Film festival provides light relief in Kinmen

Despite a limited budget and opportunities, Taiwan's independent filmmakers are never tired of finding new ways to show their works.

Vision Kinmen Film Festival (一種凝視 -- 金門影展) is one of the more novel ideas among all the mini film festivals in this season. Starting yesterday and continuing to Sunday, the festival will screen 12 films at bomb shelters in the war-zone island of Kinmen. Several other bomb shelters and tunnels will be used to display installation art works and a photo exhibition.

Tung Chen-liang (董振良), the independent filmmaker who has been making a series of documentaries about Kinmen and the island's unique military features, is backing the festival.

His independent outfit, Firefly Image Company (螢火蟲映像體), selected 12 independent films for the showcase. They include his documentary The Kinmenese Tracks (火車在海邊游), which was selected at this year's Busan Film Festival; The Ballads of Grandmother (阿嬤的戀歌) by Lee Ching-hui (李靖惠), which won top prize at the Seoul Women Film Festival's Asian Shorts section last year; and Memory Space (記憶空間) by Chiu Yu-feng (邱禹鳳), winner of best animation director at last year's Taipei Film Festival.

But the most unusual showing, perhaps, is the photo exhibition of Tung's photography works, called Liberation War Zones (解放戰地).

In his pictures, nude women models pose different locations symbolic of war in Kinmen, such as the shelters, in front of tanks, or under a big red flag.

These sensational pictures will be displayed in a specially decorated bomb shelter called Hole 831 (831洞洞). For Taiwanese men who have done military service, many must have heard of, or even experienced, Camp 831, the military brothel, which was banned a decade ago.

After the Kinmen screenings, the festival will go to Hsinchu's Image Museum from Sept 24 to Sept 28, and after that, at Taipei's Huashan Arts District from Oct. 6 to Oct. 12.