An award-winning film produced by iQIYI Motion Pictures has been selected for a prestigious film festival to open in New York on March 15.
The Summer Is Gone is the first feature-length film financed by the film division of iQIYI, China's No. 1 online video service provider and is the only Chinese entry among some 30 films to be screened at the New Directors/New Films Festival in New York.
The festival, a platform to showcase the work of up-and-coming filmmakers from around the world, is presented by famed Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center in New York.
Through its 46 years of history, the festival has been known for introducing previously little-known filmmakers like Spain's Pedro Almodovar, late film director Edward Yang Dechang of Taiwan, Hong Kong's Yim Ho and United States' Spike Lee to worldwide audiences.
The Summer Is Gone, the first theatrical art film launched by iQIYI, was a dark horse at the 53rd Golden Horse Award in Taiwan in November last year, entering the competition with six nominations and coming away with the most prestigious best feature film and best new performer for 10-year-old actor Kong Weiyi.
The film also won the Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival's FIPRESCI (International Federation of Film Critics) Prize and Observation Missions of Asian Cinema Award, which were presented prior to the Golden Horse Award.
The black-and-white production from first-time director Zhang Dalei, set in small town in western China, is about a boy's last summer vacation before he enters junior high school amid changes brought about by the privatization of state-owned companies where workers had long earned a comfortable and stable living.
The 106-minute long film has also a favorite pick at several international film festivals including the ongoing Miami Film Festival in the United States.
The film's global success is certainly a vindication of iQIYI's commitment to high-quality film projects either of its own or from its partners worldwide.
To strengthen it edge as an online streaming service provider, iQIYi has secured exclusive streaming rights to academy award films such as Moonlight, La La Land and best foreign language film The Salesman to boost its online inventory available to paid subscribers.
Currently, iQIYI has built up the largest online library of licensed films in China by acquiring premium films globally. Meanwhile, the company, also a leader in the booming market of online films, has set up the nation's biggest distribution platform of online films.
The Summer Is Gone will be shown twice at New Directors/New Films Festival at 9 P.M. on both March 16 and 17 local time, and its theatrical release in China will be on March 24.
