Year of the Fire Horse

A young girl stands in front of a hospital. She has been told that tradition forbids her from entering a place of sickness, so she can only wait outside and peer at the tiny figure waving to her from a third-story window. This is last time she will see her grandmother alive.

This memory from the childhood of filmmaker Julia Kwan finds its way into her first feature film, Eve and the Fire Horse, a quietly poetic meditation on the nature of faith set in 1970s Vancouver. The film focuses on nine-year-old Eve Eng (Phoebe Jojo Kut) and her eleven-year-old sister Karena, (Hollie Lo) as they seek to make sense of the misfortunes that befall their family. Their mother, May Lin (Vivian Wu), also finds herself questioning her life purpose. However, the eastern and western religions all three are exploring lead them toward further complications and potential tragedy, not the redemption they are seeking.

Eve and the Fire Horse debuted to critical and audience acclaim at the 2005 Toronto International Film Festival. The film has since won several awards at festivals across Canada. Most recently, Eve and the Fire Horse won the Special Jury Prize in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, the first and, so far, only Canadian film to do so.

Julia Kwan gave this interview shortly after Eve and the Fire Horse screened at last year's Vancouver International Film Festival.

In Eve and the Fire Horse, the title character is born in 1966, the year of the Fire Horse. You are also a born in the year of the Fire Horse, how much of the movie is autobiographical?

Certainly, there's part of it that's true, but a lot of it is imagination. There are a few memories that I drew from my childhood. When I was five years old, my grandmother died and my father told me this really lovely story that she was reincarnated as a goldfish. I thought, "What a nice thing to say to a child who can't grasp the concept of death." And then when I was eight years old, I somehow ended up in Sunday school and was told that my grandmother was in hell. So [the film is] really about these two memories and about how children process these heavy, complex issues of death and religion.

The characters in your film explore at least three different religions or faiths: Christianity, Buddhism and Chinese folklore. Do you subscribe to any particular faith?

That's a very personal question and I shall slap you now! [Laughs.] I can honestly say that my spirituality is evolving and it continues to evolve, so I don't have a definitive answer right now. In some ways, I feel like this film is a little bit unresolved; I almost feel like I can keep rewriting it and reediting it because there's been no resolution in my life, either.

One of the messages of the film seems to be "whatever works for you is the right path." Each of the main characters comes to some kind of resolution, for better or for worse, about his or her own relationship with spirituality.

I tried to make no judgements in the film, although as a filmmaker, you always have a position. I tried not to make judgements about what version of spirituality the characters choose, even when one of them ultimately finds that she is unable to find comfort in her religion.

Has there been a reaction to the film from the religious community?

I notice the film pops up on a lot of Christian arts websites. I haven't read a review from any but, so far, no Christian has come up to me and said, "I WILL PICKET THIS FILM!" [Laughs.] In fact, people have come up to me and said, "I'm a Christian but I really like this film because I recognize the craziness of some of the doctrine and I know some of it doesn't make any sense, particularly to kids." They find it entertaining and non-offensive, which is … too bad because I hoping to offend a few people! [Laughs.]

But it's not an anti-religious film. I never get the sense that you're making fun of the religious characters.

I wanted to portray them as being earnest. Whether it's the different sects of Christianity--Catholics, Presbyterians or Jehovah's Witnesses--or Buddhism, in Eve's eyes it's all the same.

How has the Chinese Canadian community reacted to this film?

It's been tremendously positive and supportive. I used to have ambivalent feelings about bringing my films to Asian North American film festivals because I thought it was kind of marginalizing Asian filmmakers. But I get it now; I really understand the pride and support from the community. It was amazing how differently the Chinese press reported on our [VIFF] award. In the Chinese press, it was the headline and lead story while in The Vancouver Sun it was one line at the very end of an article.

How hard was it to cast this film?

It was one of the biggest challenges we faced. The difficulty was that the two adults had to be fluent in Cantonese and the two children had to speak English, but understand Cantonese. There aren't a lot of experienced Chinese Canadian actors who are in their 30s to begin with and most of them weren't really fluent in Cantonese; the language requirement really eliminated a lot of Asian Canadian actors because we were looking for something very specific. So we ended up going to the community. Shan [Tam, one of the film's co-producers] put up calls on Fairchild TV and went on the Chinese-language news. We also put up postings in schools looking for the two girls to play Eve and Karena. Ironically, we ended up finding our two leads in Richmond. They actually live ten minutes from each other and attend different Catholic schools in Vancouver.

For the adults, we found Shirley Ng [Auntie #8] in Vancouver. We really wanted Vivian Wu to play May Lin, so we sent her a copy of the script and I wrote her a letter, which Vivian later described as a "love letter" to her. [Laughs.] She said a lot of directors don't put a lot of thought into enticing them. But she loved the script because she's a Fire Horse as well and she really connected with what the character was going through. For the father and the uncle, we had a casting session in Hong Kong and found two great actors: Lester Chan, who was in Eat Drink Man Woman, and Joseph Siu, who's quite a well known television actor over there.

I recall that your decision to have the adults speak mainly in subtitled Cantonese initially caused some concern.

When we were pitching the project around, we were told that it wasn't commercially viable to have subtitles. Ironically, when they were telling us that, I think the number one film in North America was House of Flying Daggers! I have been mentioning this in the press because I want to make sure that this is no longer an issue for the next person who makes a subtitled film. To make a blanket statement that something isn't marketable because it's partly in Chinese is a bit unfair.

The issue of the subtitles is an interesting one for me because, when I saw the film, I felt an authenticity that I don't see in most depictions of Chinese Canadians and a large part of that had to do with the choice of having the parents speak almost entirely in Chinese with very little English.

That was definitely my experience growing up. In fact, I wish I could have been even more authentic to my experience and have the children speak some Chinese as well, but we couldn't find child actors who could speak both languages fluently.

But if you had chosen to have the parents speak in English, you would have sacrificed the authenticity of the experience in trying to make the film more marketable or "universal."

What I'm finding is that the more specific you get, the more universal the film becomes. I've been surprised by the number of non-Asians who have come up to me and told me how much they relate to this film, because they grew up in a multi-faith or multi-lingual household.

Do you think there is such a thing as a universal experience?

There is a universal experience in how we feel. It's more important to be emotionally authentic than it is to worry about what details the audience may or may not understand.

What you're saying is that people's experiences are going to be different, but as long as you are emotionally true, the audience can still relate.

Yes, although, people can have quite a visceral response to details, as well. The Pop Shoppe bottle we used in one of the scenes always gets commented on. People who grew up in the 70s seem to get all wistful and tearful about the Pop Shoppe! [Laughs.] And the part that Chinese audiences really react to is the reference to Haw Flakes. They always laugh at that part.

Are you surprised by how much people laugh at the film?

People seem to think it's a comedy--the first part, at least. I knew it was funny, but I wasn't expecting that kind of raucous laughter from the audience. And then it all gets very quiet in the last 20 minutes. [Laughs] But I'm pleased that people react that way, because comedy is so hard to do.

Have there been other audience reactions that have surprised you?

I remember one [non-Chinese] guy at the test screening who asked why some of the Chinese customs and cultural practices weren't explained more explicitly. He somehow felt he needed everything spelled out. What all the customs meant. Why the parents weren't more physically affectionate toward their kids. It's like when I read reviewers saying they like the film because it's "educational." I'm not making a film to be educational. I'm not saying that this is what it's like in every Chinese family. I'm not making a documentary.

Do you think you have a "duty to your community" as an ethnic filmmaker? And if so, what is it?

"Duty to the community" is something I take very seriously, although I haven't quite made up my mind what it exactly means. There are so few voices out there that I feel a responsibility to make films that do the community proud. On the other hand does that translate into doing exclusively Chinese stories? I'm not sure. I sometimes feel a bit hindered as to the kinds of thing that I can do. For example, I don't feel I could make a film like The Cabin Movie [by Dylan Akio Smith] I'm not sure the community would be so eager to embrace that! Plus, I'm always thinking that my parents have to see it! [Laughs.]

Because you focus on Eve as the main character, there seems to be a message that there is a redemptive power in imagination. The other characters, particular Karena, don't seem to have the same kind of creative spark as Eve does.

I think that's true. Karena is more of a follower; she needs structure and doctrine. She doesn't have the same curiosity that Eve has. Eve has a more complex process of dealing with the world because she asks questions and tries to figure things out.

One of the most powerful scenes in the film for me is when Karena is being disciplined and she prays for Jesus to make her perfect. That's the only real insight that you get into what makes her character tick because other than that she's fairly opaque. That is the point when she is the most vulnerable and you can see her struggling with the idea of trying to be perfect and wanting to do right.

Do you think that some organized religions have that effect on you?

Well, they certainly set the standard of behaviour very high. Definitely Karena has a kind of a holier-than-thou attitude towards Eve but her motives are earnest. Her behaviour is both oppressive and, in a way, oppressed. It's all well intentioned but she, in a way, loves the martyr role as well. Like the scene where after she is punished, she sleeps on the floor and she won't let Eve sleep with her because there can be only one martyr in the house!

Why do you think people take on that martyr role? Is it a particular mindset that religion can lead to?

Part of the whole martyr mindset is the idea that you have to be recognized for your self-sacrifice. And in some ways, Christianity is designed to encourage that because it's the only religion in which witnessing-- the idea of going out and converting people--is part of the religion. There's no witnessing in Buddhism, for example.

Another thing I appreciated about the film was its portrayal of the male characters. For example, the way you portrayed Frank, the father, ran against the portrayal of a lot of Chinese fathers in movies…

He was warm. He was a little dim, but he was warm. He had a very special relationship with his girls. He was definitely not the distant father. I felt that I was sympathetic to all the characters. I had actually written a series of short stories for Eve and the Fire Horse that flesh out some of the characters and subplots. I am actually looking into getting them published.

So now that the film's finished, what's next?

Through 2006, we're going to start premiering the film in Europe and Asia. I'm also working on a few scripts. I have a Canada Council grant to work on a script set in the 60s, so I'm moving backward in time. And really, I just want to travel and write and live my life again. I've been so obsessed with this film for so long, it'll be nice to move on. Unless I do a sequel!

Where have you taken the film so far?

We premiered the film at the Toronto Film Festival and we've since screened the film in Halifax, Vancouver, Montreal, Calgary, Sudbury and Edmonton. We won the Best Canadian First Feature Award in Calgary.

What was it like bringing the film back to Vancouver?

It was amazing to screen it for the home audience. I'm such a Vancouver girl--I was born at St. Paul's Hospital and I write about experiences growing up in Vancouver--so to be so supported was great. We won the audience award for Most Popular Canadian Feature Film. The race was so close between C.R.A.Z.Y. [by Jean-Marc Vallée] and us that they had to have a recount. And I voted for C.R.A.Z.Y.

Imagine if C.R.A.Z.Y. had won by one vote…

I know! That would have been funny!

This article is from Schema Magazine, a forthcoming culture and lifestyle magazine created for and by an emerging generation of urban, media-savvy and diverse Canadians.