Chinese sales agent Parallax Films has boarded actor Lee Hong-Chi’s directorial debut Love Is A Gun, ahead of its premiere at Venice, and Liang Ming’s Carefree Days, the opening film of San Sebastian’s New Directors strand.

Love Is A Gun, also starring and written by Lee, follows a young man who is determined to start afresh after getting out of jail, but his turbulent past comes back to haunt him, including a gun of which he cannot get rid.

It will premiere in competition in Venice’s Critics’ Week section, which describes this debut work as “a dark, painful, fierce neo-noir, after Lee Chang-Dong, Diao Yinan, Wong Kar Wai”. It is produced by Monologue Films from Hong Kong and Southie Films from Taiwan. Parallax handles international rights, excluding mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Taiwan-born Lee made his film acting debut with 2015’s Thanatos, Drunk, which won him best new performer at the Golden Horse Awards and best actor at the Taipei Film Awards. Further acting credits include Long Day’s Journey Into Night, which premiered at Cannes in 2018, City Of Last Things and City Of Rock.

Carefree Days will premiere as the opening film of San Sebastian’s New Directors competition, reuniting Chinese director Liang Ming with his Wisdom Tooth actress Lyu Xingchen. Set in icy cold northeast China, the film follows a 25-year-old woman suffering from uremia who, despite her illness, decides to hit the road with two friends. Li Xueqin (Post Truth) co-stars.

Liang earned acclaim for his 2019’s directorial feature debut Wisdom Tooth, which won best director awards at Pingyao and Hong Kong film festivals as well as best new director at Asian Film Awards.

Parallax has also picked up Chen Shizhong’s first feature Good Autumn, Mommy and Guo Dalu’s Within, both premiered at the recent Shanghai International Film Festival.

Good Autumn, Mommy stars Shu Qi who is well known for The Assassins and serves on the jury for Venice’s main competition this year, and White K (The Best Is Yet To Come). The suspense drama takes place in a quiet sugarcane village where a family is waiting for the birth of a child, but a rainstorm changes their fate. It won the outstanding artistic achievement award at Shanghai.

Crime thriller Within tackles the social issue of left-behind children in China, following the dilemma of a single mother who cannot send her daughter to school without the local household registration and her daughter will become a left-behind child, just like herself years ago. The cast is headed by Tao Xinran.

Director Guo previously directed The Taste Of Betel Nut under the name of Hu Jia, which premiered in Berlinale’s Panorama section in 2017.