Young filmmaker Ho Thanh Thao is one of five winners at the 2021 CJ Short Film Making Project 2021 with the film titled Diem Bao (A Bad Omen), featuring a widow’s fight against a stranger in her dreams who causes bad luck for her son. (Photo courtesy of the organisers) Vietnamese residents aged 18-40 are encouraged to send their entries to thecontest by May 28 at //duanphimngancj.cgv.vn.
Eligible entries include short films (not animation or documentary) made in thelast three years, an outline for a new film project, and a detailed plan forfilmmaking.
The contests will be judged by the country’s leading directors, including Phan DangDi, Nguyen Hoang Diep, Trinh Dinh Le Minh, and Tran Thanh Huy, and filmproducer Tran Thi Bich Ngoc.
The judges will seek 10 projects for a Q&A session on June 14, and thenselect the best five projects which will be given 300 million VND (13,000 USD)each to make the films.
They will also become the mentors of the final five during the filmmakingprocess to ensure that the films meet qualifications for international filmfestivals.
Director Phan Dang Di, an independent filmmaker who has won many awards atinternational film festivals, said, “every director needs a quality andwell-invested short film as a platform to start his or her career, so the contestis doing a good job to help Vietnamese filmmakers to make their dreams cometrue.”
Di is well known for his drama Bi, Dung So! (Bi, Don’t Be Afraid), which wonthe Best Screenwriter at the Critics Week category of the Cannes Film Festival2010. He is also a founder of Autumn Meeting, an international cinema eventproviding opportunity for young filmmakers in the region.
The winner of this year’s contest will be announced in December.
The CJ Short Film Making Project was initiated by the CJ Cultural Foundationand CJ CGV Vietnam in 2018, aiming to bring works by Vietnamese filmmakers totop international film festivals.
The contest received 250 entries in 2018, 300 in 2019, and 298 in 2021.
All the entries have featured different genres, and various topics and storiescovering aspects of life and humanity.
Many productions from the contest have been selected to screen and compete atover 50 international film festivals around the world.
Some of them won top prizes, such as Mot Khu Dat Tot (Blessed Land) by PhamNgoc Lan winning Best Film at the International Competition for Fiction &Documentaries at the 16th VIS Vienna Shorts Festival in Austria in 2019.
All productions from the contest are screened for the public at CGV Art Houseafter they compete at international festivals./.
VNA
