Program Director

This year marks the eighth year of the Taichung International Animation Festival (TIAF). Being the only film festival that centers its theme around "animation" in Taiwan's major cities, we can see that Taichung is a vibrant and creative city. Furthermore, with the increasing number of competing films every year, it is apparent that the festival has slowly achieved popularity and credibility among animation directors and filmmakers worldwide.

We settled on "Transform．Rebirth" as this year's theme with the idea of bringing new hope into the instability caused by the pandemic these recent years. As for this year's "Director in Focus," we've invited YAMAMURA Koji, an iconic animation artist in Japan, and CHIU Li-Wei, the leading representative of Taiwan's local animation branding for many years. We hope that Director YAMAMURA Koji's fantastical, childlike wonder and the visual style CHUI Li-Wei developed with his many television series and short films will bring new meaning and perspective to this year's theme.

The festival will begin with two opening films: "No.7 Cherry Lane" by the internationally renowned Hong Kong director YON Fan and the Annecy award-winning "Dozen of Norths" by YAMAMURA Koji, one of this year's directors in focus. Set in the nostalgic 1960s Hong Kong, "No.7 Cherry Lane" tells a story full of emotion and forbidden passion with slow and elegant pacing. On the other hand, "Dozen of Norths" is filled with the director's usual whimsical, childlike style and speaks of the mysteries of time and space through peculiar characters in various exciting situations in this strange land of the north. The closing film is "Inu-Oh," the newest film from the famous Japanese director YUASA Masaaki. He is a rare gem that thrives in both artistic and industrial animation and has beautifully adapted the original novel with the language of animation. As for the "Feature Films" program, like in previous years, we've also chosen films that are internationally highly recognized, such as "FLEE" and "The Crossing," which separately won the Cristal and Jury award for feature films at the Annecy International Animation Festival. Other than that, we will also screen many family-friendly films that are suitable for refined and popular tastes"Perlimps" and " The Great Detective Sherlock Holmes - The Greatest Jail-Breaker," with the hopes of attracting more audience to join in on the fun!

We've invited the best local animation curators and scholars to help organize this year's themed programs. Including Professor SHIH Chang-Jay from the National Taiwan University of Arts Department of Multimedia Arts, Professor WANG Chi-Sui from Taipei National University of the Arts Department of Animation, and Hiroshiman International Animation Festival nominated director LIN Ching-Hsuan. They have not only assisted in curating the "Baby Universe" programs but also hand-picked suitable films for the themed "New Angles" programs, "Crazy Morphology," "The Journey of Metamorphosis," and "Start Over."

Lastly, I wish to thank the city government team, the Taichung Film Development Foundation, the guest curators, the juries, and the festival staff. Because of their cooperative effort and the support of the sponsors, we were able to hold this annual animation celebration successfully!

Program Director  CHANG Yen-Jung