TAIWAN’S 50th Golden Horse Awards has announced its nominees with Wong Kar-wai’s “The Grandmaster” leading the race with 11 nominations including for best feature film and best director.

    Hong Kong’s entry to the upcoming Oscars best foreign-language film category, the martial arts film also scored nominations in categories including best leading actor for Tony Leung Chiu-wai, best leading actress for Zhang Ziyi and best cinematography for Philippe Le Sourd.

    Celebrating a half century of high-profile awards, Golden Horse covers entries from Taiwan, Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, and other Chinese speaking territories.

    With Ang Lee as president of the jury this year, the winners will be announced at a ceremony Nov. 23.

    The four other best feature film nominees are Jia Zhangke’s “A Touch of Sin,” which picked up a total of six nominations including for best director, Anthony Chen’s Cannes Camera d’Or winner “Ilo Ilo” (Singapore’s Oscar submission) which also picked up six Golden Horse nominations including best new director, Tsai Ming-liang’s “Stray Dogs” with five nominations including best director and best leading actor for Lee Kang-sheng, and Johnnie To’s “Drug War” with four nominations including best director.

    The only best director nominee that didn’t make it into the best feature film category was Chung Mong-hong’s “Soul,” Taiwan’s Oscar submission for best foreign-language picture category. The psychological thriller nevertheless picked up five nominations, including for best leading actor for veteran Jimmy Wang-yu of “The One-Armed Swordsman” fame.

    Some of the biggest names in Chinese-language cinema are set to grace this year’s Golden Horse Film Festival, not the least of which is Oscar-winning director Ang Lee.

    Audiences can look forward to talks from Lee and a host of other big-name directors, including Taiwan’s Hou Hsiao-hsien and Taiwan-based Malaysian director Tsai Ming-liang; mainland’s Lou Ye and Jia Zhangke; and Hong Kong’s Ann Hui, Johnnie To, Stanley Kwan and Peter Chan.

    Event ambassador and Hong Kong actress Maggie Cheung will also speak to the audience about her years of experience in the industry.

    The Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival spans Nov. 8 to 28. (SD-Agencies)