The Films That Shaped Five Flavours: We Reveal The Full Anniversary Section Programme

The Anniversary Section films will be available online only, but Ploy and A City of Sadness will also be presented at cinema screenings.

For the first time in the festival’s history, this section was built with direct help from our amazing Five Flavours community. More than 650 of you voted across two rounds, choosing your favourites from dozens of titles we proposed. Ultimately, however, the Anniversary Section is not just a simple list of the top ten vote-getters. While some titles are poll winners, others ranked slightly lower but hold a special place for us as organizers, and help broaden the section’s geographical scope. Our goal was to celebrate two decades of the festival without limiting the story to the most obvious countries, filmmakers, and movements.

And so, the much-loved Rent a Cat by Naoko Ogigami and Microhabitat by Jeon Go-woon will return, alongside Midi Z’s Burmese-set The Road to Mandalay and Khyentse Norbu’s Bhutanese Hema Hema. Alongside works by acclaimed masters such as Hou Hsiao-hsien and Takashi Miike, you’ll also see films by directors including Yang Mingming (Girls Always Happy) and Chaitanya Tamhane (Court).

Ten films are, of course, not enough to capture the full richness of the cinema we have presented over two decades, but they are more than enough to give us a moment to look back and remember what the festival was all about six or ten years ago. When better to do so than at the 20th edition of Five Flavours? This is our story, but this time it is told collectively – through your choices, our memories and the films that have shaped Five Flavours over the years.

The Anniversary Section titles will be available to stream online on the festival platform, but we also invite you to the cinema for two special screenings. A City of Sadness will be presented in a restored version, while Ploy will serve as the centerpiece for celebrating Five Flavours’ 20th anniversary together. To mark this special screening, we’ve put together an evening packed with Five Flavours-inspired touches, culminating in an afterparty at our festival club, Turnus, where we’ll channel that anniversary energy into a party fit for a two-decade milestone!

The full programme of the Anniversary Section:

Ploy

dir. Pen-ek Ratanaruang, Thailand 2007, 106’

[cinema + online]

Film from the 3rd edition of Five Flavours

Wit and Dang, a married couple who have fallen into a rut, return from the United States to Bangkok after ten years to attend a relative’s funeral. Jet lag keeps them awake at the hotel, and Wit spends a sleepless night in the bar, where he meets Ploy – a young woman who could be his daughter. Between naps, the three drift through the hotel’s labyrinth, gradually losing all sense of time and purpose. Behind the wall of their room, meanwhile, another, more intimate story is unfolding: a chambermaid is having an affair with a waiter. Pen-ek Ratanaruang’s sensual, dreamlike film builds tension by blurring the boundary between waking and dreaming.

13 Assassins

Jûsan-nin no shikaku

dir. Takashi Miike, Japan 2010, 126’

[online only]

Film from the 5th edition of Five Flavours

The year is 1844, and Japan is living through an era of peace. When the shogun’s half-brother, Lord Naritsugu – a man consumed by a lust for power who murders the defenceless for his own amusement – commits yet another atrocity, a group of masterless samurai join forces to put an end to his sadistic reign. They embark on a suicidal mission intended not only to put an end to his tyranny, but also to restore their sense of purpose as samurai. 13 Assassins is a cult classic by Takashi Miike, a showcase of directorial mastery featuring an iconic battle sequence lasting almost an hour, now firmly etched into cinema history.

A City of Sadness

Bēiqíng chéngshì

dir. Hou Hsiao-hsien, Taiwan 1989, 157’

[cinema + online]

Film from the 5th edition of Five Flavours

Following its defeat in the war, Japan is forced to cede Taiwan to the Republic of China. The early years under Chinese Nationalist Party rule bring immense brutality to the island, quickly plunging it into crisis, chaos, and widespread discrimination. At the centre of these historical upheavals is the Lin family, living in the port city of Keelung. The lives of three brothers – a mute photographer, a veteran, and a local gangster – become bound to the tragic events leading up to the February 28 Incident and the dark period of White Terror that followed.

Court

dir. Chaitanya Tamhane, India 2014, 116’

[online only]

Film from the 8th edition of Five Flavours

When a sewer worker dies in Mumbai, the police rule his death a suicide. Narayan Kamble – an activist and folk singer – finds himself in the dock. According to witnesses, it was one of his songs that drove the sewer worker to take his own life. The prosecutor seeks the harshest possible sentence, the defence lawyer attempts to prove the charges groundless, and the judge refuses to release the elderly man on bail, despite the fact that imprisonment is taking a toll on his health. Seen through the eyes of a Kafkaesque protagonist, the law becomes a system in which prejudice is cloaked in absurd regulations.

Shadow Behind the Moon

Anino sa likod ng buwan

dir. Jun Robles Lana, Philippines 2015, 120’

[online only]

Film from the 9th edition of Five Flavours

A harrowing, single-take psychodrama built around a cast of three. It is 1993, and the long-standing conflict between the government and communist guerrillas drags on. A young married couple, Emma and Nardo, find shelter in a home tucked between the front lines. From time to time, they are visited by Joel, a soldier they know. Tonight he drops by for a game of cards, but the real game will be played on an entirely different level. What is the true motive behind his visits? Who is really on whose side? The jungle becomes a dark, suffocating witness to the unfolding drama.

Rent a Cat

Rentaneko

dir. Naoko Ogigami, Japan 2012, 110’

[online only]

Film from the 9th and 16th editions of Five Flavours

Sayoko, always dressed in colourful clothes, has a gift for befriending cats, while getting along with people proves somewhat more difficult. There is something feline about Sayoko herself: she likes to follow her own path. One day, she comes up with the idea of renting out the stray cats drawn to her to people who are carrying some kind of burden. But not everyone is suited to becoming a cat guardian, so prospective renters have to undergo a special screening process. Full of warm colours, colourful characters and the soothing purr of cats, Rent a Cat is a charming yet remarkably intelligent story about an unconventional way of life.

The Road to Mandalay

Zài jiàn wǎ chéng

dir. Midi Z, Taiwan, Myanmar, France, Germany 2016, 108’

[online only]

Film from the 10th edition of Five Flavours

Lianqing and Guo meet near the Burmese border, having both just crossed illegally into Thailand in search of a better life. The grim reality of migrant life is hardly an ideal backdrop for building a relationship, yet a bond gradually forms between them as they look for work and struggle to secure residence permits. Their visions of the future, however, diverge: the ambitious Lianqing aims higher, while Guo dreams only of making quick money and starting a business back home. Blending documentary elements with fiction, Midi Z crafts a film of striking authenticity.

Hema Hema: Sing Me a Song While I Wait

dir. Khyentse Norbu, Bhutan, Hong Kong 2016, 96’

[online only]

Film from the 11th edition of Five Flavours

A group of anonymous people secretly meet every twelve years in a remote mountain location. There, they spend two weeks meditating, testing their own limits and taking part in a purifying religious ritual. Although the temporary camp is governed by a strict set of rules, some participants also venture into the darkest recesses of their consciousness. In Hema Hema, Khyentse Norbu creates a disturbing, hypnotic tale of human passions – a drama that blends the traditions of Shakespearean tragedy with Buddhist parables about death and desire.

Girls Always Happy

Róuqíng shǐ

dir. Yang Mingming, China 2018, 117’

[online only]

Film from the 12th edition of Five Flavours

Two sharp-tongued, neurotic women. Their artistic ambitions. Frustrations. Men. Female friendships. The narrow lanes of Beijing’s single-storey hutongs, doomed to crumble beneath developers’ bulldozers. Late-night debates on film school campuses, fighting a leaky roof, cheap comfort food, and stumbling home after dark. Girls Always Happy offers a vivid snapshot of a transforming China and its urban youth – ambitious, driven, and forging an identity in a world light-years away from that of their parents.

Microhabitat

Sogongnyeo

dir. Jeon Go-woon, South Korea 2017, 106’

[online only]

Film from the 14th edition of Five Flavours

Miso wants to live on her own terms, and two things matter to her above all else: a glass of fine whisky and cigarettes. She’s willing to give up everything else if forced to choose. When a price hike hits her favourite smokes and her landlord raises the rent on her dingy flat, Miso makes a snap decision and gives up... her home. Surfing couches and looking for a place to sleep, she pays visits to her old crew. A melancholic urban tale bursting with offbeat humour, Microhabitat shows just how difficult it is to hold onto your individuality against the economic pressures of a developed society.