The first annual cross-strait film festival opens in Taiwan on June 17, offering seven movies and the chance to see three Chinese directors for about 4,000 people. Tickets are free.

Actress Shu Qi (R) and director Feng Xiaogang attend the opening ceremony of the first cross-strait film show in Taipei of southeast China's Taiwan, June 17, 2009. Movie "If You Are the One" by Feng Xiaogang was the first to be projected in the film show of movies from the Chinese mainland and Taiwan. [Xinhua]

The Chinese comedy "If You Are the One" has earned $50 million at the box office so far, the second highest grossing in China's film history, but it's showing for free this week in Taiwan.

"Some China films show modern life while some are shot way out in the countryside, so lots of angles and the Taiwan audience can get to know China better," said Ma Kuo-chun, project manager with the private Chinese Cross-Strait Film Association in Taipei, the host of the festival.

"I would welcome this chance," said Chang Tung-yuan, a film student at Shih Hsin University in Taiwan. "At least our films are in the same language."

The festival headliner "If You Are the One," from director Feng Xiaogang, reveals quirks in China's social modernization, a trend lost on many in Taiwan, by following a middle-aged man seeking love but too picky to tolerate even a hint of incompatibility.

Chinese directors made 406 films in 2008, setting a record, with urban box office revenues worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

Studios from Taiwan, where the government often puts up seed money for arthouse-style releases that turn off local Hollywood-fixated audiences, released only 36 movies last year, generating $9.3 million in box office income.

In the same year, 382 films from overseas showed locally and generated total revenues of $67 million.

Chinese movies have gone mainstream recently, covering battles and historical scandals.

Next week a Taiwan film festival, starring director Yang Ya-che's 2008 drama "Orz Boys," which looks at the darker side of growing up in Taipei, will take place in the Chinese cities of Beijing and Tianjin.