The ninth Guangzhou International Film Festival began welcoming nationwide submissions of micro films and themed short videos on Jan 5.

The competition section of themed short videos was added to the event for the first time, setting "moments of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area" as the main subject.

A total of 13 prizes have been set up, including awards for Best Director, Best Film, Best Scriptwriter, Best Actor and Best Cinematographer.

The event, encouraging competitors to focus on the Greater Bay Area by digging into local topics, is also expected to offer a showcasing and communication platform for talents and companies in the film industry. 

Li Xuewu, dean of the Arts College of Jinan University, suggested that Guangdong's feature films should learn more from benchmarking works.

"Films like My People, My Country and The Climbers have several similarities as most of them are products of cross-region cooperation and they also used a lot of private capital. These films chose tiny views to show topics of concern to ordinary people," said Li.

The ninth Guangzhou International Film Festival begins accepting nationwide submissions of micro films and themed short videos on Jan 5. [Photo/southcn.com]