The 27th Shanghai International Film Festival, scheduled to take place between June 13 and 22, will set up a unit especially for screenings of Asian films, featuring renowned directors and the newest collection of works in the field.

Here's a preview of the films selected in the Asian collection and Viva La Festival.

Asia Now | Asian Collection

She Taught Me Serendipity

The Japanese romantic film, directed by Akiko Ohku, features two rising actors — Riku Hagiwara and Yuumi Kawai. The director is known for portraying female characters with strong personalities. This film, however, marks her first time crafting a love story centered around a male protagonist.

At the Bench

The story is about different groups of people sitting on a bench by the riverside, which is presented in short episodes. The director, Yoshiyuki Okuyama, who is also an emerging Japanese photographer, captures the transient moments in Tokyo, a constantly evolving city.

Sato and Sato

This film, directed by Chihiro Amano, focuses on communication with others, exploring how people understand each other and make compromises. The two characters have completely different personalities but fall in love and get married.

Grand Maison Paris

This film is a continuation of the TV program Grand Maison Tokyo. Directed by Ayuko Tsukahara, the film follows the story of famous Japanese chef Obana, portrayed by Takuya Kimura. As he opens a restaurant in Paris and seeks his third Michelin star, he faces challenges as an outsider and sourcing ingredients. Tensions rise with staff over the ambitious menu.

Good Luck

Shin Adachi's fourth film might struggle to escape comparisons with Richard Linklater's Before Sunrise (1995), yet he does succeed in offering the spectator a completely different narrative, different in tone and theme.

The story unfolds between an independent film director and a woman who claims to have watched his film. The two-day trip is partly about sightseeing and partly self-reflection. The interactions between the lead characters are natural and funny. They wander around in the mysterious wild in search of the meaning of life.

SIFF Highlights | Viva La Festival

Boomerang

Over the course of a week, this film, directed by Shahab Fotouhi, paints a sociological snapshot of modern Tehran. As the marriage of two people from a seemingly hopeless and defeated generation comes to an end, a new romance begins to blossom among a younger generation discovering the city and its realities anew.

By the Stream

This 2024 South Korean drama film written and directed by Hong Sang-soo, was selected to compete for the Golden Leopard at the 77th Locarno Film Festival, where Kim Min-hee won the Pardo for Best Performance for her role as Jeonim. Scandals are everywhere in the film, in which Jeonim persuades her uncle to direct a theatrical skit at the university she works at. While she sketches near a stream, a scandalous incident involving some students occurs, implicating both Jeonim and her uncle.

Source: thepaper.cn