This year the NIFFF – Neuchâtel International Fantastic Film Festival set its focus on Taiwan. With a selection of feature and short films it explores the fantastic worlds of Taiwanese cinema. The “Fantastic Formosa” edition of the festival is held physically at the cinemas as well as online and offers a program mixed of real action films as well as animations.
“Where Am I Going” is screening at Neuchatel International Fantastic Film Festival
Among the short animations is also the calm and melancholic “Where Am I Going” by Huang Yun-hsien. It depicts one day in the life of an old men who wanders around the city to repair broken windows. With his bicycle, he carries around his materials hoping for some work. Every day seems to be the same in the life of this old man. At night he returns in his small hut attached to a train tunnel. He eats his fish and tries to sleep in this noisy surrounding.
He is a lonely man, without any personal human contacts. The only words directed to him come from the answering machine, when his son leaves a message, although they are not very intimate nor cordial. His son has a rather scolding tone, urging the man to finally search for a new house and at the same time stop sending fish to his grandchildren. In fact, the man is the last one of the inhabitants of his neighborhood. He got a notice of eviction, since his house will have to make space for works modernization.
But where should he go? Judging from the message of his son, he can't rely on him. Where should a person that lived his entire life at the same spot find a new home? The world moved on and left the man behind. Society changed and with it also the relationship towards what he can offer. There is no need anymore for him and his repairing business. Once something breaks, it's thrown away.
“Where Am I Going?” is a reflection on our modern society, that has lost some of his most human traditions. It's a society of individualists that is only facing the future, constantly searching for what is called progress. The animation depicts an unstoppable process, where family ties loosen and people get more an more lonely. There is a big sadness that emanates from the story and the protagonists.
But the film manages also to lighten up the atmosphere introducing a fantastic, parallel world. In it the man can, at least for a short time, rest. The creatures he finds there belong, just like him, to a long gone era. Or actually, they might both still exist, but can not be seen anymore in the turbulent, busy world.
The puppet animation fascinates with its incredibly attention to details. Not only the characters are colorful and meticulously designed and animated, the objects also show a particular care. In the small house of the man, there is pottery. When he cleans his fish you have the impression you literally smell and feel it. On a technical and formal level the film is masterly executed.
Colorful pictures and a suggestive sound track take the viewer into a fairy-tale world that has a reassuring effect. After the noisy and hectic surroundings of the city, here reigns serenity. Huang Yun-hsien offers an homage to the generation of her grandparents, through a melancholic look towards old beliefs and rituals.
