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Director’s Note:
Casting a Spell to Alter Reality reflects on scenes in Hou Hsiao-hsien’s coming-of-age trilogy (A Summer at Grandpa’s (1984); A Time to Live, a Time to Die (1985); and Dust in the Wind (1986)), where folktales of mysterious occurrences are retold from generation to generation within the intimate backdrop of Chinese-diasporic homes. Not only does the timing in history coincide, but within these scenes, Pam Virada also notices parallels to Hsiao-hsien’s films in the retellings of her grandfather’s supernatural encounters relating to his home after relocating from mainland China to Thailand. The tales she recounts include a story of an enchanted stray cat that brings money to the household, a mysterious ongoing knock on her bedroom door, and an unknown smell that keeps resurfacing within the house. Through the hardships of relocating to another country and tirelessly working, Virada speculates on whether her grandfather’s stories are told to ease the mundanity of his life. The video essay is separated into two parts, both entangling and flowing between Hsiao-hsien's films, Virada’s grandfather’s fables, and Virada’s observations. Virada associates the flow of the interior spaces between the cinematic shots, an idea of supernatural presence conjured by storytelling, and presentation of space as the physical representation of the psyche. The tales in Hsiao-hsien's films, together with the stories retold by Virada’s grandfather, give us a glimpse into the magical realism where animism, spirits, and inexplicable matter beyond rationale exist alongside life and Asian cinema. Casting a Spell to Alter Reality is part of Virada’s ongoing research to explore and retrace the Chinese diaspora and collective consciousness through its representation in films. Her video essay is an invitation to rewatch Hsiao-hsien's films, which deal with the Chinese diaspora in Taiwan, in relation to the alternative macro- and micro-narratives of the Chinese diasporic experience in Thailand. (Dir.: Pam Virada, Germany/Singapore, 14 min., English, Mandarin, and Hakka with English subtitles) Images courtesy of the Asian Film Archive |
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