Speechless
Director：Simon Chung
Screenwriter：Lv Yulai，Simon Chung
Cast：Pierre-Mathieu Vital, Gao Qiguan，Yu Rongrong，Jiang Jian
Producer：None
Cinematographer：Chen Zili
Running Time：93 mins
Region：Hong Kong, China
Year：2012
Language：Chinese
Production Company：有心人制作公司
SYNOPSIS
A mysterious Westerner appears on a riverbank in a remote part of southern China one day, completely naked. He is taken to the local police station, where he refuses to speak. The police debate what to do. Strictly speaking, the man has not broken any laws. On the other hand they cannot simply let him go. Finally they decide to send the man to the hospital.
At the hospital, the Westerner still remains silent. He seems to be haunted by nightmares and scenes from his past. The doctor’s ministrations seem to make matters worse. Meanwhile, the Westerner forms a strange bond with the hospital’s orderly, Jiang. Even though they don’t share a language, they nevertheless share a common bond. When he learns that the Westerner is about to be transferred to a mental asylum, Jiang decides to rescue the Westerner.
Jiang takes the Westerner to his uncle’s village. As he plans what to do with the Westerner, Jiang accidentally discovers a secret about him that provides a key to the mysterious stranger’s past…
Director Biography
<p>Simon Chung is a graduate of Toronto’s York University, where he majored in film production. Since his return to Hong Kong, he had worked at various capacities in the local film and television industry. He is a founding member of the Hong Kong independent film distributor Ying E Chi, and had worked with that organization as General Manager between 2000 and 2004, and is currently on its Board of Directors. His credit as Producer includes William Kwok Wai Lun’s And So and So. His work as an independent filmmaker has, in the past few years, earned him several awards both in Hong Kong and overseas, and his films have been shown in many film festivals around the world. His debut short Life is Elsewhere won a Distinguished Award at the Hong Kong Independent Short Film & Video Awards and the Award for Excellence at the Image Forum Festival in Japan. Stanley Beloved (1997) won the Luna de Valencia de Oro, (First Prize for Shorts) at Cinema Jove Film Festival in Valencia, Spain and the Award of the City of Regensburg, Regensburg Short Film Week. First Love and Other Pains (1999) won the Mythical Films Script Writing and Short Film Awards, founded by actress Michelle Yoeh In 2000. Innocent (2005), his debut feature, premiered at the Hong Kong International Film Festival in April 2005, and was awarded the NFB Best Canadian Film Award at Reel Asian International Film Festival in Toronto in 2005. His latest feature, End of Love, premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in 2009.</p>
Director's Statement
<p>The inspiration for the film came from the “Piano Man”, a guy who washed up off the eastern coast of England a few years ago. There was no ID on him and he refused to speak, so they took him to a mental hospital. He was given a piano and started playing, and stories became circulating of him being a musical genius who went mad, like the guy in Shine. In reality he was a gay student from Germany who had a mental breakdown. I transplanted the story to China because I wanted to see what would happen to such a character there. The film goes both ways: it is about homosexuality in China from a Western perspective, and also about Chinese perception of Westerners.</p>
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