2011 Tudou Video Festival awards: The best of China's online films

The Goose ‘n’ Duck Ranch, tucked away in a quiet corner of Beijing’s suburban Huairou District, isn’t the most obvious spot to roll out the red carpet. But over the weekend, the decidedly un-hip getaway hosted some of China’s most cutting-edge online filmmakers for the fourth annual Tudou Video Festival.

The venue was chosen by Tudou.com’s founder, Gary Wang, precisely for its laid-back vibe.

We give a platform to artists, we support expression, and we both passionately believe in the power of storytelling.— Todd Luoto, Tudou Vido Festival judge for the Independent Spirit Award category

Tudou, a video sharing service similar to YouTube, has built a dedicated following among the mostly 20-something digital natives who comprise China’s rising creative class.

Organizers said it’s important to recognize the Tudou community’s creativity in an offline setting.

“It provides a chance for filmmakers to meet with investors,” said festival director Zhang Hanyu. “This is not going to happen online or through other channels.”

This year, the Tudou Video Festival presented a program of short films previously shown at the Sundance Film Festival.

Huairou might be a far cry from Park City, but Sundance's representative at the event, Todd Luoto, who helped judge the Independent Spirit Award category, said the parallels were striking.

“It was great to see that Tudou is doing a lot of the same things that the Sundance Film Festival is all about,” he said. “We give a platform to artists, we support expression, and we both passionately believe in the power of storytelling.”

Read on to see profiles of the night's big winners (with their video, of course) and then we give you the full run-down of all the people who took home a “red couch”.

Winner: Wang Zizhao (王子昭)

Tudou video: "大无畏" ("Fearless")