A River Without Tears by Chinese filmmaker Liu Juan receives its world premiere as the opening film of Pingyao International Film Festival today (September 24).
It has taken more than a decade to bring to the screen and marks Liu’s second feature after Singing When We’re Young, which premiered at Shanghai International Film Festival in 2013 and won the jury prize.
“It took a long time to get this film made because I wanted to have both high production values and my own authorial expression, which can be difficult for a new director,” says Liu, speaking to Screen from Beijing.
Achieving these for her second film was helped by the support of Jia Zhangke, the Chinese filmmaker who was in Competition at this year’s Cannes with Caught By The Tides and is also known for Venice Golden Lion winner Still Life and A Touch Of Sin, winner of best screenplay at Cannes in 2013. He came on board as executive producer after being given the script by producer Zhao Jing.
“[Jia’s] involvement has been invaluable as he has protected my creative process and stood by my side throughout,” says Liu.
The result is an ambitious drama set on the border of China and Myanmar, in which a father searches for the truth after the death of his daughter. It is a journey that takes him from his mountain village in southwest China, across the fast-flowing Nu River and into Myanmar where he pursues a young woman who he believes has answers. What he does not realise is that this woman has herself become caught up in a cycle of violence that involves drug smuggling against the background of the Myanmar Civil War.
The cast is led by Wang Yanhui as the father, Jie, who worked with Liu on her first feature and is known for titles such as Cannes 2021 selection Are You Lonesome Tonight?, and Deng Enxi as the young woman, Hong, whose growing list of credits include Zhou Sun’s Becoming Li Jiahe, for which she won the most promising actress award at Shanghai in 2019.
The story was inspired by Liu’s work at an NGO called Teach For China, during which she encountered hundreds of women that had encountered violence.
“After my first feature, which is more about my own story and personal experiences, I wanted to focus on what happens in contemporary society,” says Liu, who grew up in Chongqing, southwest China, and studied at Beijing Film Academy.
“A River Without Tears is inspired by the true story of one of my student’s parents, who I met while working at Teach For China. What shocked me is that all the women I met faced violence because violence is an inevitable part of the female development. That is why I wanted to tell a story about how women encounter violence and how their attitudes toward violence during adolescence can affect their entire lives.”
Wild challenges
After spending eight years in development, Liu filmed from March to May 2021 over 64 days amid the striking rural settings of Tengchong, Yunnan on China’s southwestern border and villages along the Nu River, many of which do not even have names.
While it looks spectacular on film, shooting on location in the rainy season came with its challenges. “Shooting in the wild enhanced the film a great deal but filming a sunrise on a mountain at 10,000 feet or capturing shots on near 90-degree slots was a real test for the cast and crew,” the filmmaker recalls.
A couple of ambitious shots give an aerial view of a perilous zipline that traverses the raging Nu River. “I did it myself several times to encourage my cast and crew to do it,” says Liu with a laugh.
Some of her approach comes from shooting documentaries around the films of veteran directors Zhang Yimou and Diao Yinan.
“From Zhang Yimou I learned about how to solve problems through teamwork, endurance and when you need to be insistent,” she recalls. “Before working with Diao Yinan, I’d made my first feature so I had so many questions for him about the creative process. From him, I learned that if I want to move from being an independent filmmaker to the industrialised system, I need to have production values and respect the industrialised system. That is when I realised that I wanted to bring my work to a larger stage and how to do that.”
A River Without Tears is produced by Phoenix Legend Films, Xiamen Qingguo Culture Media and iQiyi Pictures (Beijing) and co-produced by Xiamen Chips Pictures and Fabula Entertainment.
On opening the eighth edition of Pingyao, founded by her executive producer Jia Zhangke, Liu says: “Pingyao has one of the most professional audiences in China so I think of it as a milestone and a new start for me as a director. I’m actually very nervous.”
After Pingyao, the film will receive its international premiere at Tokyo International Film Festival in the World Focus strand.
She hopes to dive into another feature soon and while details remain under wraps, there will be a connection to her latest work. “I’m conceiving my next film now,” adds Liu. “It just happens to take place around one of the biggest rivers in China.”
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