The light of Taiwan shines again in technical and vocational education: Southern
Taiwan University of Science and Technology marched forward to Cannes with its
one-million-dollar short film--The Liar.

A graduation work called The Liar by students of the Department of Information and Communication, Southern Taiwan University of Science and Technology, was selected by the Cannes Film Festival into its Short Film Corner. The film is currently the only selected work from southern Taiwan; it will be shown in May in Cannes show. Directors Zi-Yu Chen, who also wrote the movie script, discussed the grandiose phenomenon of modern society with black humor and satire, but she gave the film to a beautiful ending with a sense of humanity. While the film lasts only 26 minutes, it costs more than one million dollars NT$--more than forty thousand NT$ per minute—which is equivalent to the monthly salary of a white-collar executive.

【A scene from the film The Liar】

Zi-Yu Chen, now a senior student of the Department of Information and Communication, owns a wealth of performance experience—theatrical and dramatic—and once joined the Fuzhou theatrical exchange in China, in addition to her experience in directing. She has the courage to challenge different roles, which has helped acquired cumulative performance experience, by which she guided the drama section of the film. In the field of public relations and marketing plan, she also has had dazzling experience. She was responsible for "Tainan Film Festival─Campus Cutting-Edge Area" and also created the fans group "Cats and Dogs Neighborhood” to help Tainan City Association of Stray Animals do public advocacy. In addition, in the August of 2012, he began to serve as the program designer of "Who Will Be A Great Director in the Future (udn-tv)," tailoring scripts for students’ film productions to help promote students’ creation. At present, she is an intern working for Haipeng Motion Picture Company, given high regard.

【Zi-Yu Chen from the Department of Information and Communication, Southern Taiwan University of Science and Technology (left) was shooting the film The Liar.】

Chen Ziyu has participated in a lot of contests and has won the favor of all walks of life. Ever since the first-year of her university study, she has received numerous awards, including the first place in "Happy Family Story Micro-Film Competition” organized by the Foundation for Culture and Education Foundation, honored price in the Third Grass-Roots Creative Film Festival, the first place in the Five-Second Campus Festival, and the Judge’s prize in the Fourth TKC. Her work even entered the Eleventh PTV Student Drama Exhibition.

【Zi-Yu Chen from the Department of Information and Communication, Southern Taiwan University of Science and Technology】

This Cannes Film Festival finalists work tells about the scam rookie Sheng-Tien Wu, who, in order not to be fired by his boss Hei-Chun Chen, started the final act of his fraudulent career. His target is Mei-Chi Chen Lin, a grandmother living in the nursing home. The Liar brings out an irony, with great humor and satire, to reflect the alienation of modern society, hoping to recover the goodness of human nature and the value of selfless social relationship. Interestingly, during the time of making the film, Zi-Yu Chen repeatedly received phone calls from scams, which bothered her quite a lot, making her complain and say, "Next time I'll shoot "Meeting A Handsome Boy! "