The stars are coming out this November, and with the Golden Horse Awards only part of a series of major film and television events, Taiwan's entertainment world is set to shine.

As last year, the Government Information Office again decided to bring together the Golden Horse Awards, Golden Bell Awards, Taipei TV and Film Festival, and Taiwan International Film and TV Project Promotion, along with two special events--the 50th anniversary of Taiwanese-language films and the Asia-Pacific Film Festival--to create the 2006 Taiwan International Film and Television Expo. Through this, the GIO hopes to create a platform for fostering creativity, culture, funding, and marketing, while also pooling the nation's collective strength to compete in the film and television industry.

The festival launched with an event titled "Classicals of 50 Years--Retrospective of Taiwanese Dialect Films," celebrating the 50th anniversary of the film Hsueh Ping-kuei and Wang Pao-chuan, the first Taiwanese-made, Taiwanese-language film, directed by Ho Chi-ming.

By the 1980s, over 1000 Taiwanese-language films had been made, but as Taiwan prospered economically in the late 20th century, cultural assets like these began to be ignored and brushed aside--until recently, when visionary people began to collect and preserve them. Thanks to the hard work of the Chinese Taipei Film Archive, 211 Taiwanese-language films have been recovered, with over 170 of them being complete. These precious glimpses of Taiwanese culture are being brought back into the spotlight through a national tour, and true film aficionados should seize this chance to cherish the golden age of Taiwanese cinema.

Uniting the various elements of film and TV culture is a booming trend worldwide, and is the theme of this year's festival.

2007 will mark the debut of high-definition TV broadcasts in Taiwan, bringing the country into the digital mainstream. The Taipei TV and Film Festival is focusing on this new technology and the business opportunities it presents, with visitors from Japan, Korea, Germany, and the UK sharing their experience.

Cinema is the core of the film and TV industry, and for a film to be a success, it needs not only a good script, talented scriptwriters, a skilled director, and star power, but also financial backing.

Hollywood pumps out blockbusters with big-name casts and amazing effects, and one of the main reasons they are able to do so is the immense amount of funding they have access to.

The Film and TV Project Promotion event, in its second year, is designed to build a bridge between creators and financial backers. The organizers are running 30 seminars on project promotion, giving local directors the chance to present reports or short videos to promote their projects.

For the star-struck fan, though, the most exciting event of the expo is surely the Golden Horse Awards. A total of 30 films from the Chinese-speaking world were in the running, with Hong Kong films once again ruling the roost.

In the race for the Best Film gong, big-name films such as The Banquet and I Don't Want to Sleep Alone were surprisingly bringing up the rear, while Taiwan had only one horse in the race--Silk. Costing NT$200 million, Silk was Taiwan's most expensive picture since the 2002 horror film Double Vision. Silk tells the story of a researcher investigating the existence of spirits and attempting to capture one, but the further he goes, the more things take a turn for the terrifying. The film has all the elements Taiwanese films usually lack--style, a strong cast, astonishing special effects, and selling power--and has been an inspiration for the Taiwanese cinema industry.

About 40 local films were produced in 2005, a substantial increase on 2004's 24, and although these films only accounted for 2% of box office returns, Hon Hai Group chairman Terry Guo has followed his son Shou-cheng in providing funding for the local film industry. Such investment from enterprises outside the industry is providing an invaluable pillar of support for Chinese-language film.

This year's Taiwan International Film and Television Expo is focusing on the theme "Spotlight on Taiwan, Vision for Asia." In its early years, Taiwan's film industry was renowned for its creativity, and despite now facing immense challenges in terms of personnel, funding, marketing, and sales, by engaging in exchanges with people from the film industry throughout Asia, Taiwan can at least get a better idea of its strengths and weaknesses, building a solid foundation upon which to pursue the nation's cinematic dreams.