"Golden Horse" Nominees Include Two Oscar Hopefuls

China's Oscar submission this year, Zhang Yimou's The Flowers of War (previously discussed) was not released in time to show up in the nominations for its own country's Oscar equivalent. Nevertheless two Asian submissions for this year's Best Foreign Film Oscar race are competing for the "Golden Horse". While there are multiple film awards which hail from Asia (it can be horribly confusing to follow) The Golden Horse is the oldest and most inclusive of the awards institutions as there are no nationality requirements, only that the film be predominantly in a Chinese language. As is our habit and general proclivity let's start with Best Picture and Best Actress, the two most important categories in any awards show.

Let the Bullets Fly, Piano in a Factory and A Simple Life (pictured) compete for "Best Feature Film" alongside "Return Ticket" and "Seediq Bale"

Best Picture

• Let the Bullets Fly (China / Hong Kong)
• The Piano in A Factory (China)
• Return Ticket (China Taiwan)
• A Simple Life (Hong Kong's Oscar Submission!)
• Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale (Taiwan's Oscar Submission!)

Let the Bullets Fly, set in the 20s, pits Chow Yun Fat (playing a local tyrant) against an intruding bandit chief for control of a provincial town. The Piano in a Factory is a dramedy about a child of divorce who lets it be known that she will live with whichever parent can provide her with a piano. Her money-strapped musician father concocts a plan to raise the money. I couldn't find much info on Return Ticket (damn those movie titles with utterly generic titles that lead you all the wrong places in google searches) The Oscar submissions are discussed on the Foreign Film Charts so chase those links above.

Best Actress 

Chen, Ip, Hailu and Shu Qi compete for Best Actress

• Michelle Chen, You Are the Apple of My Eye
• Deanie Ip, A Simple Life 
• Qin Hailu, The Piano in the Factory
• Shu Qi, A Beautiful Life

The Best Actress shortlist has a huge age range from 28 year old Chen (who looks even younger) to 63 year old frontrunner Deanie Ip who recently won Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival for her role as an aging nanny who needs the man she raised (Andy Lau) to care for her. The category is rounded out by superstar Shu Qi (sometimes credited as Qi Shu) who is familiar to international audiences from several films that have travelled the world (Millenium Mambo, Three Times, So Close, Transporter, etcetera). A Beautiful Life is described as a romantic tragicomedy in that it begins as a romcom only to veer towards disability drama as the beautiful gold-digging Shu Qi meets and mistreats a man who really loves her before he receives a terrible diagnosis.

Complete nominee list and controversial Oscar submission after the jump...

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