A total of 15 films, made up of three domestic and 12 foreign productions, will vie for Tiantan Award at the 11th Beijing International Film Festival in August, organizers announced on Thursday.

The shortlisted Chinese productions are "All About My Mother" by Zhao Tianyu, "Before Next Spring" by Li Gen, and "Beyond the Skies" by Liu Zhihai. The international contenders include Bille August's "The Pact" (Denmark), Hamy Ramezan's "Any Day Now" (Finland), Izuru Narushima's "A Morning of Farewell" (Japan), Betania Cappato's "A School in Cerro Hueso" (Argentina), Andrey Zaytsev's "A Siege Diary" (Russia), Oliver Rihs' "Caged Birds" (Switzerland/Germany), Ivan I Tverdovsky's "Conference" (Russia/Estonia/United Kingdom/Italy), Pan Nalin's "Last Film Show" (India/France), Kurt Martin's "Moon Rock for Monday" (Australia), Philippe Lacôte's "Night of the Kings" (France/Côte d'Ivoire/Canada/Senegal), Andrei Gruzsniczki's "No Rest for the Old Lady" (Romania), and Charlene Favier's "Slalom" (France/Belgium).

Prominent Chinese actress Gong Li will serve as jury president of this year's Tiantan Award. Other jurors are Chinese mainland actors Chen Kun and Zhang Songwen, Chinese mainland director Wuershan, Taiwan-based director Leste Chen, Hollywood director Renny Harlin, and Lebanese director Nadine Labaki, organizers revealed.

The annual film festival in Beijing will run from Aug. 14 to 21. During the event, various activities will take place, ranging from the red carpet reception, opening and closing and award ceremonies, film screenings, industry forums, new talent discovery, a college student film festival, and special screenings of classic or unreleased movies in the Chinese mainland. 

Special screenings will exhibit more than 250 films, including screenings in Beijing's neighboring cities of Tianjin and Zhangjiakou for the first time. At Thursday's press conference, organizers revealed the first batch of films to be screened. Those include eight remastered classics by Charlie Chaplin such as "Modern Times" and "City Lights"; 4K versions of Mabel Cheung Yuen-Ting's "An Autumn's Tale" and Francis Ford Coppola's "The Godfather: Part III"; selected classic animated films from Japan's Studio Ghibli; and Chinese revolutionary films such as "The Eternal Wave," "Song of Youth," "The Birth of New China," and "Yuan Longping."

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic control and prevention measures and travel restrictions, very few foreign guests will be able to attend this year's event. However, digital technologies, cloud communication, and artificial intelligence will be widely utilized so that spectators can enjoy the festival remotely via cloud trading platforms, online video conferences, and various other methods.

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