Golden Horse 2021: The Soul, The Falls, and Drifting lead the nominations

THE FALLSby Nathaniel R

The nominations have been announced for Taiwan's annual Golden Horse Awards. Social drama Drifting about a homeless ex-con leads the pack with 12 nominations. Very close behind are the mother/daughter pandemic drama The Falls (which we reviewed at Venice) and the Chang Chen led mystery The Soul (streaming on Netflix) with 11 nominations each. Moneyboys, the gay hustler drama that premiered at Cannes this summer snagged just two nominations but big ones (Best Actor for Kai Ko and Best New Director for C.B. Yi).

The actual winner doesn't often translate into being Taiwan's Oscar submission (The Assasin and A Sun are the only winners of the past ten years to be sent to the Oscars) though the submission is often among the nominees. UPDATE 10/06 That's true again this year as The Falls has just been selected for the Oscar competition.

The complete list of nominations and a lot more photos after the jump... 

BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE

• American Girl (7 nominations)
  This doesn't yet have a listing at IMDb but it's a feature-length debut from a female Taiwanese-American director named Fiona Roan Feng-I Roan. She studied at AFI and has previously released a few short films. The film is about an American teenager struggling to adjust to life in Taipei once her mother is diagnosed with breast cancer. 

• Drifting (12 nominations)
  A drama about a homeless man (Francis Ng) just out of prison. A third of its nominations are for acting!

• The Falls (11 nominations)
  A mother/daughter drama revolving around COVID-19 quarantine and mental illness. Reviewed at Venice. and Taiwan's Oscar submission this season.

• The Soul (11 nominations)
  A sci-fi tinged murder mystery about a corporation developing a futuristic cancer treatment. Chang Chen stars. Currently streaming on Netflix.

• Till We Meet Again (10 nominations)
  A fantasy film about a man struck dead by lightning working as a God of Love from the afterlife. Kai Ko (from Moneyboys) stars.

BEST DIRECTOR

TERRORIZER

• Drifting Petals - Clara Law
• Drifting - Jun Li
• The Falls - Chung Mong-hong
• The Soul - Cheng Wei-hao
• Terrorizers - Ho Wi-ding and Hu Chih-Hsin

Drifting Petals, which is remarkably not the same movie as Drifting, is also without a listing at IMDb yet so we dont know anything about it. Terrorizers which played TIFF last month is a drama about lost youth in Taipei centered around a young man who commits a slashing attack in public (note: it is not the same film as the classic Terrorizers (1986) from Edward Yang. Chung Mong-hong won this prize two years ago for A Sun.

BEST NEW DIRECTOR

• Treat or Trick - Hsu Fy-Hsiang
• Man in Love - Yin Chen-hao
• May you Stay Forever Young - Rex Ren & Lam Sum
• Moneyboys - C.B. Yi
• American Girl - Fiona Roan Feng-i

It's the fresh new filmmaking voices category. Treat or Trick is a police thriller, Man in Love is a romantic drama about a small time crook. May you stay forever young doesn't yet have an IMDb page so we have no info.  

BEST ACTRESS

Gingle Wang and Alyssia Chia in "The Falls" 

• Chen Shiang-Chyi - Increasing Echo
• Alyssia Chia - The Falls
• Gingle Wang - The Falls
• Karena Lam - American Girl
• Caitlin Fang - American Girl

80% of the category is mother and daughter duets with both The Falls and American Girl landing the daughter and her sick mother in the category. Chen Shiang-Chyi (The Wayward Cloud, What Time Is It There?) previously won this category for Exit (2014)

BEST ACTOR

Kai Ko in "Moneyboys"Roy Chiu in "Man in Love"

• Cheng Jen-shuo - Gatao The Last Stray
• Chang Chen - The Soul
• Roy Chiu - Man in Love
• Francis Ng - Drifting
• Kai Ko - Moneyboys

You know Chang Chen of course since he starred in numerous Asian classics like Three Times, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Happy Together and more and he's also in Dune which is about to hit theaters. Roy Chiu was previously nominated in this category for Dear Ex (2018), a gay romantic drama of sorts that was an Oscar submission and is currently streaming on Netflix. Francis Ng previously won this award for The Mission (1999)

Kai Ko is a previous Golden Horse winner from when he was just 20 (You Are the Apple of My Eye) and he's having a big year with Moneyboys and Till We Meet Again (both up for prizes here) though he doesn't like the term "comeback" after his career was dampened by a drug bust seven years back. 

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

• Chung Hsin-ling - Man in Love
• Loletta Lee -Drifting
• Annie Chen - Terrorizers
• Wang Yu-Xuan - Goddamned Asura
• Wen Cheng-ling - Leave Me Alone

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Lung Shao-Hua in "The Last Stray"

• Lung Shao-hua - Gatao the Last Stray
• Liu Kuan-ting - Treat or Trick
• Tse Kwan-ho - Drifting
• Wil Or - Drifting
• Umin Boya - Till We Meet Again

BEST NEW PERFORMER

• Eve Al -I Missed You
• Lin Ju - Raydio
• Moon Lee - Terrorizers
• Caitlin Fang - American Girl
• Devin Pan - Goddamned Asura

A few of these movies don't have IMDb pages yet so this category is something of a mystery.

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

• American Girl
• Coffin Homes
• Echo
• The Falls
• Goddamned Asura

Coffin Homes is a horror comedy satirizing the overpriced housing market in Hong Kong

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

• Drifting
• Increasing Echo
• The Soul
• Treat or Trick
• Till We Meet Again

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

• American Girl
• Drifting
• The Falls
• The Soul
• Till We Meet Again

BEST ART DIRECTION

• Leave Me Alone
• The Falls 
• The Soul
• Till We Meet Again
• Treat or Trick

BEST MAKEUP AND COSTUME DESIGN

• Drifting
• The Falls
• The Soul
• Till We Meet Again
• Treat or Trick

BEST FILM EDITING 

• Drifting
• The Falls
• May You Stay Forever Young
• The Soul
• Terrorizers

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS 

PLURALITY

• The Falls 
• Plurality
• The Soul
• Till We Meet Again
• Treat or Trick

Plurality is a sci-fi action film about a man who has had four dead serial murder suspects loaded into his brain.

BEST ACTION CHOREOGRAPHY

• Coffin Homes
• Nezha
• The Soul
• Till We Meet Again
• Treat or Trick

There are a lot of movies called Nezha so we don't know which one this is.

BEST SOUND EFFECTS

• Nezha
• The Soul
• Till We Meet Again
• Treat or Trick
• Terrorizers

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE

• Drifting
• The Falls
• Listen Before You Sing
• I Missed You
• Till We Meet Again

BEST ORIGINAL SONG

MAN IN LOVE

• Coffin Homes - "One by One"
• Drifting - "Drifting"
• I Missed You - "I Missed You"
• Man in Love - "Oh Love, You are Much Greater Than I Imagined"
• Till We Meet Again - "Red Scarf"

OUTSTANDING TAIWANESE FILMMAKER

• Frank Chen

LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD  

• Lin Tsan-ting
• Tsai Yang-ming

Comments

[Mirko]

Didn’t know Clara Law (Autumn Moon, Temptation of a Monk, The Goddess of ‘67, Farewell China) has a new film ready. Now I’m very curious about Drifting Petals

[Mirko]

The Falls is also Taiwan’s Oscar submission