23:42 – And I’m signing off for the night. Hope you enjoyed the Live Blog, and thanks for following! It’s been a long night.
23:40 – Again, tonight’s results show a good balance of art versus commercial. Yeah, the jury will reward something like DYING TO SURVIVE, as long as the top prize goes to something with true artistic success. This year’s Golden Horse results aren’t so bad at all.
23:37: I kind of guessed when ELEPHANT didn’t win anything other than Best Adapted Screenplay that it might have a good chance at Best Feature Film. This is how a jury thinks.
Hu Bo’s mother is finally urged to walk up to the mic and give a speech. Hu’s parents are now the copyright holders of the film.
23:35 – Lee asks Gong if she wants to go on stage to present, but no dice.
The Best Feature Film award goes to ELEPHANT SITTING STILL. Ang Lee: “I really want give the director’s mother a hug.”
Final count: Four for SHADOW, three for DEAR EX, LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, and DYING TO SURVIVE, two for ELEPHANT SITTING STILL, and one for ON HAPPINESS ROAD, HIDDEN MAN, LONG TIME NO SEA, TRACEY and CITIES OF LAST THINGS.
23:32 – Ang Lee now on stage to present Best Feature Film. Lee looks as camera shy and nervous as usual.
23:28 – One award left. Ang Lee will present Best Feature Film after the final commercial break.
23:23 – At the jury press conference, Golden Horse’s new Chairperson Ang Lee did ask the first-round jury to try and balance the art and the commercial this year. This year’s results seem close to what he was aiming for.
23:20 – The Best Actor award goes to Xu Zheng for DYING TO SURVIVE, for its third award of the night.
This is Xu Zheng’s first GH nomination and win.
23:18 – Chang Chen and Carina Lau present the Best Actor award. Lau and Chang call out the nominees one by one.
Deng Chao is currently the front-runner, but Roy Qiu is obviously the hometown favorite.
23:14 – It’s weird to have this quiet political battle break out on the Golden Horse stage while election campaign fever sweeps the island. All the news channels are talking about the huge nationwide elections happening next week.
23:11 – Another commercial break. Best Actor coming up next.
23:09 – Keeping count? Four for SHADOW, three for DEAR EX and LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, two for DYING TO SURVIVE, and one for ON HAPPINESS ROAD, ELEPHANT SITTING STILL, HIDDEN MAN, LONG TIME NO SEA, TRACEY and CITIES OF LAST THINGS.
23:07 – The Best Actress award goes to Hsieh Ying-xuan for DEAR EX, for its third award of the night. Take that, China.
This is Hsieh’s first nomination and win. Hsieh plays the hysterical mother in the comedy-drama, and tonight’s Golden Horse wins should further boost its box office in Taiwan.
23:04 – Tao ask Andy Lau about his choice. Lau: “I choose my wife, too.”
Kara Wai and Tu Men on stage to present Best Actress.
Oh, boy, Tu Men says “I’m happy to be in Taiwan, China”.
23:03 – I think we’re entering the one award per commercial break section of the show. There are three awards left: Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Feature Film.
Melody Tao, of course, asks Deng Chao who he thinks will win Best Actress – as his wife Sun Li looks on.
22:55 – Entering our fifth hour soon, and we get a musical performance by Karen Mok.
Oh, the entry for the OUR YOUTH IN TAIWAN win on the Golden Horse Facebook already has a netizen battle going on. Yay.
22:48 – SHADOW can now bypass Taiwan’s cap on films from China and get a theatrical release in Taiwan, but it already has a release date set, so I guess that’s a waste.
22:46 – The Best Director award goes to Zhang Yimou for SHADOW, for its fourth award of the night.
Believe it or not, this was Zhang’s first Golden Horse nomination.
22:43 – Andy Lau now onstage to present Best Director. I predict this will be between Bi Gan and Zhang Yimou.
Andy Lau says that he’s been busy in rehearsals for his concert but managed to find spare time to come present an award. Lau says that he’s done 150 films already, but he’s only worked with one of tonight’s nominated directors.
Lau to other nominated directors: “Yes, I’m expensive, but I’ll also make you money!”
22:39 – Time for Best Original Film Song. The award goes to Bali Song from DEAR EX, for its second award of the night.
DEAR EX co-director Kidding Hsu directs Lee Ying-hung’s music videos.
22:37 – Keeping count? Three for SHADOW and LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, two for DYING TO SURVIVE, and one for ON HAPPINESS ROAD, ELEPHANT SITTING STILL, DEAR EX, HIDDEN MAN, LONG TIME NO SEA, TRACEY and CITIES OF LAST THINGS.
22:36 – And the Best Original Film Score award goes to LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, for its third award of the night.
22:33 – Leehom Wang back on stage now to present the two music awards. First up: Best Original Film Score.
22:28 – Going into the major awards now as the two music awards and Best Director will be presented after the commercial break.
22:24 – Tao tells Hu Bo’s mother that her son’s film was excellent.
And now, time for the In Memoriam segment.
22:20 – The award for Best Adapted Screenplay goes to ELEPHANT SITTING STILL, for its first award of the night.
I don’t think I have to remind everyone the story behind ELEPHANT. This is a very bittersweet moment as writer-director Hu Bo’s mother accepts the award on her son’s behalf. Hu Bo’s photo appears on the big screen behind her.
Hu Bo’s mother is too emotional to say more, so she steps away.
22:17 – Chan and Zhou stay on stage to present Best Adapted Screenplay.
22:15 – Co-writer Zhong Wei says that his wife still hasn’t seen DYING TO SURVIVE and always says that he’s not a good writer. He says that he’ll put the award at home to shut her up.
22:11 – The Best Original Screenplay award goes to DYING TO SURVIVE, for its second award of the night.
I can’t say I agree fully, but again, I won’t say it’s not undeserving. It’s a very smart commercial film, despite its flaws.
22:10: Eason Chan and Zhou Xun on stage now to present Best Original Screenplay.
22:05 – Fu clarifies that her film isn’t just about politics, but about the follies of youth.
Fu just called for Taiwan to be seen as an independent nation.
Ang Lee’s expression: “What am I gonna do now?!”
22:01 – The award for Best Documentary goes to OUR YOUTH IN TAIWAN. It’s an excellent film about two social activists in Taiwan.
The film’s producer hopes more people will pay and see documentaries in cinemas. Director Fu Yue can’t stop crying. Fu says she’ll finish thanking everyone on Facebook.
22:00 – We’re heading into the fourth hour as Huang and Hsu stay to present Best Documentary.
21:56 – The award for Best Live Action Short Film goes to A FINAL REUNION.
Da Peng tries to get a hug from Vivian Hsu, but Huang then stops him.
21:55 – Huang and Hsu stay to present Best Live Action Short Film. Two of the nominees played at this year’s Taipei Film Festival.
21:53 – Lei ends her speech by thanking those who are taking care of her mother back at home.
21:47 – The award for Best Film Editing goes to DEAR EX, for its first award of the night.
This is editor Lei Cheng-ching’s first Golden Horse nomination and first win. She’s also a Central Motion Pictures alum.
There’s no real pattern between awards at Golden Horse, but I think DEAR EX has a chance for at least two more awards tonight.
Keeping count? Three for SHADOW, two for LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, and one for ON HAPPINESS ROAD, DEAR EX, DYING TO SURVIVE, HIDDEN MAN, LONG TIME NO SEA, TRACEY and CITIES OF LAST THINGS.
21:44 – Huang Hsin-yao and Vivian Hsu take the stage to present Best Film Editing.
21:38 – And the award for Best Director goes to Wen Muye for DYING TO SURVIVE. That’s kind of a surprise, though not undeserving.
21:36 – Zhang Yimou now on stage to present Best New Director. This is the strongest category of the night in my opinion.
Zhang called all the nominees “Chinese directors”. Hmmm.
21:34 – Tao continues up the stairs and speaks to the DYING TO SURVIVE team, starting with Xu Zheng. Xu defers his first answer to his director Wen Muye, who is also nominated for Best New Director.
21:31 – Rene Liu is now the highest-grossing female director in Chinese-language cinema, thanks to US AND THEM. The film can be seen on Netflix.
Tao speaks to Liu’s team, who Tao jokes as “having more Golden Horse awards than we have backstage.” Mark Lee says this is the first time he’s at Golden Horse without getting a nomination but here to supporting Liu, who is nominated for Best New Director.
21:26 – Eason Chan now on stage to perform his theme song for Rene Liu’s US AND THEM.
21:20 – Time for another commercial break. Best New Director – the night’s most exciting category, coming up.
For those keeping count: Three for SHADOW, two for LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, and one for ON HAPPINESS ROAD, HIDDEN MAN, LONG TIME NO SEA, TRACEY and CITIES OF LAST THINGS.
21:16 – The award for Best Cinematography goes to LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, for its second award of the night. There are three people credited (for different sections of the film)
Of course, when you have a single one-hour shot in 3D…
21:15 – Liu and Chung remain on stage to present Best Cinematography. I’m pulling for ELEPHANT SITTING STILL on this one, but i haven’t seen LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT.
21:14 – “Actually, I still have to work tomorrow,” Liu says during his speech.
21:09 – Focus puller is seriously one of the hardest positions on a film crew, so it’s great that Liu is getting recognition for his work.
21:07 – Melody Tao speaks to Chung Mong-hung, who is presenting the Outstanding Taiwanese Filmmaker of the Year award to focus puller Saburo Liu. Yes, a focus puller is getting an achievement award, which is why Golden Horse is awesome.
21:03 – Back with Sam Yang’s performance of the nominated theme song for XIAO MEI.
20:58 – Time for commercial break again. Next is Taiwanese Filmmaker of the Year and Best Cinematography.
20:56 – As we head into our third hour, I’m starting to feel like maybe they should start playing acceptance speeches off the stage.
20:53 – And time for Best Art Direction. The award goes to SHADOW, for its third award tonight.
20:51 – The award for Best Makeup & Costume Design goes to SHADOW. The first film to have more than one award tonight.
For those keeping count: Two for SHADOW, and one for ON HAPPINESS ROAD, HIDDEN MAN, LONG TIME NO SEA, TRACEY, CITIES OF LAST THINGS and LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT.
20:50 – Hu Ge now presenting Best Art Direction and Best Makeup and Costume Design. Four films are nominated in both categories.
20:48 – Quick recap of the FIPRECI Prize and this year’s audience award – The former went to THE LOOMING STORM and the latter went to ELEPHANT SITTING STILL.
20:45 – Time for the obligatory jury introduction. 667 films were submitted this year.
20:42 – Summer Lei on stage now to perform the theme song for FATHER TO SON.
20:36 – Time for another commercial break! Best Art Direction and Best Makeup and Costume Design after this.
20:35 – Liao saves the last for Hou Hsiao-hsien, whom Liao calls his mentor.
20:32 – Liao started his career at Central Motion Pictures studio, so that’s the first organization Liao thanks in his speech.
I think Liao is starting to give a year-by-year recount of his career.
20:30 – Hou Hsiao-hsien also goes up and presents the award to Liao. Liao says he’s not used to holding a Golden Horse award and hands it to HHH to hold it. Liao has been working with HHH for 40 years.
20:27 – Liao has worked on over 100 films in his long career. He has won the Taiwanese Filmmaker of the Year award twice already, but he has yet to win a Golden Horse Award despite all his past nominations.
Hou Hsiao-hsien: “They never see his editing in my films because my shots are too long!”
20:25 – Rene Liu now on stage to introduce Special Contribution Award recipient, editor Liao Ching-sung. Liao edited Liu’s US AND THEM and many other directorial debuts.
20:23 – And the Best New Performer award goes to Si Pangoyod for LONG TIME NO SEA.
Is 12-year-old Pangoyod the youngest Best New Actor winner in GH history? Will have to check.
20:19 – Jeannie Hsieh on stage now to present Best New Performer. Hsieh is known as the “big sis of Taiwan” (It’s from a song she sang, don’t ask).
All five nominees tonight are from Taiwan, which is a huge deal considering the strength of Chinese films this year.
20:17 – Andy Lau snapping his fingers along to Bali Song is the cutest thing I’ve seen all night.
20:14 – Back from commercial break with Lee Ying-hung’s performance of the addictive Bali Song from DEAR EX.
20:10 – Time for another commercial break. Those keeping count, one award each for ON HAPPINESS ROAD, HIDDEN MAN, SHADOW, TRACEY, CITIES OF LAST THINGS and LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT.
20:09 – TRACEY director Jun Li is in tears.
20:08 – Yuen gives his speech in Cantonese, talking about the turning point when he thought about quitting acting. Yuen has been acting for 30 years.
20:06 – The Best Supporting Actor award goes to Ben Yuen for TRACEY.
Yuen gets some love from Kara Wai, Carina Lau and Andy Lau along the way to the stage.
20:05 – Time for Best Supporting Actor. Will Lee Hong-chi take it for CITIES OF LAST THINGS? There was an awful lot of cheers for Zhang Yu for DYING TO SURVIVE.
19:59 – And the Best Supporting Actress award goes to Ding Ning for CITIES OF LAST THINGS.
This is Ding’s first nomination and win at the Golden Horse Award.
Ding dedicates her award to the LGBTQ community. She also thanks her husband in English, “You are the biggest award I ever got.”
19:58 – Best Supporting Actress up first. I have a feeling one of the Taiwanese nominees has a good chance tonight.
19:57 – Law and Yuen are presenting the two supporting actor awards.
19:55 – Law Kar-ying gets his CHINESE ODYSSEY rendition of Only You as his introduction as he takes the stage of Kingdom Yuen, one of Hong Kong’s favorite female comedic actor.
Law gives a live performance of Only You, which is as terrible as you expect.
19:51 – Another commercial break. Law Kar-ying and Kingdom Yuen coming after the break.
19:49 – For those keeping score, it’s currently one award each for ON HAPPINESS ROAD, HIDDEN MAN, SHADOW and LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT.
19:48 – The award for Best Sound Effects goes to LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT.
19:47 – Deng and Hung stay to present Best Sound Effects.
19:45 – Wong almost forgets to thanks Deng onstage – Deng has to play two roles and his performance was essential to pulling off the dual characters.
19:43 – The award for Best Visual Effects goes to Samson Wong for SHADOW. This is his first nomination and win.
19:41 – Hung and Deng stay to present Best Visual Effects. Another hard category to call and wouldn’t be surprised by whichever film comes out on top.
19:38 – And the winner of Best Action Choreography is He Jun, Kenji Tanigaki and Yan Hua for HIDDEN MAN.
Tanigaki is also nominated tonight for MONSTER HUNT 2.
Tanigaki regularly works with Donnie Yen and is making his directorial debut this year with ENTER THE FAT DRAGON.
19:37 – Hung and Deng are here to present Best Action Choreography. This is a hard category to call, but I predict DeeDee to win for SHADOW.
19:36 – Sammo Hung and Deng Chao take the stage, welcomed by the GATAO 2 cast. Deng asked Hung if he was scared by the welcome since it wasn’t rehearsed.
19:34 – And we’re back with a performance of Edison JV’s performance of the theme song for GATAO 2: RETURN OF THE KING. It’s one of the five nominated Best Original Songs tonight.
And the performance ends with someone in the cast firing a fake gun into the air. That’s fun.
19:30 – And it’s time for our first commercial break. This is the first time I won’t have to see those looping Star Movies Chinese ads!
19:27 – Someone in the film’s team is holding a huge……thing.
19:26 – The Best Animated Short Film award goes to WHERE AM I GOING?
19:25 – Gwei stays onstage to present Best Animation Short.
Just realized that all the voiceover narration of film titles are done by Lee Kang-sheng.
19:24 – ON HAPPINESS ROAD director Sung Hsin-yin thanks her staff for helping her finish the film, despite working in a country with almost no animated feature film.
Sung says, “As long as you work hard at something, there will be people to help you.”
19:21 – And the winner of Best Animation Feature is…….ON HAPPINESS ROAD. Gwei also stars in the film as the voice of the lead character.
ON HAPPINESS ROAD also won the top prize at this year’s Taipei Film Awards.
19:20 – Gwei Lun-mei is the first to take the stage as presenter. She’s presenting Best Animated Feature, which only has three nominees.
I predict ON HAPPINESS ROAD to win.
19:19 – Tao talks about the entire one-hour long take in LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT. “The cinematographer is nominated tonight, but he’s not here tonight because he’s still recuperating from his injuries.”
19:18 – Tao plays to her strength as a host, speaking to people rather than giving a monologue that a comedian host might.
19:14 – Tao walks up the stairs to introduce the nominees as she passes by. She takes the time to give Chloe Maayan a hug for her performance in THREE HUSBANDS. Tao also speaks to Maayan’s mother, who praises her daughter’s work in the Fruit Chan film.
19:13 – Andy Lau is sitting next to Ang Lee. Not even Hou Hsiao-hsien has that seat.
19:11 – Leehom’s time is over. Momoko Tao takes the stage for the 6th time as the host. Ang Lee makes an appearance in a new version of the Momoko Tao award ad that I’ve already seen too many times during the festival.
19:08 – Another photo montage of the nominees appear onscreen, drawing more applause. Cool, but we already 5 minutes into the thing.
19:07 – The audience awkwardly applauds along as Wang breaks into a rap break, especially the older ones.
19:05 – This is only the first of a few overlong musical performances tonight, so I’m trying to conserve my energy here. It’s gonna be a long night.
19:03 – The show starts with a performance by Leehom Wang. An original medley named “Action”
19:00 – And the show is officially beginning. We start with the obligatory montage of this year’s nominees.
18:57 – Whoops, I think the loudest cheer of the night goes to Andy Lau, who is also presenting tonight.
The host reminds him that his first Golden Horse Award appearance was in 1987. Way to make him feel old.
18:56 – “You’re now your husband’s manager, too,” the red carpet host says as Carina looks awkwardly left and right.
18:55 – Carina Lau makes her way down the red carpet to loud cheers. She’ll be presenting tonight, but her husband doesn’t seem to be here.
18:53 – The jury has made its entrance. Gong Li, the chairperson of the jury, enters last.
18:48 – Welcome to Asia in Cinema’s 55th Golden Horse Award Live Blog! As always, keep reloading this page to see the latest updates. The latest post is on top so you won’t have to scroll to the bottom.
We’re coming live from Taipei tonight. The final section of the red carpet ceremony is on Taiwan Television as the team for Us and Them – led by director Rene Liu – walk the red carpet. Liu is nominated for Best New Director tonight.
Asia in Cinema 