Directing
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In Taiwan, there is a group of people participating in this race against time. They are hidden inside the film archive of New Taipei City’s “Singapore Industrial Park”, where the 17,000-plus film reels and over a million film artifacts have become their spiritual nourishment. Day after day, they shuttle back and forth inside, carrying their doubts, their learnings, and their faith. What they are doing is awakening these long-neglected film reels, then piecing together the no-longer-existent social atmospheres and lives of distant pasts recorded on them. And spending time in this archive has become everyday life for these film archivists and restorers.
Known as ‘Pa Nana’, a celebrated Latin singer in 1950s–60s Taiwan, Kao Chu-hua supported her family through nightclub performances after her father’s execution during the White Terror. Drawing on family testimonies and newly declassified archives, the film reconstructs her life under state surveillance, revealing survival beneath authoritarian rule and enforced silence.
Situated in Zuoying District of southern Taiwan’s Kaohsiung City, Xiling Street was once a dining, shopping, and entertainment hotspot for local soldiers because of its proximity to a naval base. This film combines oral history, 360-degree virtual reality videos, and dramatic reenactments to reproduce Xiling Street’s heyday in the 1980s, taking the audience on a 30-year journey transcending time and space.
