Taiwanese box-office hits like the gangster flick Monga, which outperformed Avatar on its first day of release in Taiwan, sometimes fly under the North American radar. Similarly, Matthew Chou, director general of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Vancouver, cited how his Canadian friends “didn’t realize that Taiwan would have so many international professional-standard performing arts groups” until seeing them at the 2010 Winter Olympics. “So I think through all kinds of culture and arts,” he said at a Taiwanese Film Festival press conference, “we can improve the mutual understanding between the Canadian people and the Taiwanese people.”

The festival—which runs Friday to Sunday (July 2 to 4) at the Vancity Theatre (1181 Seymour Street) and is presented by student group UBC Literature Etc. and sponsored by Chou’s office—aims to improve awareness of and access to Taiwanese cinema.

This year’s six selections skew contemporary, with a sensitivity toward minority groups and outsiders. There’s the sweet tale of a lunch-box delivery guy who falls for a hearing-impaired girl in Hear Me, and the story of a has-been rock star in A Place of One’s Own. There’s also a custody drama inspired by a 2003 news story about a man attempting to jump off a bridge with his daughter (No Puedo Vivir Sin Ti ).