Reasons for separation, final re-unification and the shaky grounds it stands on are in the core of Wenqian Zhang's slow-mo felt documentary that investigates her own family's turbulent dynamics, and seeks answers about her father's decade-long physical absence, and mother's explosive temperament. Although it may sound that “A Long Journey Home” is a relationship drama, this is a film about the consequences of economically motivated separations, and the possible scenario of what happens when a ‘breadgiver' accepts the offer of a well-paid job elsewhere to be able to financially support the family, but then returns, so to say, penniless. At the same time, it points out the generational differences regarding the understanding of family and happiness.
A Long Journey Home is screening at Singapore International Film Festival
Right at the beginning of the film, we got to hear Wenqian Zhang's father reading the half of his own letter sent to the family after he had finally made a decision of returning home. There will be some similar moments in the film, each of them intersected between loud arguments and other kind of family drama going on. Bedrooms become an important stage for parents' solos, with the walls protecting them from each other's stubborn ways. Walls are also sheltering the viewers from a potential confrontation overload.
Screaming and the adult temper tantrums are not a rarity in Zhan's family home that seems to occupy far more people than the viewer can fathom. Awareness about it is raised during the scenes shot in the dining room always occupied by 4-6 persons. Some will also walk past, or appear should something unpleasant happens during those moments of togetherness. Which it does, more than on a couple of occasions.
For the most of the documentary's runtime, the camera stays static, picking up on conversations and periodicaly anger-loaded fights between the family members. People are often out of the focus due to the fact that there is nobody behind the camera (the director is often present in front of the lense, actively participating in everything that is going on in the house) which is let to run and collect the material. With a lot of attention to the spoken words, predominantly on monologues or lecturing by Zhang's parents, some of the takes are quite long. And regarding the sound – with the director handling most of the technical aspects herself, it is sometimes raw and disbalanced with the outside noise becoming too dominant in some scenes. In one of them, the hammering of summer downpour penetrates the room with an unpleasant violence.
Uncomfortable is also the atmosphere building around the daughter's mostly silent suffering. Her emotional nakedness is growing from minute to minute, exposing her helplessness. “A Long Journey Home” conquers hearts with its honesty.
