Taiwan wildlife films triumph at Japan festival

2015/08/26

Two films spotlighting the respective plight of raptors and lives of traditional fishermen in Taiwan were winners at the 12th Japan Wildlife Film Festival Aug. 24 in Tokyo.

“Fly, Kite Fly,” by Raptor Research Group of Taiwan, collected a Best Environmental Conservation Award and “A Town Called Success,” by Public Television Service Foundation, earned a Nature and People Award.

Liang Jie-de, director of 2014’s “Fly, Kite Fly,” said it was a genuine pleasure to achieve the JWFF honor. “This is my second time to be awarded at the event following the Asia and Oceania Encouragement Award in 2013 for ‘The Black Eagle: Phantom of the Forest.’”

“Fly, Kite Fly” records the efforts of Shen Chen-chung of nongovernmental organization RRGT documenting the bird from 1991 to 2013. It illustrates the population decline of the species in Taiwan and at times fraught relationship between human beings and Mother Nature.

Ecological writer Liu Ke-hsiang said the film is like an elegy to Taiwan’s around 200 surviving raptors. “It makes one reflect upon the importance of environmental protection and identifies pesticides used in the agricultural sector as the main culprit for the bird’s demise.”

Equally praiseworthy is 2013’s “A Town Called Success.” Following three 60-something fishermen for two years in Chenggong Township, which literally means success, the film depicts the realities of life in a small Taitung County fishing village.

One of the segments focuses on the crew plying the Pacific Ocean before daybreak in search of marlin equipped only with hunting instincts and 20-kilogram spears. The absence of technology makes the tale a Taiwan version of American author Ernest Hemingway’s classic, “The Old Man and the Sea.”

Such traditional fishing methods are facing extinction in light of large-scale harvesting indiscriminately netting vast quantities of marine life. For many, the disappearance of this century-old sustainable fishing practice is symptomatic of the decline in marine resources worldwide.

JWFF is a biennial event co-organized by Nature Film Network of Japan, Wildscreen of the U.K. and Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival of the U.S. It received 1,853 entries this year, with only 36 making the finals.

Source: Taiwan Today (http://taiwantoday.tw/ct.asp?xItem=234194&ctNode=413)