The Chinese Independent Film Foundation (CIFF) is a
not-for-profit screen culture organisation dedicated
to showcasing new and old art-house Chinese-language
cinema across Australia. Founded in Narrm/Melbourne,
CIFF works with collaborators across mainland China,
Hong Kong and Taiwan to present films that
rarely receive theatrical release locally.


SPECIAL SCREENING – ACMI 

CHINESE AUSTRALIAN SHORT FILMS
A new wave of Chinese-Australian filmmakers are emerging as a bold generation of storytellers, eager to assert their place within both national and global cinema.

Presented by the Chinese Independent Film Foundation, this program gathers seven award-winning shorts, spanning 2012 to 2024, previously screened at Festival de Cannes, Toronto International Film Festival, MIFF, BFI London and more. Featuring Australian diaspora filmmakers, alongside directors from Singapore and mainland China who have lived and worked in Australia, the selection traces the stories shaping contemporary Chinese-Australian screen culture.

The screening will be followed with a panel discussion with the filmmakers, moderated by curator and artist Nikki Lam.

FARAWAYS (2012),  dir. Audrey Lam
WITHERED BLOSSOMS (2024), dir.  Lionel Seah
A GENTLE NIGHT  (2017), dir.  Qiu Yang
DANCING GIRL & BALLOON MAN (2023), dir. David Ma
BONG XI FA CAI (2024), dir. Johnathan Lo
TUI NA (2022), dir. William Duan
IDOL (2020), dir. Alex Wu

Where: ACMI, Fed Square
When: Thursday, March 26,  7.30pm

Tickets.
ACMI + THE ART GALLERY OF NSW | 2025

FOCUS ON QUEER 
中文 CINEMA
In 2025, CIFF curated and presented a selection of 18 queer Chinese-language films, from June 19 – August 2 at ACMI, and September 13 – November 1 at the Art Gallery of NSW. This program was presented with the curatorial support of the Beijing Queer Film Festival – mainland China’s longest running queer arts festival.

Spanning Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien and other dialects, this program captured queer experiences with nuance, emotional depth and cultural specificity. Everyday conversations, family tensions, unspoken desires and quiet acts of resistance unfold not only through story, but also through the cinematic form itself – traversing fiction, documentary and experimental modes.

SPRING FEVER 春风沉醉的夜晚 (2009)
THE TWO LIVES OF LI ERMAO 李二毛的两次人生 (2019)
HAPPY TOGETHER 春光乍洩 (1997)
THE LAST YEAR OF DARKNESS 最后的黑暗之年 (2023)
THE WEDDING BANQUET 喜宴 (1993)
SAVING FACE (2004)
THE RIVER 河流 (1997)
GREEN SNAKE 青蛇 (1993)
EAST PALACE, WEST PALACE 东宫西宫 (1996)
BE A WOMAN 舞娘 (2011)  
QUEER CHINA, ‘COMRADE’ CHINA 同志中国 (2008)
THE PARISIAN IN BALI VILLAGE 巴黎人在八里庄 (2023)
HERE, HOPEFULLY 希望在哪里 (2022)
FLYING FISH 会飞的鱼 (2024)
OUTPICKER (2024)
FROZEN OUT 无地自容 (2021)
WEGEN HEGEL 色空 (2023)


SEASONAL PROGRAM – ACMI

FOCUS ON TONY LEUNG CHIU-WAI

As part of ACMI’s upcoming Focus on Tony Leung Chiu-wai season, CIFF was invited to curate three early and rarely screened works from Tony Leung Chiu-wai 梁朝偉‘s celebrated career, spotlighting lesser-seen chapters of his filmography. Moving into film, Tony has become a director’s actor, working with some truly iconic filmmakers, including Wong Kar-wai, John Woo, Johnnie To, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Ang Lee, Zhang Yi-mou, Ildikó Enyedi and Tran Anh Hung. The list is as impressive as it is long. Join us in the cinema as we journey deep into the films and get lost in the thoughtful eyes of Tony Leung Chiu-wai.

THREE SUMMERS 三個夏天 (1992)
LOVE UNTO WASTE 地下情（1986)
THE LONGEST NITE 暗花 (1997)

Tickets.
ESSAY | Words by William Duan

Thoughts on East Palace, West Palace


“Fantasy and the performance of desire play a central role in the film East Palace, West Palace – through fantasy, Zhang Yuan ultimately captures a reality of queerness in ‘90s China, a time when homosexuality faced severe societal and legal repression. The film plays out on the knife’s edge of binaries, firstly through the dichotomy presented in its title: East and West – and then reverberating throughout the rest of the film; night and day, freedom and repression, exterior performance and hidden interiority.”

READ MORE.

William Duan (he/they) is an award-winning filmmaker based in Naarm (Melbourne), Australia. They are inspired by deeply human stories from the diaspora. Learn more about William’s work here.

This piece was especially commissioned by CIFF to celebrate the Foundation’s Focus on Queer 中文 Cinema program. 

CENTER STAGE
阮玲玉 (1991) Directed by Stanley Kwan 關錦鵬 (Hong Kong) 
Program: Panorama of Chinese Film Blending historical reconstruction with contemporary reflection, Center Stage revisits the life of 1930s screen icon Ruan Lingyu through a self-reflexive cinematic form. By interweaving reenactment, archival material and present-day interviews, the film collapses temporal distance and foregrounds the act of looking itself. On an audiovisual level, shifting textures and performance registers emphasise history as something continuously re-staged rather than fixed, transforming biography into a meditation on stardom, gender and spectatorship.

THE SPRING RIVER FLOWS EAST
一江春水向東流 (1947)  Directed by Cai Chusheng 蔡楚生 & Zheng Junli 鄭君里 (China) 
Program: Once Upon A Time In 華語 CinemaThis two-part masterpiece follows a couple torn apart by war and circumstance, spanning years of longing, betrayal, and moral collapse. Its storytelling ambition and emotional depth set a benchmark for modern Chinese cinema. The film’s power lies in its humanity—how private suffering mirrors national trauma. It remains a cornerstone of cinematic memory, carrying the stories, wounds, and endurance of its era.
Sunday, September 13, 2pm

ACMI (Melb) tickets

THREE CASTRATED GOATS 三个羯子 (2024) Directed by Ye Xingyu 叶星宇 (China) 
Program: Panorama of Chinese Film A rare comedy film capturing the absurd reality of rural China under the influence of Covid-19 pandemic back in 2022. Fei returns to his village from the city to sell goats. As pandemic breaks out in the city, Fei is trapped in the village. When volunteers come to do a PCR test, they notice one goat sneezing. Its escape into the village turns one man's quarantine into a complete farce.

DRAGON INN
龍門客棧 (1967)  Directed by King Hu 胡金銓 (Taiwan) 
Program: Once Upon A Time In 華語 CinemaDragon Inn stages a moral duel between loyal fugitives and corrupt power at a desert outpost. With architectural precision, silence, and swift choreography, Hu forged a cinematic language that balances suspense and serenity. Its influence goes far beyond its genre: a study in rhythm, virtue, and the choreography of justice. The film’s timeless energy shows how Chinese-language cinema turns movement into philosophy and legend into art.
Sunday, August 2, 2pm

ACMI (Melb) tickets

TEN YEARS 十年 (2015) Directed by Kiwi Chow, Jevons Au, Kwok Zune, Ng Ka-Leung, Wong Fei-Pang (Hong Kong) 
Program: Panorama of Chinese Film Comprising five short films by emerging Hong Kong filmmakers, Ten Years imagines a near-future city shaped by authoritarian control, cultural erasure and everyday fear. Set in a speculative 2025, the film depicts ordinary citizens navigating censorship, surveillance and repression. Blending dystopian fiction with social realism, Ten Years operates as both political allegory and urgent warning - capturing collective anxiety at a moment when the future feels disturbingly close.

STORM UNDER THE SUN 紅日風暴 (2007)  Directed by Wei Shiyu 魏時煜 & Peng Xiaolian 彭小莲 (China) 
Program: Once Upon A Time In 華語 CinemaStorm Under the Sun reconstructs the 1950s Anti-Rightist Campaign through survivor testimony and forbidden archives. Stripping away propaganda, it reveals how fear and silence reshaped generations of Chinese intellectuals and artists. As an act of resistance, its power lies in restoring names and voices erased from the national record—a stark reminder that cinema’s role is not just to dream, but to preserve truth where memory fails.
Sunday, July 5, 2pm

ACMI (Melb) tickets
Address: Elsewhere Books
Level 3, 139 Franklin Street, Melbourne

CIFF acknowledges the Traditional Owners of
the unceded land on which we work and create,
the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung and Bunurong
peoples, and the wider Kulin Nations.