My Mother's Rhapsody

'My mother' of the title is Lin Zhiguang, who is in fact the mother of director Qiu Jiongjiong’s father. This thoroughly entertaining film is Qiu’s expansive family chronicle, a documentary in the form of an art/folk tale. Lin, born to a wealthy family in 1926, lived through the Chinese civil war, the Communist Revolution, the Anti-Rightist Campaign, and more. A formidable seamstress, cook, and manager, she had seven children with her husband, Wang Junhui, the ticket seller for the famous itinerant Sichuan opera troupe, Xinyouxin.

Mother Lin tells her story and that of her children with confidence and a twinkling-eyed charisma. Qiu Jiongjiong frames and fragments her tales with amusing disruptions, including a be-winged adult Cupid, and a rooster whose every intense expression spookily mirrors her words. This is both a key background to Qiu’s A New Old Play, and a delightful portrait of an extraordinary woman.

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Available on Festival Scope Pro from 26 January 9:00 CET to 14 February 9:00 CET