Summer 2019. Hong Kong’s leaderless pro-democracy movement stuns Beijing and captures the world’s attention. ‘If We Burn’ is an urgent, immersive journey into the protests, and a meditation on what it means to resist.

Hongkongers, still living in the aftermath of the 2019 protests, are leaving by the thousands to the UK to forge a free future.

Following the journey of Hong Kong migrants, the film explores the tension between their identity and role in a modern society. Through intimate observations, the film cuts through the smoke and fire of the 2019 protests to reveal the current state of post-trauma in Hong Kong, and offers a glimpse into its possible futures. What will become of Hongkongers in a foreign land? Can they break free from the past? Where can they truly find home?

“I want to marry myself! To plan for a solo wedding, to marry myself, to declare my forever love for myself to the world!” Attractive comedienne Ping vows to become a viral Youtuber. She concocts a plan to put on a show of marrying herself in what was meant to secure both money and likes. In this satire of marriage and the individual self, nothing is left untouched: women, men, organised religion, homosexuality, the filthy rich, not to mention ye good old mother! Love yourself in Say I do to me, won’t you?

Post Apocalyptic Hong Kong is a series of 5 short films, reimagining the city in a dark and dangerous light. Cast in the shadows of the anti-extradition protests and of the pandemic, the future, infinitely fraught, hangs in the balance. Questions of histories, of humanity, of freedom are launched to the forefront in this examination of the unknown.

PAK is a hardworking taxi driver who refuses to retire. A grandfather in a family with strong social values and firm Confucius beliefs, he belongs in a striking snapshot of a conventional Hong Kong family. HOI, a retired and divorced Christian who lives with his only son and his family, struggles to find belonging in his own home.

PAK and HOI harbour the same secret - they are both gay. A chance encounter draws these two grandfathers together. Torn between love and tradition, they must choose what they ultimately want in the final years of their lives – their true yearning for each other or their traditional ‘happy’ family life.

On a buzzing red carpet, a 70-year-old short-haired woman strides towards the stage with confidence. Behind the red carpet, it’s a muddy path that leads to a movie studio in New Territories, Hong Kong. To her, glory and hardship are nothing more than just different paths that lead to the world of cinema.

40 years have passed, Ann Hui has experienced numerous ups and downs in her career, but the turn of the tide has never threatened her dedication and integrity towards movies. Her works embody her humanistic concerns and deep interests for the people of Hong Kong. On the lonely journey of discovery, her life is now full because of movies.

The film documents three real-life characters across time engaging in rebellions (during the Cultural Revolution, during the 1967 riot and during the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre) when they were young. Through reconstructing these events, the film dramatises their scarred memories and experiences by interlinking their stories with four young people who have participated in the 2019 Anti-extradition Law Amendment Movement in Hong Kong. Although these protagonists are separated by time and history, their lives parallel and overlap with each other as they find themselves swimming in similar chaotic predicaments.

In 1984 the National Union of Mineworkers went on strike. The dispute lasted for over a year and was the most bitterly fought since the general strike of 1926. On 18 June that year, the Orgreave coking plant in South Yorkshire was the site of one of the most violent confrontations, which culminated in a cavalry charge through the village.

Jeremy Deller’s The Battle of Orgreave, staged seventeen years later, was a spectacular re-enactment of what happened that day. Orchestrated by Howard Giles, a historical re-enactment expert, it involved more than 800 participants, including former miners and policemen, reliving the events that they themselves took part in.

The Battle of Orgreave, filmed by Mike Figgis for Artangel and Channel 4, first aired on 20 October 2002. The film intercuts dramatic photographs from the clashes in 1984 with footage of the reenactment in 2001 and powerful testimonies to tease out the complexities of this bitter struggle.

Sam Wong, the owner of a Chinese restaurant in London’s Chinatown, dies in a phone booth. As a favour to her uncle, a young law student, Elaine Choy, agrees to probate Sam’s will but finds that the task is less than trivial. Sam’s wife, daughter, son-in-law, cook, and two sons disagree on who should have which parts of the business. And two other beneficiaries remain frustratingly elusive. But in the search, Elaine and Sam’s younger son, Mike, a restaurant owner himself, realise that they’re not only exploring Sam Wong’s life, but also their own cultural identities as both English and Chinese.

Filmed on locations in Hong Kong and in various cities in France and UK, Flowing Stories is an ode to village life and a journey in search of Hong Kongers’ collective roots. Tsang’s camera records the beautiful scenery and time-honoured customs of the local village, as well as a once-a-decade village festival, which serves as a continuation of a tradition passed down through generations and a testament of family bonding. Seeing how a lot of Hong Kong citizens nowadays are confused about the future, the director hopes to explore the meaning of home and diaspora through reviewing the village’s development in this documentary.

The Inbetweeners is a series of 5 short films surrounding stories of people or pieces of land that carry double identities and meanings. It captures conversations across seas and lands; contemplates the meaning of “home”; rediscovers one’s identit(ies); sees the mundane in new light; and reimagines old images through modern lenses. Through these short films, we invite you to explore questions of who you are and where you are at as you manoeuvre between here and there.

MYANMAR DIARIES is built up of short films by ten young anonymous Burmese filmmakers, combined with emotionally harrowing citizen journalism documenting the junta’s brutality, as well as courageous resistance to it. The film shows how Myanmar goes from the military coup to nation-wide protests and civil disobedience, to barbaric repression where thousands of peaceful protesters are imprisoned and murdered, to a growing popular armed revolt against this monstrous military junta. Moving organically back and forth between documentary and fiction, the film offers a seamless flow in which the filmmakers find innovative creative ways to keep their protagonists anonymous. An extremely urgent film in a time when Myanmar has almost disappeared from the news headlines around the world.

Embedding herself in a small fishing village in southern China for several years starting in 2011, first-time documentarian Jill Li witnessed an unprecedented experiment in local democracy. Corrupt officials had illegally sold villagers' land, but the villagers decided to fight back.

The documentary is divided into two halves: the first, "Protests", depicts the grassroots activities of the residents as they work to reverse the land sales and gain a substantial measure of control over their local territory. We see how the villagers themselves learn to organise free and fair elections, form alliances, and win support. Part two, "After Protests", confronts the collapse of idealism as the newly elected village government finds itself mired in the same kind of corrupt dealings they had originally condemned.

Li reveals the complexities of their triumphs and setbacks from the inside. Her astonishingly intimate, sympathetic and fair-minded access to the events' major players reveals Chinese local politics with three-dimensional passion and energy.

The Hong Konger: Jimmy Lai's Extraordinary Struggle for Freedom follows the life of Jimmy Lai — from a 12-year-old child fleeing from the oppression of Maoist revolutionaries, to a simple textile labourer in Hong Kong to then the owner of fashion brand, Giordano, and later, the guardian of freedom of speech and the press in Hong Kong as founder of Apple Daily. The movie chronicles Jimmy’s story of heroic sacrifice as he marched alongside millions of his fellow Hong Kongers in defence of freedom and democracy which led to his own arrest and imprisonment. Through his own testimony as well as exclusive interviews with diplomats, citizen activists, scholars, and friends from across the globe, audience shall see before them a Jimmy Lai who is truly a symbol of the freedom movement.

During the Ghost Festival, many Taoist organisations give away rice to the elderly and the poor. The rice distribution depicted in this film attracted over eight thousand people. Most of them waited over 20 hours.

The screening in Edinburgh on 26th March will be followed by a hybrid Q&A session Dialogue between the shores, featuring Dir. HUANG Ting-fu (online) and Dir. Tammy CHEUNG (in-person), hosted by Dr. Fraser ELLIOTT (in-person).

A Holy Family is a personal account of A-Liang Elvis Lu’s own return to his family in a rural area of southwestern Taiwan after 24 years of absence. It explores the conflicts A-Liang has with his family with their religious practices, superstitions, and what he sees as blind beliefs in supposedly life-changing miracles. Carrying with him just a camera, A-Liang is forced to face his own trauma and grudges as he starts to observe the intertwined emotions in his family from the perspective of a filmmaker. It is an intimate journey of home-coming, a portrait of rekindled family bonding despite differences in religious beliefs, and an unflinching tale of self- discovery through filmmaking.

Kaohsiung served as an important military base under Japanese rule. It suffered heavy casualties during the 228 Incident, in which the civilians were brutally suppressed. The film shows how each individual survives and sustains their memories through the different eras of oppression. To this day, memories of it still live in some people and places, and the wild tomatoes grown from this land.

Beijing, 1988. On the cusp of middle age, Chen Handong (Hu Jun) has known little but success all his life. As the eldest son of a senior government bureaucrat, he heads a fast-growing trading company and plays as hard as he works. Few know that Handong's tastes run more to boys than girls. Chen develops a relationship with a young boy named Lan Yu (Ye Liu) that goes farther than he ever wanted it to.

The shop is run by Uncle Yeung, who persists in keeping the artisan trade alive. Two dolls crafted by his hands, Lo-mui and Rolex, are pure-hearted by nature and can’t wait to accomplish their mission as devoted servants in the afterlife. With the old neighbourhood facing redevelopment and the shop’s business suffering, the dolls take matters into their own hands and hatch a plan to escape to the outside world...

When facing student suicides, what comes to our minds?

Another attempt at suicide in Berg’s College happened after a girl’s death in 2021. Teacher Cheung Ting bureaucratically explained that it was nothing but a misunderstanding. Three students from the AV team, Ka Wai, Ka Lok, and Chun, tried to investigate with documentary videos, although the truth seemed to cascade away……