Taiwan Showbiz Latest News and Updates

Sophia Sun Intern Indonesia’s Giovanni Rustanto brings “A Ballad of Long Hair” to the 2023 Taiwan Creative Content Fest, its latest stop on a tour of project markets and labs. Set in the 1990s, the project centers around an Indonesian-Chinese young man who inherits a magical trait from his witch mother – his hair grows half a centimeter every night. Possessing mesmerizingly long hair and a unique talent for ethereal metal music, he stands up against oppressive forces and sparks a youth rebellion that challenges toxic masculinity and government corruption.

Taiwan Creative Content Fest kicked off in Taipei today with organizer, Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA), emphasizing its soft power ambitions and growing international cooperation activities, in particular with France, South Korea and Japan. 

EXCLUSIVE: Los Angeles-based distributor Orchid Tree Media has acquired North American rights to Anastasia Tsang’s A Light Never Goes Out, which is Hong Kong’s submission for Best International Feature at the Oscars. A theatrical release is being lined up in select cinemas. 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief CJ ENM Hong Kong, a unit of South Korea’s CJ ENM, has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA), Far EasTone Telecommunications (FET) and local TV network – TVBS to launch a multi-year content fund that would support the co-production and joint distribution of audiovisual content. The “strategic alliance” combines assets including production, distribution and marketing, media networks and technology.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Japanese entertainment conglomerate Kadokawa is seeking to double its international revenues through a strategy of diversification and localization. Taiwan is expected to be a key plank in the outreach, executives at the Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF) heard on Tuesday. “Currently 20% of Kadokawa’s revenues come from outside Japan. I want to get this figure to 40%,” said Natsuno Takeshi, CEO Kadokawa Corp. Kadokawa has its roots in publishing of comics and other fiction and also has deeply-established roots in film production and distribution.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief A trio of ministers, accompanied by a fleet of senior industry names, were on hand Tuesday in Taipei to give their official blessing to the opening of the fourth running of the Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF) – and to underline the Taiwan government’s investment in soft power. Cheng Wen-tsan, VP of the [government executive branch] Executive Yuan, Taiwan’s Minister of Culture, Shih Che, and a minister without portfolio were accompanied by Chunghwa Telecom’s chairman, Kuo Shui-Yi, head of TAICCA Homme Tsai and Dominique Boutonnat, president of France’s National Center of Cinematography and the Moving Image, on stage at the Songshan Cultural and Creative Park, a former-tobacco factory site that has since been redeveloped. “Nowadays we are investing not only in semiconductors and heavy industry, but also in media and content,” said Cheng. He confirmed that some NT$10 billion ($310 million) of government funding has been approved for the “1 Plus 4T Content Plan” and will be released over four years. In a classic example of public-private partnerships, state cash is being supplemented by further financial commitments from Taiwan’s three major cable-telecoms-internet groups through deals signed last week with Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA).

Screenworks Asia, the production subsidiary of Taiwan’s Catchplay, is teaming with the Taiwanese arm of Chinese platform iQiyi to jointly stream two of its original series: Not a Murder Story and I Can See You Shine.

Sophia Sun Intern Indian director Suman Sen (Oscar-nominated short film “The Silent Echo”) is at the 2023 Taiwan Creative Content Fest with his in-development debut feature film “Solo” (aka “Solo”). The film will center around a story about a mundane 62-year-old diabetic insurance worker, Biplab, who is tormented by everyday trivialities. Feeling frustrated and hopeless about the community he lives in, he begins to question the government’s choice to erect a massive statue.

Sophia Sun Intern American-Taiwanese actor and director Peter Ho (“Wind and Cloud”) is at the 2023 Taiwan Creative Content Fest with in-development film project “Appetite for Desire.” The completed picture is intended to be a 120 minute film that tells the story of clout-chasing YouTubers Yong Cheng and Gao Wei who are introduced to a mysterious dish called Kappa meat by their high school classmate. The magic Kappa meat gives them temporary superpower which allows them to create more extreme video contents. However, as Yong Cheng and Gao Wei become more and more reliant on it, a darker secret about it is being revealed.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Screenworks Asia, the production subsidiary of Taiwan-based streaming platform Catchplay, has set two series to release early next year. “Not A Murder Story” follows a wannabe actor who finally gets a chance of success. And when he wakes up with a dead woman besides him, he is determined not to let it stand in his way.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Unscripted queer reality dating series “Boys Like Boys” is to air on Warner Bros. Discovery’s TLC channel in Taiwan in early 2024, making it the first local LGBTQ+ dating reality show to air on linear TV in the territory. The show is an original production by GagaOOLala, Asia’s out and proud LGBTQ+ streaming service, which is pitching an expanded array of queer content at the Taiwan Creative Contents Fest (TCCF) that launches Tuesday in Taipei. “Boys Like Boys” had its premiere at the Kaohsiung International Film Festival and is now available worldwide on GagaOOLala and WeTV in the Philippines and Thailand, where the ‘Boys Love’ genre has become highly popular.

Sophia Sun Intern Taiwan director and screenwriter Hsu Chao-jen is pitching “Mr. Tiger” at the 2023 Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF), which launches in Taipei on Tuesday. The film “Mr.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief TAICCABOSSAs Taiwan seeks for creative, industrial and political reasons to make a bigger mark for itself on the international stage, its Taiwan Creative Content Fest is diversifying, expanding and making greater efforts at cross-border outreach. Homme Tsai, chair of industry support body TAICCA spoke outline the event’s strategy and novelties in a conversation with Variety. What are the objectives of the Taiwan Creative Content Fest? The TCCF is an international event for content licensing and project investment.

Taiwanese LGBTQ+ Streamer GagaOOLala has announced a packed slate of originals and acquired titles on the eve of Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF), including unscripted queer reality dating series Boys Like Boys. 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Warner Bros. Discovery, Taiwan Mobile and the Taiwan Creative Content Agency have signed a multi-year memorandum of understanding to create and distribute Taiwanese original content locally and across international markets. The MOU, signed in advance of next week’s TCCF event, combines the expertise and reach of the three companies to develop, produce and distribute local IP and content for both local and global audiences.

Warner Bros Discovery‘s international restructuring has continued with James Gibbons setting out the shape of his Asia Pacific team, with Japanese Country Manager Masami Takahashi choosing to retire.

Naman Ramachandran Warner Bros. Discovery has revealed several leadership roles across its Asia Pacific (APAC) business, following the appointment of James Gibbons as president, Asia Pacific, in October.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Subscription video subscriptions in Taiwan increased by 315,000 in the July to September quarter, to reach 5.8 million, according toa new research report. Netflix and Disney+ were responsible for the bulk of the growth. The “Online Video in Taiwan” report from consultancy Media Partners Asia and its AMPD Research sister company showed premium VOD engagement and subscriptions were up 6% quarter on quarter.

Taiwan saw significant premium VOD subscriber and engagement growth in the third quarter of 2023, adding 315,000 net new SVOD subs to reach a total of 5.8 million subscriptions, according to a report by Media Partners Asia.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken was repeatedly interrupted at a Senate hearing today by about a dozen protesters opposed to Israel’s actions in Gaza.

Warner Bros Discovery has signed a multi-year Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Taiwan Mobile and Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA) to create and distribute Taiwanese original content locally and across international markets.

EXCLUSIVE: Picture Tree International (PTI) has boarded sales on German Iranian director Alireza Golafshan’s comedy Everything’s Fifty Fifty about a divorced couple who embark on a family vacation, ahead of the AFM.

Emiliano De Pablos In standout results that suggests the strength of select Spanish arthouse films on the current international market, Bendita Films Sales, the Santa Cruz de Tenerife-based boutique world sales agency, has closed a formidable raft of deals to Galician auteur Lois Patiño’s multisensory journey film “Samsara.” Winner of a Special Jury Award at Berlin’s 2023 major sidebar Encounters and the Audience Award at Mexico’s Ficunam festival, “Samsara” has just screened in main competition gathered “Samsara”(Oct. 20-28), running up more than a dozen international film festival selections. Bendita Film Sales has clinched commercial release pacts in the U.K.

Launching in the first year of the pandemic in 2020, Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF) has taken a few years to secure its positioning in the global film markets calendar, but this year’s edition is on track to be its biggest and most international yet. 

After focusing on Taiwanese projects for its first three years, the pitching section of Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF) opened its doors to international projects for the first time this year. 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Vietnam-based sales agent Skyline Media has closed multi-territory deals for two of its current titles “The Soul Reaper” and “Vietnamese Horror Story.” The deals follow Skyline’s recent trip to Busan’s ACFM and come ahead of its participation as exhibitor at a string of further final quarter sales events – Tokyo’s TIFFCOM, Santa Monica’s American Film Market and Taipei’s Taiwan Creative Content Fest. Folk horror film “The Soul Reaper,” currently in the final stages of post-production, was licensed to GaragePlay for Taiwan and to Westec Media Limited (WML) for Laos, Cambodia and nine other Southeast Asian territories. The film, adapted from Thao Trang’s best-selling horror novel “Lunar New Year in Hell Village” (aka “Tet O Lang Dia Nguc”), is set to be released in Vietnam cinemas on 08 December. GaragePlay is one of Taiwan’s leading distributors, and recently handles releases of “Suzume,” “John Wick: Chapter 4” and “Someday or One Day.” WML is the biggest content distributor in Cambodia and has distributed more than 1,000 titles theatrically since its establishment.

It’s official: Hou Hsiao-hsien has retired from filmmaking. Deadline reports that the Taiwanese filmmaker’s family released a statement earlier this week that confirms he’s retiring after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The immediate family of leading Taiwanese film director Hou Hsiao-hsien said on Wednesday that he had retired from filmmaking due to illness and is now living peacefully in retirement. They said that their family-run company remains active and in business. The statement (see below) was issued in response to news articles earlier this week that followed an introductory speech given in London by critic and curator Tony Rayns before a screening of 1985 title “A Time to Live and a Time to Die,” one of Hou’s best-known features. Rayns was reported to have said that Hou has dementia, will not direct again and that members of Hou’s company had lost their jobs. The family statement – signed by Cao Baofeng, Hou’s wife, son Isaac Hou and daughter Bess Hou – explained that Hou had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease before the COVID pandemic and that COVID had, to their surprise, worsened the problems. They continued by saying that Hou has recovered from the COVID-related complications and is now resting quietly at home with his family.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Chinese film sales company Parallax Films is poised to make a splash this week in Tokyo. The outfit has two titles in the Tokyo International Film Festival official selection and a host of festival-travelled Chinese films in the TIFFCOM market. Appearing in main competition is “A Long Shot,” a crime drama by first time feature director Gao Peng.

President Joe Biden‘s Oval Office address drew an estimated 20.3 million people across 10 networks.

Ed Sheeran has announced the cities, dates and venues for the highly anticipated Asia leg of his ‘+ – = ÷ x’ tour.Ed Sheeran will hold a total of nine concerts across Asia, from January to March 2024. It’ll kick-off in late-January with two show in Japan, before heading to Taiwan and Southeast Asia in February.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The inaugural edition of the Cinema at Sea – Okinawa Pan-Pacific International Film Festival will be held next month (Nov. 23-29) on the Japanese island of Okinawa.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent Rome Film Fest opener “There’s Still Tomorrow,” a bold period dramedy that marks the directorial debut of popular Italian actor Paola Cortellesi, has scored a slew of international sales. The film, shot in black-and-white and set in post-World War II Rome, riffs on Italy’s neorealist past, albeit with a female empowerment element angle and a contemporary A-list Italian cast.

Naman Ramachandran Classic cult film streamer Cultpix has signed a content rights partnership with the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute (TFAI), formerly known as the Taiwan Film Institute. The agreement, the fast-growing streamer’s 50th, will kick off with two films, “The Fantasy of the Deer Warrior” (1961) and “The Bride Who Returned from Hell” (1965), which have both been digitally restored by the TFAI. The partnership was revealed at the ongoing Lumière Film Festival in Lyon, France.

Manic Street Preachers and Suede have added an Eden Sessions show to their joint 2024 UK and Ireland tour – find out how to get tickets below.The bands, who toured Europe together in 1993 before recreating the line-up for a North American tour in 2022, recently announced a joint UK and Ireland tour for next year. Both acts head to Japan, Singapore and Taiwan this winter for other shared dates.Today (October 16) the Manics and Suede have revealed a fresh date for the tour, which sees them stop by Cornwall to play the Eden Sessions on June 29, 2024.

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media Reporter “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour” is towering over the global box office with estimates of $126 million to $130 million in its first weekend of release. It’s a seismic start for any concert film, but this is particularly impressive because it was announced just six weeks ago and unspooled on the big screen with minimal marketing dollars. “The Eras Tour” which is produced by Swift and distributed by AMC Theatres, collected a projected $31 million to $33 million from 94 international markets.