For the 12th Beijing International Film Festival (BJIFF), more than 80 Chinese and foreign films are screened at the event of Online BJIFF—iQIYI Online Film Screening from August 10 to 23, 2022. Movie-goers can not only watch the films selected in the Beijing Film Panorama in theaters, but also log on to iQIYI and enter the Online BJIFF feature page to get a sneak peek.

The New Wave of the Internet section, one of the most popular sections for movie fans, will present 17 of the latest popular online films. Among them, Today and Me produced by Beijing Flying Youth Culture Media Company is a headliner.

　　

The film is co-directed by Zhao Xiaoxi and Zhao Xiao’ou, with Yu Hua and Mo Yan as executive producers, Liang Zhenhua as the chief screenwriter and producer, and Hu Yating as the screenwriter. Starring several outstanding young and middle-aged actors such as Wang Jinsong, Qiao Zhenyu, Liu Yun, Gao Weiguang, Cao Lei, Sun Qian, and Yin Fang. It was produced with artisan spirit and has set a new benchmark for creating high-quality online movies. As a film dedicated to the Teachers’ Day, Today and Me chronicles many important milestones in the history of Chinese education, allowing us to see the figures of many great educators. From these lofty figures, we can feel the moving spirit of our nation’s teachers in transferring knowledge from generation to generation.

As a non-profit film, Today and Me will be screened on August 18 for free on the iQIYI platform as a surprise. You can scan the QR code below or click “read more” to check the information. Movie fans should never miss it!

　　

The First Perspective section presents to fans three films, Sardar Udham, Palm Springs, and About Endlessness.

Based on real people and events, Sardar Udham tells the story of how the protagonist Udham Singh escaped alive from the Amritsar massacre during the period of India under colonial rule, stayed stoic, sought opportunities, and finally took revenge.

The film’s magnificent and visually stunning scenes and exquisite spatial design thoroughly showcase the indomitable spirit of the Indian resistance to colonial rule. The film features a complex historical time frame but a clear narrative, extending from individual emotions to national sentiments, with both the structural integrity of a feature film and the authenticity and density of a historical biopic.

Sardar Udham has been selected for the Tiantan Award, the Competition Section, at this year’s BJIFF, and will be screened at Beijing Geological Hall Theatre on August 18 during its showings on the iQIYI platform. Fans can visit the feature page of the “12th BJIFF” on the Maoyan Entertainment ticketing platform to purchase tickets.

　　

Palm Springs is a romantic comedy film about a story that Nyles, who is disappointed in love, meets Sarah, a girl who’s perverse and rakish, at a wedding, kicking off a constant and hilarious relationship. The film follows the design of the time loop. But the director adds more ingenuity to it, coming up with something new and different—in the face of eternal love and ordinary daily life, you will want to stay in this loop forever, perhaps this time.

About Endlessness is the work of maverick director Roy Andersson, and is his next feature film following A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence. The film continues Roy Andersson’s consistent style, with staged scenes in space like an empty exhibition, using an indifferent and detached perspective to quietly tell life and death, love and pain, noise and loneliness in this world. The eyes of compassion are silently gazing at this vast land where everything is left to its own devices, writing a romantic and absurd poem.

As the year 2022 marks the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations between China and Argentina, the BJIFF and the Argentine Embassy in China have jointly established the Argentine Film Week section, where five Argentine films will be screened—Machine for the Aura, The Heist Of The Century, Zama, The Secret In Their Eyes, and The Motorcycle Diaries. Among them, the new film Machine for the Aura by young Argentine directors Ana Laura Monserrat and Nahuel Srnec has been selected as the opening film of the Week.

　　

　　

Machine for the Aura tells a story of Valeria, a young woman scientist, who discovers the existence of a type of energy typical of living beings that can theoretically be observed only by women. She seeks to prove the existence of this energy to older male scientists, but no one believes it. At the moment, Marcela Bonardi, a girl who can see the energy aura, and her photographer brother Juan Ignacio Bonardi, come to Valeria. The film depicts a journey of pursuing the “aura of soul” from the female perspective in warm and delicate words, and makes a perfect combination of women’s love and self-worth discussion with narrative technique.

This year, the Global View section has singled out two Israeli films: the action sci-fi comedy OMG, I’m a Robot! directed by Tal Goldberg and Gal Zelezniak and the war film Spring 1941 directed by Uri Barbash.

Spring 1941 tells the story of Clara and her husband Artur Planck who take their daughter to a village where they find a grocery store as a safe house during World War II. The grocer Emilia requests Artur to pose as her husband to avoid a search, but Clara finds out that the two are romantically linked. Amidst the horrors of the war, they do not know what is right or wrong, but lose control of themselves, leaving dreary sighs only.

Online BJIFF—iQIYI Online Film Screening for the 12th BJIFF is now fully available online. Let’s enjoy this film feast together!