Bian Zhuo’s As the Water Flows is a gentle and beautiful film about aging and reconciliation, shaped by the director’s own family story. The film was inspired by the diary of Bian’s late grandfather, a man who suffered greatly during China’s Anti-Rightist Movement. What started as an attempt to recreate that hardship slowly turned into…
Category: Asian Cinema
2025 ALULA Film Festival: “As the Water Flows” Review
One wonders what the title As the Water Flows truly means – at least until the film’s final moments, when its philosophy finally surfaces. Water moves forward, never looking back, yet somehow it reflects everything it passes. Life, Bian Zhuo seems to say, is much the same: a continuous current defined by the memories we…
Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival 2025: “When the Trees Sway, the Heart Stirs” and “Rokkoku Kitchen” Review
Directed by Lee Jiyoon, When the Trees Sway, the Heart Stirs centres on the story of residents in Seoul’s Jeongneung Valley, who have begun relocating amid plans for regional redevelopment. The director turns her lens to the mundane, everyday moments of life, walking alongside both current and former residents to capture their experiences. The film lays bare…
Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival 2025
Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival (YIDFF) 2025, the largest biennial festival focusing on documentary in Asia, gathers outstanding works from 2023 to 2025 to navigate the observance from intimate family matters to the turbulence of our living world. This year, the witness of diverse ‘home(land)’ in chaos enshrines the perseverance within people, from Palestine to…
Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival 2025: “SPI” Review
SPI (烤火房で見るいくつかの夢) directed by Sayun Simung, reveals a touching Tayal family story centring around ‘gaga’, certain routines and rituals that sustain solidarity and peace among Tayal people. After the death of Grandpa Wilang, Grandma Yabay can hardly break away from the sadness, followed by the pregnancy of the underage granddaughter, the camera unfolds how Sayun’s…
Joss and Gawin on “My Golden Blood”, Working Together and Their Fanmeet in Europe – Exclusive Interview
For fans of Thai BL dramas, seeing your favourite actors up close is an experience unlike any other. When Joss and Gawin arrived in London for their first European fan-meeting tour, many of us were quite excited. Fans had spent hours immersed in My Golden Blood, following the story of Mark, a vampire struggling with…
69th BFI London Film Festival: “Left-Handed Girl” Review
Left-Handed Girl is one of those films that makes your heart ache and smile at the same time. In her stunning solo debut, Taiwanese filmmaker Shih-Ching Tsou tells the story of a family who, in the face of struggle, confront painful secrets yet ultimately rediscover what matters most: their love for one another. Following a…
69th BFI London Film Festival: In Conversation with Shih-Ching Tsou, Director of “Left-Handed Girl”
For years, Shih-Ching Tsou has been the heartbeat behind some of contemporary cinema’s most human stories. Born and raised in Taipei, she moved to New York after graduating from Fu Jen Catholic University, earning her master’s in Media Studies at The New School. Her career began with Take Out (2004), a small, vérité-style indie she…
69th BFI London Film Festival: In Conversation with Calif Chong, Isabella Wei and Matthew P. Scott of “High Wire”
Hong Kong director Calif Chong’s debut feature, High Wire, makes a striking entrance, a film that is at once humorous, compelling, and real. Best known for her acclaimed 2019 short Underneath, Chong ventures into feature territory with a story that examines the delicate balance of duty and desire, the weight of parental expectation, and the…
69th BFI London Film Festival: “High Wire” Review
Hong Kong director Calif Chong, best known for her acclaimed 2019 short Underneath, delivers something different with High Wire. High Wire speaks to something human and widely felt: the way immigration reshapes people, their hopes, their fears, and their relationships with the next generation. For many immigrant parents, the act of starting over comes with…
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