This year's Shanghai International Film Festival is underway, with the jury already beginning to evaluate films from a wide range of genres and countries.

CRI's Liu Kun has more from Shanghai.

Reporter:

Led by renowned Chinese actress Gong Li, the jury of the 17th Shanghai International Film Festival consists of six other film masters including Peyman Moadi from Iran, Shunji Iwai from Japan, Sally Potter from the UK, Lone Scherfig from Denmark, Sang-soo Im from South Korea, and Liu Jie from China.

This is the first time ever that the Festival appointed a female president to its jury. But Gong Li says she doesn't see herself any different from the rest of the panel.

"We work as a team and we are like a family. Our decision will be made on the rule of fair competition. I don't feel any different about my own role compared to the rest of the jurors. But I think I speak for everyone of us when I say I feel really honored to be a juror and would like to contribute to the development of Chinese film industry."

Fifteen movies have been selected from over 1000 submissions for the final 8 Golden Goblet Awards including Best Feature Film, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Actor and Actress.

Gong Li reveals that apart from artistic features, market potential is another important aspect of consideration when deciding the nominations.

"The 15 nominations do have their own commercial values. They are not just selected based on their artistic achievement. It's a combination of both sides. I feel this will be a trend for film festivals in the coming years."

Like the jury members, the nominated films are from countries around the world, such as Australian movie Canopy, French and German co-production Diplomacy, and Thai movie The Last Executioner, to name just a few.

Sally Potter, one of the jurors, says under the great diversification of nominations she actually sees a common theme running through them all.

"So often there's the emphasis on how different people are, different nations, different genders and so on. And in fact what we find is the universal principle. So there's an enormous liberation and diversification through that simple principle of common humanity."

The award ceremony of the Golden Goblet will be held in Shanghai Grand Theatre on the night of June 22nd.

For CRI, this is Liu Kun in Shanghai.