'Seediq Bale' wins Golden Equine

BEIJING -- Hong Kong and Taiwan centered the Golden Equine Film Honours, the greatest Chinese-language kudofest, with Taiwan's foreign-language Oscar entry, "Players from the Rainbow: Seediq Bale," winning best film, and Ann Hui's "An Easy Existence," Hong Kong's foreign-language entry, taking helmer, actress and actor honours. "I'm thrilled to win -- I really hope I will not possess a stroke," "Simple Existence" helmer Ann Hui told a ceremony in Hsinchu, Northern Taiwan. Best actress visited veteran Hong Kong thesp Deanie Ip, who also won best actress at Venice in September on her role within the film. "An Easy Existence" handles the connection between an ageing domestic assistant, performed by Ip, and her employer, performed by Andy Lau, who won best actor. "I wish to thank Andy Lau and Ann Hui for giving me this opportunity only at that age," stated the 63-year-old Ip. Lau stated the honours ought to be a rallying demand the Hong Kong film biz to emulate those of Taiwan, that is showing strong signs and symptoms of revival. The honours reflected the altering dynamic from the Chinese-language film biz. From the 22 groups granted, 10 were won by five Hong Kong-Landmass China co-productions. Six Taiwanese films won in nine groups, while one Hong Kong film required home three honours. Hui required the very best helmer prize in front of Wei Te-sheng, who was simply hotly expected for "Seediq Bale," Wei Te-sheng's $24 million pic, the most costly film in Taiwan's history. In addition to best pic, some 1/2-hour "Seediq Bale" required several technical honours. Pic shows the Wushe Incident, a 1930 uprising by aboriginal Seediq players from the Japanese when Taiwan was colonized. Landmass Chinese helmer Jiang Wen had been broadly likely to sweep the honours, but ultimately his "Allow the Bullets Fly" required the cinematography and modified script honours. The fest has two worldwide honours. The FIPRESCI Award visited Zhang Meng's "The Piano within the Factory," as the NETPAC award visited Malaysian Dain Said's "Bunohan." Peter Ho-Sun Chan's fighting techinques drama "Wu Xia" required three honours for choreography, visual effects and art direction. The Golden Equine honours occur in self-ruled Taiwan and also the jury consists of Taiwanese, landmass Chinese and Hong Kong idol judges. They judge Chinese-language films from Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore and China, including Hong Kong and Macau. Films from Landmass China were first allowed to participate throughout the the nineteen nineties. Contact the range newsroom at news@variety.com