20 November 2014 - The Maryo Delos Reyes film “Bamboo Flowers” overwhelmingly won the Audience Favorite award at the 1st Silk Road International Film Festival which opened on October 20 and was concluded on October 25, in the city of Xi’an in Shaanxi Province, China, the starting point of the ancient Silk Road.
“Bamboo Flowers” chronicles the lives of ordinary folks living on the island of Bohol and how they cope with the numerous changes in the world around them.
The Philippine Embassy in Beijing received the award on behalf of the Film Development Council of the Philippines (FDCP), which produced all four Filipino film entries in the Film Festival under the auspices of its Sineng Pambansa program.
Three other Filipino films also made it to the finals of the festival, namely, “Anac Ti Pating” ("A Shark’s Child ”), a coming-of-age story of a young boy in Baguio City directed by Martin Masadao; “Ang Babae sa Likod ng Mambabatok” (“The Woman Behind the Tattoo Artist”) directed by Lauren Sevilla Faustino about a 92-year-old living legend who is called the ‘Last [Traditional] Tattoo Artist of Kalinga’; and “Sonata,” directed by Peque Gallaga and Lore Reyes, a story about the unlikely friendship between a reclusive retired opera singer and a young boy.
Organized by the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT) of the People’s Republic of China, this first-ever Silk Road International Film Festival was composed of five events: film panoramas, an award ceremony, the Silk Road cultural forum, a film market and film-themed concerts.
Almost 200 movies from all over the world took part in the competition section of the festival. Among the 41 movies that made it among the finalists that vied for the festival’s top awards, more than three-fourths, or 31, were foreign movies while 10 were Chinese productions. A total of 144 films from 24 countries were screened during the festival.
Since the festival’s "Silk Road" theme included both the overland Silk Road and the Maritime Silk Road, which started from Fujian Province, the hosting of the film festival will be rotated between Xi’an and the city of Fuzhou in Fujian Province. END