Outstanding Contribution Award
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2025 Chang Chang-yen
Chang Chang-yen is a veteran film critic and film education promoter. In the 1980s, he was dedicated to promoting cultural exchanges between the Taiwanese and Japanese film industries and a vanguard of putting Taiwan cinema on an international stage. Based on his professional knowledge and passion for cinema, Chang served on the jury of several Taiwanese and international film competitions. Moreover, having learned from Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival in Japan, Chang helped in planning and establishing Taiwan International Documentary Festival. Upon receiving the Outstanding Contribution Award, Chang said modestly, “Working in film isn’t for winning awards or applause. I just focus on what I’ve loved all my life, and I believe it is what I must carry on doing.”
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2024 Yan Jhen-fa
Having worked in the profession for more than fifty years, Yan Jhen-fa painted thousands of movie posters and worked as the principal painter at the Chin Men Theater in Tainan. Suggested and supported by the Chin Men Theater, Yan once ran a movie billboard painting course, teaching those who were interested in the hope that the skills would be passed on and the beauty of cinema could be preserved. Yan had dedicated his life to film, and when he learned that he was awarded the Outstanding Contribution Award, he felt very moved and said, “I’ll keep painting until I can longer see.”
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2023 Liu Chen-hsiang
Senior still photographer Liu Chen-hsiang served as still photographer on Dust in the Wind directed by Hou Hsiao-hsien and Terrorizers by Edward Yang, documenting the beautiful times of Taiwan New Cinema. In recent years, Liu collaborated with director Chung Mong-hong on several of his features and captured the moments in still photography that looked different from the films themselves. During the judging process, the Taipei Film Festival committee board members unanimously voted for Liu to recognize the important role still photographers played in the film industry, which should not be ignored.
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2022 Kevin Chu
Kevin Chu is currently the Chairman of the Motion Picture Foundation, R.O.C. During the 1980s and 1990s, Chu made many hugely popular commercial films and discovered several young actors. In recent years, he has devoted himself to increasing the cultural exchanges between the film industries in Taiwan and China, nurturing new directors and promoting Taiwan cinema in the Chinese-speaking market. During the judging process, an overwhelming majority of the Taipei Film Festival committee board members voted for Chu to acknowledge his contribution to the industry.
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2021 Wong Edmond
Edmond Wong began his career as a film critic. For more than forty years, generations of audiences get to understand film and learn about the trends in the world cinema through his writing. Wong had promoted Golden Horse Film Festival and been involved in the establishment of Taipei Film Festival and Taiwan International Documentary Festival, which broadened the audiences’ horizons. While Wong was the director of the Chinese Taipei Film Archive, he prioritized the cultural asset preservation. For decades, Wong has dedicated himself to promoting culture and film education as an academic and educator.
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2020 CHIANG Tai-tun
Chiang Tai-tun is a senior cinema projectionist and technician, who has worked in the profession for fifty years. From 16mm, 35mm to 4K and 8K digital projection, Chiang has always been keen to study the new technology and worked out the best way to project films in different venues and environments. In the 1990s, he materialized his support for the revival of Taiwan cinema by coordinating the 16mm projectors and offering technical support to directors Hung Hung and Wei Te-sheng at Purely 16 Film Festival. For years, Chiang is often seen at Taipei Film Festival, Golden Horse Film Festival, and Kaohsiung Film Festival as well as large-scale outdoor screenings, and his presence guarantees that these films, in which the filmmakers put so much time and effort, will be perfectly shown on the big screen to the Taiwanese audiences.
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2019 Mickey CHEN
Documentary director Mickey Chen totally embodied Yang Shih-chi’s spirit of “an individual fighting against the establishment” and demonstrated such great courage and integrity. Having a soft and yet determined heart, Chen not only made documentaries to stand up for social justice but participated in various social movements. Even when he was on his last legs, he kept working and used his films as weapons in the social movements, fighting for justice.
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2018 CHEN Kuo-Fu
Chen Kuo-fu was the CEO of the first and second editions of Taipei Film Festival. During his reign, he laid the foundation and built a young, independent, and innovative image that helped Taipei Film Festival become an important platform for Taiwan cinema. The selection committee thought Chen’s adventurous spirit and innovative thinking were something other filmmakers should learn from, and his frontier spirit had shaped Taipei Film Festival.
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2017 Hung-Tze Jan
Jan Hung-tze played a crucial role in the birth of Taiwan New Cinema. He drafted the famous “1987 Taiwan Cinema Manifesto,” in which their views on cinema, concerns for the film industry as well as their determination and expectation of the future development were stated. Together with Chen Kuo-fu, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Edward Yang, Wu Nien-jen, and Chu Tien-wen, he founded Taiwan Cinema Salon, seeking funding from the private businesses. Jan had put in so much time and effort that he managed to have persuaded the investors to fund films, including A City of Sadness and A Bright Summer Day. Moreover, Jan held a gathering of filmmakers at his home, encouraging Ang Lee to accept an extremely low budge to make his first feature, Pushing Hands.
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2016 Taipei Documentary Filmmakers' Unio
Taipei Documentary Filmmakers’ Union has been actively involved in the investigation and publication of Taiwanese documentaries; the large-scale oral history investigation project has accumulated up to a million words in the interviews conducted, which put the history of Taiwanese documentary down in writing. Meanwhile, the union always responds quickly and sensitively to the social movements in Taiwan. For example, in March 2014, when the students occupied the Legislative Yuan, later known as the Sunflower Student Movement, the union immediately gathered dozens of its members and began a charity crowdfunding campaign online; six months later, the documentary, Sunflower Occupation, which served as an audiovisual record of this important student and civic moment in Taiwan, was completed.
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2015 KO I-Chen
In the past thirty years, Ko I-chen has lived by the principles declared in the 1987 Taiwan Cinema Manifesto, which consist of caring for the socially disadvantaged, criticizing injustice, and pursuing a better society. With his films as well as his own body and action, Ko has demonstrated the ideals and integrity of a Taiwanese filmmaker. Repeatedly, he leads filmmakers of all generations to prove that Taiwanese filmmakers fight on the frontline of social reform and stand with the disadvantaged groups.
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2014 JIING Yng-Ruey
A professor at Tainan National University of the Arts, Jiing Yng-ruey has been saving Taiwan’s cinematic heritage for years and made a great contribution to the preservation and restoration of Taiwanese films. His work not only allows these cultural assets to be passed on but enrich the Taiwanese film heritage.
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2013 Peggy Chiao
Peggy Chiao has played an important role in putting Taiwanese films on an international stage. Since the Taiwan New Cinema movement, she has been introducing Taiwanese filmmakers to the world and building good relationships between Taiwanese directors and international film festivals such as Cannes, Berlinale, and Venice. The Taiwanese directors Chiao has helped include Edward Yang, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Tsai Ming-liang, Wang Shaudi, Hsu Hsiao-ming, Cheng Fen-fen, Yee Chih-yen, and Lin Cheng-sheng. From Taiwan cinema to the Chinese-speaking market and the world stage, from a film critic, academic to producer, Chiao has made a great contribution to the development of Taiwan cinema and people’s understanding of it.
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2012 TSAO Yuan-Feng、《Funscreen》
Sound recordist Tsao Yuan-feng has been working behind the scenes for years, devoting himself to Taiwanese films. Funscreen is the only independent online film magazine in Taiwan. It is very admirable that it offers both the mainstream and non-mainstream audiences different angles to watch films.
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2011 Alphonse Perroquet/Parrot Caille/Quail Java Sparrow Youth-Leigh
Since the 1980s, film critic Alphonse Perroquet/Parrot Caille/Quail Java Sparrow Youth-Leigh has been a staunch supporter of Taiwan New Cinema. In the 1990s, he was the first to write about gay films. For years, he has kept following the new productions and writing detailed reviews.