On the Border

On the border is a delicate, sober and well directed work on silence and border. Minimal and with a great cinematography, it leaves the spectator with a constant role of imagination and creative approach to vision.

A Korean teen and his missing father. The boy meets a woman. It's the border between a China town and the Korean. His father leaves the motorcycle store he runs, for unknown reason. Interweaving handycam-like realism and stylish, atmospheric cinematography, the film portraits the a trip of desire and unlikely companion. When you find something lost at a time, there could be a world you never knew you would pursuit otherwise.

There is a moment in On The Border where the boy and the girl share their desire to go South Korea. His purposes are different for her is only subtle, aesthetic, for him is life. Surprising the delicate care that Wei Shujun manages the story, showing with a laconic look and silently building the routine of this young man who yearns to leave his filthy everyday life and replace it with that world full of neon lights that promises Korea. A dream that determines his life, which conditions his way of relating to others and Shujun manages to convey the weight of this desire.

This movie is amazing and its a map to our soul, our silences and our dreams. Poetry, sensibility and an existencial inquiry.

What does freedom mean? Can we as humans go wherever we want to? Money, power and control... are threating things to our freedom as humans?

10/10

WEI Shujun's "Yan Bian Shao Nian (On the Border)" vividly shines with its splendid cinematography and great performances by its actors/actresses, reflecting the tale of a hopeful boy who wishes to leave China to go to Korea in search of his lost father. For him, to seek for a lost father means a lot: feeling a sense of belonging, easing his longing for a real home, and quest for a new life... Celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2018, International Eskisehir Film Festival is honoured to have the short film "Yan Bian Shao Nian (On the Border)" awarded with "Special Jury Distinction" by Festival de Cannes 2018.