Manhattan Film Festival / Los Angeles Diversity Film Festival 2019 – 归程 (Our Way Home)
The year is 1962. James picks up his older sister, Barbara from college for the Thanksgiving holiday. After a racist encounter in a nearby diner, they think they're being followed but realize in the end that it's not someone they expected.
Interview with Director/Producer Alexandra Hsu
Congratulations! Why did you make your film?
A couple of years had passed since I last directed (Sophie, 2014; Rencontres Paysannes, 2015; POP! 2016, the last two projects are still in post-production) and I felt myself yearning to create a fresh story and build a new world through film. About that time, my father Tony S. Hsu, a former physicist turned writer, was working on his own project, the Chinese-language version of Chasing the Modern: The Early 20th-Century Life of Poet Xu Zhimo (It had already been published in English and received very positive reviews). Xu Zhimo, one of the most famous poets in China during the 1920s, was his grandfather (my great-grandfather).
To complete the Chinese-language version, my father was flipping through old family photos, hoping to weave some images into the center of the book. I looked through the albums with him. One page held two photographs that echoed in my head: One was of my father in his third-grade class photo when he was growing up in Queens, New York. The other was a 1962 photograph of himself, and his sister (my aunt), and a family friend. They stood around a gleaming 1950’s Ford Falcon. Those two images combined not only whispered a story—they subconsciously called me into action. These images offered me an entire universe: Of two Chinese-Americans coming of age during the 1960s in a mostly white world, and their history, trials, humiliations and moments of great happiness and humor. I showed the photographs to my filmmaking friends. After some conversation, I realized that I had to make a film sparked by the Falcon photograph.
I think finding inspiration in photographs is a Hsu Family thing. Every day when my father was growing up in Queens, he would walk past a black-and-white 1920s photograph of his grandfather Xu Zhimo, dressed in a white silk Chinese gown. It was that portrait that compelled my father to spend 10 years researching and writing the biography, Chasing the Modern.
Imagine I’m a member of the audience. Why should I watch this film?
My father and three sisters grew up in America before the term “Asian-American” had even been coined. They had been born in Shanghai but spent their formative years growing up in New York, and yet, like so many other immigrants from China, Taiwan, Japan, etc., they were not viewed as Americans. Instead, they were viewed as foreigners living in America. And, yet, this Falcon photograph captures a different story. Here were my relatives of Chinese descent dressed in fully Western 1960’s clothing — a natty blue blazer, dress shirt and tie for my father, a soignée pink sweater, white blouse, and black shades for my aunt, her hair styled into a bouncy flip, and a Shetland sweater and khakis for their friend.
There haven’t been many mainstream film narratives about the 1960’s Chinese/Asian experience in America. While the Summer of Love, the Vietnam protests, the Black Pride movement and national race riots were about to explode throughout American society, Asian-Americans were experiencing their own personal revolutions—and revelations. I hope Our Way Home transports the viewer into this experience—not only the brutalizing, racist micro-aggressions of everyday life but also the pressure, external and internal, to assimilate and deny your cultural past. My Chinese-American identity adds so many layers to who I am and the stories I choose to tell. I wanted to imagine what it would be like to feel self-hatred because of my ancestry and to feel like I had to leave such a big part of myself behind. Amid these explorations of racism, identity and assimilation in the film, I hope the viewer also finds some humor (in the sibling relationship) and a lot of visually stylish moments.
How do personal and universal themes work in your film?
As a storyteller and filmmaker, I am always searching to capture worlds that are universal, authentic, undiscovered, and humanistic. Of course, the film is deeply personal to me: It was an image of my father and my aunt that compelled me to contemplate, in story and then in imagery, what their 1960’s young adult lives in America had been like. After having grown up in a row house in a Queens neighborhood, my father went on to earn his PhD in Physics from Yale. In many ways, he is the embodiment of the American Dream. I suppose I am driven to discover what this seeming cliché, the American Dream, looks like from “The Other’s” point of view.
Both my parents have worked extremely hard and faced some difficult periods and serious adversity for our family’s well-being and security. They did this so that I could pursue my own American dream—being a filmmaker.
How have the script and film evolved over the course of their development?
Making period films is expensive and challenging, especially in a place and town you’ve never shot in before—Long Island, New York.
We had to source 1950’s cars that still functioned, and a 1950’s diner we could shoot at for at least half a day. It was challenging to find period cars in Long Island, actually. If we had rented them in the city, it would have been very expensive, particularly transporting the cars from the city to Long Island. We would have needed to transport them on a flatbed and face paying big tolls, too. We, fortunately, found an amazing resource: George Bryant, a SAG actor who collects these old cars in the area and rents them out for filming in Long Island. He was incredible. However, the cars, just being old, had issues. The red car would frequently shut down.
There were several suitable diners in the area. It was about finding the right one that still maintained the period interior look. Oh, and add to that, we needed to find a diner that would also allow us to shoot inside.
The costumes were rented and sourced through our amazing costume designer, Amy Jeanne Fox (At Home with Amy Sedaris). We also had to ensure that all our locations—on the road and at the school location— had nothing modern that might break the visual spell.
I had my actors watch films from the time period or about the time period. This was to prepare them to talk as though they were living in that time period. I had them prepare monologues using phrases from that time period as well—telling stories, in character, about road trips they had taken.
In terms of my creative process for this film, I chose to work with these three actor friends, and it was the first time I worked with them altogether. My friend, actor Gareth Yuen, is Chinese-Australian, and while we were prepping for the shoot, I heard his American accent for the first time. He performed a monologue for me and I realized his accent was closer to that of an American southerner. We built that into his character.
We experienced one major negative encounter during the shoot. I don’t think any of us will ever forget what went down.
It happened on our last day of shooting. We were trying to wrap up some daytime driving scenes. Our actor, Anthony had a flight out that evening, so there was that added time pressure. To film the driving scenes, my cinematographer Enrique Unzueta and I had found a small road in a residential area. This was ideal because we didn’t encounter too many modern cars parked outside the houses, and it was a small road away from major traffic.
As we started shooting, I instructed Anthony to drive along the road, and Enrique, our sound person, Kym Lukacs, and I ducked behind the backseat, watching the footage on the monitor. I got distracted by watching the performances and before I realized what was happening, we had driven into somebody’s long driveway. This driveway was at the end of the small road we were shooting on. The homeowners came out and we gave them a friendly wave and quickly apologized.
It was obvious we were shooting a film. A camera was mounted to the hood of the car and our actors were in period clothing. Neighbors driving around rolled down their windows, greeted us, full of smiles, curiosity, and excitement. Then, one group drove by and asked us what we were doing. They had no excitement for us. It turned out to be the same people whose driveway we had traversed earlier. Shortly after, we had pulled into the driveway next door; the house was under construction, so nobody was there. We were not harming or inconveniencing anybody; we were changing camera positions.
However, this humorless group in the car pulled into the driveway and blocked our way out. We had no idea what they were doing. Finally, Anthony and I got out and approached them. They said we were trespassing and that they had called the cops on us. The father was a massive jerk. He glared at all of us and demanded our names and IDs. The mother and father claimed that their son had been receiving death threats and that film/news crews had been coming onto their property. The son rolled down the window from the backseat stating that his parents didn’t know what we were doing. Our two Caucasian team members— one of the producers and our Eastern European assistant director—came over and called out the family for keeping the team under hostage, claiming that what they were doing was illegal and that we would call the cops on them.
The family, in the end, backed down, particularly after we offered to show them some of the footage. We were finally able to leave and continue shooting. We didn’t have much sunlight left and Anthony was also concerned about his flight. It had been an awful situation. But, in the end, no police officers showed up and we were able to nab our last daylight shots.
Most of everyone else in the area was friendly and didn’t treat us completely like aliens.
What type of feedback have you received so far?
The film had its World Premiere at HollyShorts last year and was selected for the Women in Film Shorts Night in January. Audiences have been surprised and appreciative, to finally see a film that captures the Asian-American experience during the time period. People were thankfully surprised by the ending. After one screening an African-American journalist approached me and said he very much connected with the experience and story in Our Way Home. That really buoyed me, that the tension and hostility we captured in the film resonated in an authentic way. What's more, it showed me that Our Way Home could cross color lines and its experience and message could deeply move others from a different background.
Has the feedback surprised or challenged your point of view?
My team and I decided to end the film with a surprise. Who is following the siblings on the road? It’s not who you expect. We chose this ending because we wanted to show how all-encompassing and complex racism and self-hatred can be. I won’t say much more here—I don’t want to spoil the ending. But I will say that when audience members told me the ending took the film to another level, I felt vindicated about our creative decisions.
What are you looking to achieve by having your film more visible on www.wearemovingstories.com?
Our Way Home premieres on the East Coast at the Manhattan Film Festival, on Friday, April 26th. Please come out and see Our Way Home. I truly appreciate your support and hope the film gets you talking.
Who do you need to come on board (producers, sales agents, buyers, distributors, film festival directors, journalists) to amplify this film’s message?
I am hoping for film-festival directors and journalists to come out to see the film. In that way, Our Way Home could possibly travel to more film festivals. I am also looking for producers and financiers for the feature I’m developing – Queens is set in the same time period, in Queens, New York, and also has overlap with some of the characters. Readers on just our second draft of Queens said that Queens feels like a never-before-seen Hollywood movie. It focuses on the story and journey of a young Chinese woman coming-of-age, in Flushing, before Queens became the new Chinatown.
What type of impact and/or reception would you like this film to have?
I hope that audiences who have seen Our Way Home will walk out of the theater buzzing with conversation. I hope they come out of the theater’s dimly-lit interiors into the lobby’s lights thinking about the value of family history — every family’s history. As I mentioned above, the entire universe of Our Way Home sprung from a Hsu family photograph. Not enough people understand the value or potency of their own family stories. But as the 16th-century French philosopher, Michel de Montaigne famously said, “In every man’s history is the entire human condition.” (I wish I could offer a meaningful Chinese proverb here, too, but none come to mind!) Our own histories have meaning beyond our immediate families. They are the stories that bring meaning to our communities, societies, and the times in which we live. They influence and change the way we feel and react to current events. Racism is, unfortunately, still exceedingly present in today’s world. If we take the time to understand one another and empathize with other stories, I think this will help us come together.
What’s a key question that will help spark a debate or begin a conversation about this film?
To everyone in the audience, think about the times that you have experienced racism. What was that moment like for you? What would you have said or done differently? Did you experience racism in the same way that your parents, grandparents, and ancestors experienced such treatment?
I think everyone could also benefit from asking themselves this question: Has racism evolved over the past century? If so, how? And how can we change this negative dynamic for good?
Would you like to add anything else?
I hope that the short film "Our Way Home" can lead us to have more conversations about racism and the way in which our own families have experienced it or perpetuated it against others. I have heard that Our Way Home has made some audience members uncomfortable. It forces us to confront a difficult reality and our own personal histories and responses.
I’ve been told by some people that maybe the reasons why this film has been slower on the festival market is because it presents uncomfortable truths in our American history. If someone who sees "Our Way Home" leaves the theater feeling engaged and challenged, I hope they let their friends know and encourage them to see the short. More conversations about the movie’s themes mean more progress (and more success for the film).
As a filmmaker, I’m passionate about putting together the best creative teams. I’m fortunate to have had such a hardworking team behind “Our Way Home,” and I’d like to thank every person on the team— everyone in front of the camera, behind the camera, in development, pre-production, post-production, and in our festival run —for all their dedication to getting this film made.
What other projects are the key creatives developing or working on now?
Director Alexandra Hsu is currently developing her first feature film, titled Queens, which more deeply explores the world and lives of a couple of the characters from Our Way Home. Queens was also inspired by the young adult lives of Hsu’s father and his siblings, in Queens, New York. Set in the 1960’s, Queens focuses on the story of Barbara, a shy, 19-year-old Chinese American woman involved with the 1960’s New York World’s Fair. Queens is a charming coming-of-age story, with a multigenerational narrative. During this demanding period of moving from childhood to adulthood, Barbara and her siblings must learn to weave Chinese traditions with American perspectives when their grandmother comes over from Asia to spend time with the family. Jake Lee Hanne wrote the screenplay. (Hsu and Hanne both attended NYU Tisch School of the Arts, Singapore.) Alexandra is currently developing the project with the SFFILM FilmHouse Residency -- Meet SFFILM’s 2019 FilmHouse Residents.
In addition to developing Queens, Hsu is collaborating with actor Anthony Ma and producer David Li to develop a limited series about the 1980’s Vincent Chin case. This is another “based on a true story” project. The pilot script is being penned by Jake Lee Hanne, who also wrote Queens with Hsu.
Producer Rebecca Shuhan Lou is also on the team for Queens, as a Creative Producer. She is in development on her feature film Her Weight on Me, and another sci-fi feature called My Everything. Rebecca has also co-created a pilot called Talk Yellow to Me.
Producer Sophie Luo is currently developing a feature film directed by Alexandra Hsu. She has recently produced several community-oriented photo series for Nike, a campaign for MAC Cosmetics, and a short featuring Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Producer Ashley George is on the hunt for a good feature to produce this year and has a few scripts on her desk. One is a pretty cheeky mainstream comedy and the other is a darker comedy surrounding the death of an Indian father and the family that's dealing with that.
Writer Michael Cumes is currently the in-house writer and narrative designer for the London studio Space Ape Games, working on numerous exciting and (unfortunately) highly secret game projects. Michael is also working on a horror script about the notorious early-20th-century Hinterkaifeck murders, and developing a children's animation serial about puberty, class war and pigeons.
Interview: April 2019
We Are Moving Stories embraces new voices in drama, documentary, animation, TV, web series, music video, women's films, LGBTQIA+, POC, First Nations, scifi, supernatural, horror, world cinema. If you have just made a film - we'd love to hear from you. Or if you know a filmmaker - can you recommend us? More info: Carmela
归程 (Our Way Home)
The year is 1962. James picks up his older sister, Barbara from college for the Thanksgiving holiday. After a racist encounter in a nearby diner, they think they're being followed but realize in the end that it's not someone they expected.
Length: 13:10
Director: Alexandra Hsu
Producer: Ashley George, Alexandra Hsu, Rebecca Shuhan Lou, Sophie Luo
Writer: Michael Cumes
About the writer, director and producer:
ALEXANDRA HSU is an award-winning director/producer, born and raised in Orange County, CA. Alexandra has directed five short films. She received her MFA from NYU Tisch (Singapore). As a producer, ALEXANDRA HSU has produced ten short films in North America, Europe, and Asia, two of which have been shortlisted for the BAFTA US Student Film Awards.
MICHAEL CUMES is an award-winning writer for film, TV and video games. He has worked with the BBC, Ubisoft and Warner Bros, amongst many others.
ASHLEY GEORGE is an award-winning production magician & director whose work has screened globally at Outfest, HollyShorts, Newport Beach Film Festival and beyond. She lives in Brooklyn, NY.
REBECCA SHUHAN LOU, born and raised in Beijing, is an award-winning writer/ producer graduated from the American Film Institute MFA program in Producing.
SOPHIE LUO is a NY-based independent producer. She has produced an array of original content, including commercial campaigns, branded videos, shorts, & feature films.
Key cast: Anthony Ma (James), Jennifer Soo (Barbara), Gareth Yuen (Robert), Noam Shapiro (John)
Looking for: journalists, film festival directors, producers
Facebook: Alle Hsu
Twitter: @allehsu
Instagram: @allehsu
Hashtags used: #ourwayhome #shortfilm #longisland #newyork #representationmatters #diversity #womeninfilm #directedbywomen #femalefilmmaker #api #asianamerican #1960s
Website: allehsu.com
Other: IMDb
Made in association with: Alexandra House Productions, LLC, Tunnel Post, Cine Evolution
Where can I watch it next and in the coming month? Manhattan Film Festival / Cinema Village, 22 East 12th Street, New York, NY, 10003 - April 26th, 2019; Los Angeles Diversity Film Festival Preview Night - LAdies Night! / West Hollywood City Council Chambers, 625 North San Vicente Boulevard, West Hollywood, California 90069 - May 18th, 2019; Los Angeles Diversity Film Festival / West Hollywood, California - August 22 – 25, 2019