Chinese director Rao Xiaozhi was given the Best Director Award for "Home Coming" at the closing ceremony of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Film Festival held at the Nehru Centre Auditorium in Mumbai, India, on January 31, 2023.

This year's SCO Film Festival, held in Mumbai, India, from 27 to 31 January 2023, was jointly organized by the SCO Council of Heads of State and the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of India, and hosted by the National Film Development Corporation of India (NFDC). A total of 57 films were screened during the festival, including 14 in the competition section and 43 in the out-of-competition section. Ning Ying, a fifth-generation Chinese director known for her Beijing Trilogy ("For Fun", "On the Beat", "I Love Beijing "), was invited to be a jury member of the festival.

Entrusted by the China Film Administration, the China Film Archive selected five domestic movies for the festival, with "Home Coming " and " B for Busy " both in the competition section, " My Country, My Parents" and "The Chanting Willows" in the SCO Country Focus section, and "Goodbye The Groundhog" in the Children Focus section. Notably, "Home Coming" , released on China's National Day Holiday last year, ranked fifth in the 2022 domestic box office chart, raking in a stunning 1.593 billion RMB yuan at home. The movie, based on real events, depicts the odyssey of Chinese diplomats getting their overseas countrymen out of harm's way and is the first of its type as such.

In addition to film screenings, a number of events took place during the festival, including master classes, panel discussions, country-themed pavilions, and an exhibition of stills and posters. Hence, the festival set the stage for further dialogue and exchange among film professionals from member states and opened up new opportunities for countries to showcase and promote their films.