The 2021 Freedom Crossing Film Festival presents Crossing Love and Nature: an open exploration of the world and our place in it. We present 5 documentaries exploring the joys and pains we experience crossing through life and the natural world. The 2021 FCFF begins with a story of pushing the boundaries of the human body (JUMP! Men) in dialogue with a journey of perseverance and growth as children complete a 1,200 km bike tour of Taiwan (Cycling Angels). We then delve into the interaction of human society and nature, from devotion to preserving a rare endemic species (Formosan B.B. is Coming) to the societal and ethical implications of stray dogs (Twelve Nights 2). Finally, we consider what it means to be human in dialogue with the sea (Whale Island).

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LIN Yu-Hsien, KUO Le-Hsing│2017│ 92min │ Mandarin, English (English + Mandarin subtitles)

LIN Yu-hsien is a gymnastics coach who returned to his hometown after a career setback more than a decade ago. LIN trained seven young boys there, and he made a childish yet ambitious deal with the boys that they would make it to the Olympics one day. The boys have grown into men, but only HUANG and LEE continue to pursue their dream with LIN, who's now the coach of the Taiwanese National Gymnastics Team. For HUANG and LEE, it is the Olympic dream that keeps them going. They have made it through the pain caused by numerous jumps and falls, and now they are going all out, marching dauntlessly to the goal.

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Paul CHU│2016│ 84min │ Mandarin (English + Mandarin subtitles)

Every summer in the Xi-Yu Children’s Shelter, kids as young as eight choose to get on their bicycles and embark on a 1,200 km tour around Taiwan, climbing mountains as high as 8,500 ft above sea level. Despite accusations of ill intent and the general disapproval of associate institutions, the shelter principle Mr. Wu chooses to lead the children on this journey because he believes it’s what the children need to rehabilitate them from their troubled past. 

After five tours, they had gotten bored of rounding Taiwan and decided to ride some 3,200 km from Beijing to Xiamen in 2012. But do the children share the same motivations as Mr. Wu? “I don’t like riding on these tours at all” expressed one of the kids, but joined anyway “because the route takes us through Chiayi, my home town. Maybe I’ll get to see my mother on her way to the market.” Whatever the reasons, what is common among the kids is that this is a journey of great courage, perseverance to ultimately achieve a dream most of us take for granted - to find their way home.

Chueh-Ming MAI│2019│ 120min │ Mandarin (English + Mandarin subtitles)

Decades of overdevelopment, illegal hunting and frequent human activities in the mountains have caused the Taiwan Black Bear’s near extinction. Since 2008, the experienced mountaineer/director Mai led his team to document Professor Huang Mei-show, the only researcher who studied the Taiwan Black Bear deep in the forest, miles away from civilization. Through the film’s visual aesthetics, viewers can explore the beauty of the Taiwanese mountains, get a sense of the research and filming teams’ passion for the bears, and the painful ordeal bears all over the world experience. 

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Raye│2020│ 93min │ Mandarin (English + Mandarin subtitles)

Since the documentary film “Twelve Nights” was released in 2013, regulators have rushed ahead to pass the No-Kill policy in public shelters in Taiwan, terminating the twelve nights law. However, the real problem of stray dogs has not yet been resolved. 

“Twelve Nights 2: Back to Day Zero” is the follow up sequel that steps out of the older shelters and into different corners of Taiwanese society, delving back to the original source of Taiwan’s stray dog problem. The film invites audiences to explore ‘spay & neuter’, ‘animal shelter systems’ and ‘life education’ through the actions of animal welfare charities and shelters in Taiwan. It reveals the true cause and effect between humans and stray dogs. As part of the investigation, the team also travelled to the United States, Japan and Austria to learn from the experiences of those countries, with the hope of engaging more people in creating a fairer and better solution for animal welfare.

Chia-chun HUANG│2020│ 108min │ Mandarin (English + Mandarin subtitles)

Although Taiwan is an island surrounded by the sea, many of its people fear and turn their backs on the sea for reasons rooted in politics, history and religious beliefs. In Whale Island, LIAO Hong-ji, a writer of marine literature and Ray CHIN, the underwater photographer, invite the audience back into the sea. Their hope is for us to better understand the ocean and reconsider the connection between the people of Taiwan and the sea.

The 2021 FCFF is fully virtual and can be watched from anywhere in North America! Full festival and single film virtual passes are available for purchase at our Vimeo page: https://fcff.vhx.tv/products