself and his father. The poetic daily life extends more inquiries about life, death, destiny, dreams and reality. Behind the hope of "immortality" is the real life experience.

"Longevity" poster

The family space is so cramped that the naked eye can see it, and it is even more difficult to break through the dilemma of a person's thinking. The family is to the individual, and the society is to the family, a nest of warmth and a rut of restraint. The 30-year-old Fang Junrui, the protagonist of "The Nest", hopes to pursue a rich spiritual world, but always negates each other with the environment in which he lives. The so-called "personality is politics", behind unreconcilable families and unrealized ideals, is the indelible mark engraved on individuals by decades of changes in the times.

The Nest poster

Mobile children, mobile teachers. "Dandelions Before the Wind Blows" records a choir composed of immigrant children "walking south and singing north" in the city's changes. During this journey accompanied by music, they have been savoring the joys and sorrows of youth. Here, music is not only about how ignorant teenagers settle themselves in uncertainty, but also as a way to deal with the times.

"Dandelion Before the Wind" poster

In the school of fish swimming against the current, she didn't have the courage to swim to the other side, because she didn't live for herself. As for who it was for, Wu Jun thought it was his daughter, and later thought it was his mother. Husband, daughter, mother... Fate seems to be teasing her, and climbing to the top is just like Sisyphus' fable, and the pressures in the process are heavy boulders that keep rolling down. "The Rooster with the Golden Cockscomb" tells how a mother can live out herself and get out of the predicament in the midst of grief, struggle and transcendence.

"The Rooster with the Golden Crest" poster

"Illness is like the night of life, a heavier identity...As the days go by, we must, or are cursed, find ourselves as beings of another world." In Susan In Sontag's pen, the metaphor of disease is the silent weight of the patient. In Xiaolong's life, physical barriers and geographical barriers still can't stop him from riding China's "Journey to the World". On the road, a motorcycle tricycle dangles to carry the dignity of a person and a group of people living in a hidden corner. and the quest for love.

"The Journey of the World" poster

Because of the gradual solidification of the circle, each of us inevitably lives in some kind of information cocoon. At this time, through the lens of the documentary, maintain a real sense of touch, let more aspects of reality worthy of attention enter the field of vision, and let more voices of sorrow and joy that should be heard enter the heart. A contemporary answer to the question "what makes a good documentary".