 Good evening. Welcome to the first screening of the 2014 Understanding Taiwan Through Film and Documentary series. I'm Zhang Biyu. Hello. It's very good to see so many new faces today. It's fantastic. Tonight's film is 62 years and six and a half thousand miles between. And we are delighted to have the film's director Anita Chan jump here with us tonight. Let's give her an applause. Anita is an independent filmmaker, teacher and a writer. She has involved in many arts projects and also has taught in many places in the world, including the US, Taiwan and Nepal. I hope I got it right. Yes. And the film is a quite intimate documentary exploring the seemingly fast cultural and geographical distance between the filmmaker herself who was growing up in the US and her 100-year-old grandmother, who was born in the Japanese period and witnessed the turbulent retro-session of the KMT regime and also lived to see the democratization of Taiwan. So what a life, such a brilliant life that she's celebrating. According to the issues raised in Anita's own website about this particular film, she questions how the post-colonial history is constructed and also explores the blurred boundaries between history and memory. And if we say truth, is there any such thing as real truth or memory when we look back? Is it sometimes a little bit shifting or maybe sometimes being reconstructed? So in addition, through the exploration of Amar's life story, we can also see how Anita herself tries to navigate her own path and reposition her 21st century Taiwanese-American identity. So after this screening, we will have the opportunity to ask her more questions. As before, we always say this at the end of introduction of the filmmaker. On behalf of the Centre of Taiwan Studies, we would like to thank the Ministry of Culture and the generous donation of Dr. Yin. Because of their support, that's why we can afford to put on this series. And thank you very much for the representative, someone from the Ministry of Culture. Now, without further ado, we will have a film. But, sorry, before we start the film, sorry. And Anita would like to say something, and I'll hand it to her. I'm sorry. Okay. Yes, please. Such a warm and lovely introduction. Thank you. Yeah, I just wanted to thank everyone for being here today. It's been quite a while since I've actually seen the movie, so it'll be good to see it again, I guess. What you're going to be seeing tonight is actually a director's cut, which I've never made. I mean, I've always thought all my films are director's cut, but for this particular work, it was very complicated to make. And there were a lot of different interests that I had to balance. There was compromises made, scenes taken out. So it's kind of good that you'd be able to see what I originally wanted to have made. And it's also, I have so many different versions of this work. In different, you know, the voice, a dub-over version in English of the Chinese version. And then me speaking Mandarin for the voiceover with Chinese subtitles. And then the public television version, which is shorter, with scenes cut out. And then you're happy. Right, it was pretty crazy. And since I shot it on film, 16 millimeter, you know, subtitling was tricky. I just sent it to France to burn the laser title in. So, and it's pretty much at this point, it's the last film, actual solenoid film I've made. And since then, I've been working in digital video. And I'm not sure if I'll shoot on film again, but they're very different processes. So just to let you know, and that's all I'm just saying. Do you prefer the DVD version or your own version? We do have one in the library, so everyone can, or again. So which you prefer? Well, the one that I had sent you. That's the director's, yeah. You would like this one. One of the things you mentioned was that there were different versions of this film and one version was the public television service one. And there were some kind of, you suggested there were some kind of struggles. I was wondering if you could say a little bit about that and how, for example, this version was different from the public television version. Yeah, yeah. You know, I worked independently to Taiwan Public Television. And, you know, I was kind of young and sort of stubborn. And, you know, like, oh, artistic integrity and no censorship and freedom and all that typical American values, you know. And then when I started working with Feng Xianxian, who is really this amazing woman. I mean, just smart and so committed and just dedicated. And she had discussions, these long discussions of filmmakers about their works and some filmmakers in Taiwan decided not to work with her because she had certain, you know, really set ideas. And of course she defends her ideas really well. I mean, you get to listen to her and, you know. And she wanted me to, yeah, take out a few scenes that she thought would, you know, aggravate tensions that are already existing in Taiwanese society. The scene where my aunt says that many people use Taiwan as a springboard. They take everything and leave. And there's no feeling or caring about the land. And I think, you know, Feng Xianxian said, I agree with that. But we don't want to exasperate tensions with, you know, Taiwan as a multicultural society. You know, with, you know, the Kuomintang or the population that came, you know, from China or second generation. And so she and I, I was like, okay, you know, I can respect that, you know. At first, though, I thought, well, that's sort of censoring my aunt because that's my aunt's, you know, narrative. And then, but then I understand, I understood her concerns because I think the stakes were really high when you're working with public television. And, you know, you always kind of want to go to the safer route. So, yeah, so I think that was kind of a big deal for me. And at first I thought I would just give up the funding and, you know, perhaps keep just making the movie. And my friends who had helped me out up to this point, which had been already several years, they said, look, you know, you work so hard and this is just one scene to take out. What do you think, you know, we think you should just keep going at it. So I just, I deferred to her judgment. And I thought, you know, of course I should do that because, you know, in terms of ethics, I mean, I feel like, you know, associated for documentary filmmakers that when you make a movie, you need to think about who is most materially affected by the work. You know, and the people living in Taiwan, they're the ones that, you know, have the biggest stakes, right. And, you know, I mean, recently I lived there for six years, but there's something about being tied to the land and not being able to leave, even if you want to leave, right. So those are the kind of things, compromises that I made and also just part of growing up, you know, kind of as an artist and like, all right, you know, there's some advantages to working with public television and there's some compromises that I'm willing to make. Any questions? Ron, I have a question. It's quite interesting because in your own website, and also you mentioned about it in the film, actually, you talk about, you're not really sure about this life story. It was written by your auntie rather than by your grandma. So it's the second hand information and also was written sort of based on her memory about her childhood. So it's not about grandma anymore. It's about the older generations, you know, recalling what's going on in the past. So what's your take on this? How are you going to cope with this? How are you, you know... Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, I was very struck by, you know, I mean, the thing with in U.S., you know, especially with scholarship, it's always about integrity and, you know, sight, who is the source and, you know, being very authentic. Yeah, yeah, that's a very American kind of part of me and then when I found out that, wait, but it says, my grandmother's name, you know, as the author and actually she didn't write it. I mean, I was really shocked by that. So I mentioned that in the movie. But, you know, I mean, my grandmother read it and she wanted the award money and whether or not she... How much was it? I don't even know. I mean, not even that much. Well, I mean, in terms of... It's just like she can gamble, you know. She likes gambling. But, you know, this thing about, you know, I mean, I don't know how much was negotiated in terms of this isn't true. I mean, I think generally it was probably accurate enough for her to say okay. And also because it was published and it was public, you know. So I think, you know, you... I think all of us, I think as scholars, we always kind of just like, okay, credibility, you know, peer review. Generally, all right, I think this is okay, you know. But I just felt like still that there was... It just sort of spoke to the precariousness too of the way we cobbled together information to bring about a certain narrative of history, right? We're doing that all the time. It's quite interesting because when I read the script first on the website, it feels like more about you rather than about grandma. Don't you feel that? It's like growing up. It's about how you navigate being a Taiwanese or a Taiwanese American. What do you think? Yeah, I hope that people see it that way. I mean, I try to, you know, be fairly reflexive in the documentary itself because also the documentary is a construction as an art form, you know. And you're putting together information and the fact that my mom does two-take of the same, you know, kind of, you know what I mean? I kind of thought that that was, you know, really interesting to put in there. But I hope that people too get a sense of what kind of a person my grandmother was, you know. If anything, you know, the kind of berating of me and the berating my aunt, she's a very strong-headed woman and you can kind of make those sort of conclusions, you know. Yeah. Anyone? Yes, please. Simple question. When did you complete this film? Were you born in Taiwan or were you born in the States? I was born in the States. Yeah, and I completed about 2005. So about eight years ago. Yeah, yeah. I know I haven't seen the movie in a while. What's the question? Because I agree with your analysis. But it is also about you, because if you think, why would you make a film like this? What's your motive and what's your inspiration? And I get the sense that it is you who... Making sense. Making sense of yourself as somebody whose roots are in Taiwan, whose ancestry are in Taiwan and yet has very little connection other than by blood. But you have little, because you were born in the States perhaps, that you somehow are trying to discover your own roots through our mind. And this, I think, applies increasingly as more people emigrate. And they have their children in foreign countries. And their children grow up hearing the language of their parents but unable to communicate with their grandparents through their own mother tongue. This is increasingly common, especially in Taiwan when the mother tongue language was forbidden to be spoken. Now, Amma lives through several eras of the colonial rule, through the Chinese and the Chinese through the Japanese colonial rule then the Republic Chinese rule. So I think that Amma has gone through all the different periods, the most recent periods of colonial rules. I don't know whether you have seen the film Lang Taosa. It is one. It's again charts the history of Taiwan. It's a feature film. But it's, um... It was made to a... I don't know how to explain it. In Chi Ju. Oh, so perhaps. And the era is very similar. And so I think that's why I was thinking, that's why I asked the question whether you were born in Taiwan whether you were born, you know. Thank you. One of the things you mentioned was that your grandmother actually read the the actual text of the book. And I've got... Okay, she likes the prize money but she must have had some comments. There must be something she disagreed with. Were you ever able to get to that point? Well, that's interesting you mentioned that because, you know, when I was prepared to work on her film and I got the funding to be able to travel to Taiwan, you know, as an artist for me, I can travel when I can get some support, right? So I always... I love artist residencies because I pay you to go. And so I pay Artist Village, I'm waiting for the money to come through and it came through, but when it did, that was when my grandmother had her stroke, her third stroke, which she could not speak at all. And she was also easily tired so I can only ask her about one question maybe every other day. And the one thing I knew when I actually had the whole book translated for me, okay, so a lot of the things I knew about already about her life but then there was one part which I definitely... it was wrong which was that she fell in love with, you know, that she chose to marry my grandfather and I knew that that was wrong because she had told me in Taiwanese when I was younger, I had interviewed her that she didn't like to get married and she didn't like having children but she had one after the other after the other, after the other she says horrible and I thought, am I understanding her Taiwanese correctly? I thought they were so in love with each other and so I thought, you know what, if I want to make a documentary about my grandmother at least one thing needs to... I need to give her one thing which is she was forced into marrying my grandfather and all her children are, you know, are in denial including my mother so that's fine. If you notice it's very diplomatic and I go through my translator to ask this question rather than me asking it which was Grandma told Anita that she had a boyfriend she was already in love before she married grandfather, you know and so I confronted my aunt with this and of course my aunt just repeated the narrative of the book which is he fell into the... he saw this quiet woman but she was actually just motion sickness experiencing motion sickness but thought she was so gentle and wanted to marry her little did he know so this is what was so tricky about making this movie is that I wanted everyone to be pleased with it and of course that's really hard in a movie especially in a family themed movie and so I had to... it was a really delicate balance, you know and I wanted that at least to be there for her sounds good question Any questions? Yes please and so I went to visit her and she... at the end she was very quiet but then we... she set me off in a taxi it was in Holi and she set me on time and I was going to close the door and she held the door open and I was like what's going on and she goes we are Hakka don't ever forget and I was like what's Hakka? she looked at me with a serious face and she said I can't forget this and she was okay so then I asked my parent my mother what Hakka is I was like what's Hakka? I can't forget this and I was like oh it's nothing what do you mean? what is that? it's Cantonese so then a lot of my Chinese American friends or Asian American friends or Cantonese were telling all my Cantonese friends hey I'm part of Cantonese and they were like what? and so then I thought I was Cantonese for a while and then I told my dad he's like yeah you know Hakka but he was very quiet I think he was part of the history of discrimination and he just kind of denied that part of him and he didn't learn the language do you mean that your father size Hakka is a local Minnan well it gets really crazy because my dad his father is Hakka and then his mom is Taiwanese right? and then my mom I think maybe past five or seven years she went to a lecture and she's like oh my god we're Pingu and I was like what? she was like totally makes sense because we're matrilineal her side was very like pro-woman and he didn't have any like patriarchal whatever and also because it's Pingdong and it's Tainan and Fulshan in that area so she's like oh my god we're Pingu so I really don't know but one thing at the end I kind of felt like well the one thing I definitely have in common I can make a conclusion is that in Taiwanese the people in Taiwan we've been led astray and I think being led astray that's the whole thing you're told you're this you're told that you should only speak this you're told that you should only obey these rules whatever those are the kind of things when you're aware of that then you can decide your own path or at least have a possibility to think about what is it that you want to be you know what makes sense what is anyway I think that's what's interesting about the so called new world because such as America Australia everybody has ancestor from wherever and in America you have all sorts of descendant like other nationalities and you generalize there's a new nation it's America and then the Americans with such background they pass and search their paths then through your parents understand and you understand another way and I think that's I spoke to some of my foreign friends they said that's funny about Taiwanese people because they always say we're Chinese and then some people from China they're not Chinese and then some are we're Chinese so then it gets very confusing and I just wanted to maintain that also when I came to America I was Chinese that's what I was told until somebody said no you're not and I was like what do you mean and so maybe that was sort of similar my mom used to make Japanese food and I always thought Japanese food was Taiwanese food and when I was speaking and I grew up actually my first language was Taiwanese and I would swear at the kids in Taiwanese everyone spoke Taiwanese they would take my cookie and I'd get pissed my mom told me this whole story she was cracking up and the kid was like but I thought you're young you don't really know then you realize oh this influence of Japan so I think the history is really important to know and yet we know the history is also very slippery exactly and so this idea of oral history too is really important to ask those questions the hard questions and to ask people to try to remember and try to be brave to say it to speak out about any questions or comments or comments we heard from your grandmother in the film I just wanted to ask how do you feel say self determination of the people sort of values again say like economic stability or just continuing with the status quo I think the way my aunt put it was so eloquent this idea of we are on this island we drink the water we eat the rice that's grown in Taiwan we know whatever we are materially, physically connected to this land and because of that we have a right to decide what happens to the future of this land and you could talk about today all over the world indigenous people as well this idea of being the caretakers of the area of the land and know it really well and so I think that it really does just it makes sense practically but also and I think people have seen it also as a human rights issue too that one's ability to be able to have sovereignty and control the means of your survival of your living and not only just the means of it but the value of that the value of your existence and your connection to the land and being able to decide its destiny rather than being controlled by other people with other interests that are not necessarily your own I think it seems so obvious but then on the other hand for those who want to control territories it's not and there's so many ways to slowly get people to lead them astray and have decide that maybe this land is better if it's controlled by another group of people who don't live on the land you know not tied to it I must say I'm out next to the Japanese colonial area and also Chiang Kai-shek's Republic of China and you will ask I must during the Japanese rule they really was really talking about independence whereas the great why because because the Japanese got everything in order we were happy with them they were they were controlling they were administering the country in a way that people were reasonably happy whereas when you from the Chiang Kai-shek's era when you forbid the speaking of your mother tongue and you have to be fine for it even as a child we told them you have to block out as a child to say I'm a pig of course that feeling for independence is greater so the greater the oppression the greater the feeling for independence so it's not surprising that now because things are reasonably peaceful people want to have the status quo whereas if the Chiang Kai-shek's rule and the martial law continue I think they will be a greater further for independence thank you any questions actually do you have another one I have one, yeah sorry for as soon as as you emailed me and I saw the list of your films the one that particularly really fascinated me and one of the things that you expected me to say was Democratic Grandmother and I was curious about how this nickname arrived when exactly did she first start getting interested in politics because as you suggested it was quite a dangerous thing to do particularly in the latter period of the martial law it's actually her children so it was my oldest uncle who passed away before my grandmother and the last words that he said before he died was independence which is really dramatic he's in the hospital I was with my grandmother when she came out of the hospital she was like 10's away from him so you know it's simple but it was my uncle who was an activist and then my aunties they would tell her about things and she would go to these kind of secret enclaves like the alleys and just listen to politicians speak and she was the oldest person there so you were talking about the 1980s she started to early 1970s I don't even know she was also part of the Presbyterian church which was where the activism was also happening so she was involved in that too so that's why I have a shot at the church does she ever get in trouble with the police not that I know of but she's well kind of camouflaged as a nice elderly lady with a cane or an umbrella that can do damage because I've seen her do that she would get on the bus and take her umbrella and hit people's skin legs so she goes let me sit down I was so embarrassed I turned pink and I was like oh you still are pretty she was like get up but it's quite interesting for me I'm a big fan always go for the politics what I noticed was the beginning of the film and I can see why it's called 62 years and six and a half thousand miles between because the difference and the distance between you two when she looked at you she said oh you look look at you what's wrong with you you have to be so comfy just really reflecting the difference between age and culture for me that's really interesting and you didn't really set out to really pursue that actually that particular sort of fade out a little bit for me I think I wanted to really have people think about how difficult a task this was because within that ten years my mom told me that I needed to just stay away from my family in Taiwan and it was this clash between well tradition and modernity because they wanted me to get actually I think I was like 26 and they were like oh you're 30 and I'm like no oh you gotta get married actually in Taiwan you're 27 but that pretty much means 28 and you're actually 30 so they were just pressuring me and they sent me up with all these guys these like you know meetings yeah exactly and my grandmother would go with me and my mother would go with me and my aunt would go with me and I just... and they'd give me photos like which one do you like and I'm like oh come on anyway so I mean that's a whole nother movie but you know so I wanted to set that up how difficult this is going to be very interesting thank you I think we don't have more questions maybe later you can have private conversations thank you very much