Description
A TOISAN TRILOGY: Three Award-winning Films
In the 1870s, the first major wave of Chinese came to America primarily from southern China, with a heavy concentration from the Toisan (Taishan) region of Guangdong Province. A Toisan Trilogy presents three award-winning short films directed by Arthur Dong that draw upon this early period of Chinese migration to America. The stories follow the plight of three Toisan natives set against a backdrop of U.S. immigration laws that pushed men to leave their wives in order to go to America. This separation created the so-called “bachelor society” in American Chinatowns consisting of men without their wives, and in China, a parallel “widow society” that was formed by the women left behind. For the first time together, A Toisan Trilogy presents:
Sewing Woman (1982), 14 minutes
This beloved classic reveals one woman’s determination to survive: from an arranged marriage in Toisan to working class comforts in modern America. Sewing Woman is based on a series of oral histories and the life story of the filmmaker’s mother, Zem Ping Dong, an immigrant who worked in San Francisco garment factories for over fifty years. With a candid monologue spoken by veteran actress, Lisa Lu (The Joy Luck Club), Sewing Woman chronicles a story of family and reunification between a “widow” and her “bachelor” husband. Winner of over 20 international film awards, including an Oscar® nomination for Best Short Documentary. Included as an added bonus is a Chinese-subtitled version of the film. Written by Lorraine Dong.
Living Music for Golden Mountains (1981), 27 minutes; 2010 Directors Cut, 18 minutes
Living Music for Golden Mountains is a touching portrait of filmmaker Arthur Dong’s Chinese music teacher, Leo Lew, an immigrant who toiled as a laundry worker but kept spiritually alive through his love of music. The film traces Lew’s “bachelor” life in San Francisco Chinatown, planning to one day return to his family in Toisan. Produced in 1981 at San Francisco State University with Elizabeth Meyer, Living Music for Golden Mountains marks Dong’s documentary directorial debut and won a Regional Academy Student Film Award for Best Documentary. DVD includes a new 2010 director’s cut of the film that the filmmaker re-edited and re-subtitled especially for the anthology.
Lotus (1987), 27 minutes:
Shot on location in remote villages of Hong Kong, this fictionalized story set in the Kay Lok Village of Toisan follows Lotus, a woman with bound feet in 1914 China who must decide whether to bind her daughter’s feet. For more than thirty centuries, China celebrated a practice known as footbinding and the fight against it triggered one of the biggest, most overlooked women’s struggle in world history. Lotus is a “widow” whose husband is away in America and make an independent, life-changing decision in the absence of patriarchal figures. The DVD includes galleries of vintage bound feet shoes and historical photos of women with bound feet. Winner of the CINE Golden Eagle Award. Lotus was produced by Dong and Rebecca Soladay, with story by Lorraine Dong and Arthur Dong, and screenplay by Soladay.
