Memories Look At Me

Screening of Ji Yi Wang Zhe Wo (Memories Look At Me) (87 mins, 2012, dir. Song Fang) followed by a discussion with filmmaker Song Fang.

Moderated by Zhen Zhang (NYU Cinema Studies).

Sponsored by the Asian Film and Media Initiative in the Department of Cinema Studies.

This event is free and open to the public.

Synopsis
Fang comes back to her parents’ home in Nanjing, to stay with them for a while. Her elder brother’s family comes for reunion. Her brother who is not often home gives her a Yengisar Knife as a gift. Her sister-in-law carefully recommends her a blind date.

The people around her parents, many are facing the diseases and aging. Time keeps going on, and leaves us changed. During Fang’s stay, the memories keep coming back in the conversations. Some she knows, some not. Every moment of the present is mixed up with the past. And the steps towards the future may be accompanied with the eternal lost.

Winner: Opera Prima Leopard for Best First Feature, 65th Festival del film Locarno, 2012

Special Jury Prize, 13th TOKYO FILMeX

Special Mention, 27th Mar Del Plata International Film Festival

Director’s Notes
I am fascinated by the time, fascinated by what it gives to us, what it takes away and what it changes. Memories often come to us without any expectation. In people’s talk, the half part may relate to the past.

I don’t want to reproduce the past. I just want to illustrate it through conversations, by words, as it often happens in the daily life. I try to make a film that consists mainly of the conversations. And the relations between the events are not progressive. The events are placed on a flat surface, like the pieces on the chessboard.

I also want to show the life attitude of my parents’ generation, which I cherish.

Time is invisible. Apart from the alternation of day and night, and the cycle of the four seasons, what else can make us feel the passing of time? Perhaps the changes of ourselves.

Director’s Biography
Song Fang was born in Jiangsu Province, China.

She studied film directing in INSAS-Institut National de l’Art du Spectacle et de l’art du diffusion in Belgium from 2002 to 2003, and received her MA on Film Directing from Beijing Film Academy in China in 2008.

In 2005, she was admitted by the Asian Film Academy Workshop hosted by Pusan International Film Festival.

In 2006, she acted in the film The Flight Of The Red Balloon directed by Mr. Hou Hsiao-Hsian.

In 2009, her graduation short film Goodbye received the Second Prize of Cinefondation at the 62nd Cannes Festival.

In 2010, she co-directed the documentary Yulu with 5 other directors.