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Spring Festival

Spring Festival is a realistic family drama which happened in a small city in China. Qi Lu and Weiyu Zhou is a couple that they look normal in front of their family but actually live apart for half a year. The Spring Festival is the day they have to show up together to their family. However, Zhou wants to date her lover and leaves younger daughter with Lu.
With daughter heavily cries, Weiyu Zhou is forced back home. This becomes the chance for Zhou to ask for a divorce but Lu doesn’t want to sign on the divorce papers. They had a secretly had an argument and pretend well again in front of the big family.

  • Mohan Liu
    Director
  • Mohan Liu
    Writer
  • Aerrow Xu
    Producer
  • Mark Chen
    DOP
  • Selena Wu
    Assistant director
  • Tom Xiao
    1st Assistant Camera& Best boy
  • Hank Zhang
    Gaffer
  • Yujo Pan
    Production designer
  • Xiaojing Fu
    Production designer
  • King Cao
    Sound Recordist
  • Demon Cong
    Sound Recordist
  • George Chan
    Still photography
  • Fu Zhao
    Editer
  • Yan Geng
    Editer
  • Mark Chen
    Colorist
  • Project Type:
    Short
  • Runtime:
    13 minutes 25 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    November 21, 2024
  • Country of Origin:
    Australia
  • Country of Filming:
    Australia
  • Language:
    Chinese
  • Aspect Ratio:
    2.35:1
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    Yes - University of Sydney
Director Biography - Mohan Liu

Mohan Liu is an artist and filmmaker native to Sydney. She comes from Hohhot, a small city in the north China. Growing up in a multicultural social environment has notably shaped her artistic vision and particular manner of visual storytelling as a filmmaker. Mohan got her bachelor's media arts degree from the University of New South Wales. In the early stages of her career, she tried to portray abstract concepts through art forms such as making crafted designs, moving images, and multimedia arts. Three years of formal education in media arts, compounded with her own explorations, shaped her into being a practice-led artist and an attentive collaborator.

She stepped into production design in mid-2022 as she was able to penetrate her artistic tendencies and punctuality as a result. She collaborated on nearly twenty short films for students, she has been working as a stylist, makeup artist, and production designer. Those hands-on experiences improved her skills in visual translation of a director's vision by matching works that are distinct conceptually, and at the same time emotionally engaging. Her enthusiasm for story-telling by design has led her as a potential partner among Sydney filmmaking.

Now finishing her master's degree study at the University of Sydney, Mohan is moving to those directing and screenwriting. Her short film, Spring Festival, concentrates on family and tradition, meaning her search for storytelling which is personal but also universal. The combinatorial nature of Mohan's skills and her becoming knowledge offer her the position to create films that resonate even among the people with different ethnical background.

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Director Statement

Inspiration
The inspiration of this film was the true story of my elder brother. It happened when I was graduated from high school, and I didn’t notice what happened until my mother told me they were going to divorce. I only noticed that my sister-in-law was acting so wired, that she was trying to go out on the day of Spring Festival which is not allowed under the custom. So, I experienced a part of the story, and had a chat with my mother, then I started to write this story, but in a more dramatic way. And these series of events I experienced influenced my value towards family and marriage in a deep extend, therefore, in my projects I want to explore themes behind our life that are happy but brutal.

Themes and Significance
The specific key idea behind this film is “Marriage is good or bad ?”. I want to express that family and marriage is not always happy as we thought. At least, from my perspective, I see marriage contains many negative points. But at the same time, I respect people chasing a happy marriage as their life goals. However, I still hope my audience could critically think about marriage and make the best decision for themselves. Since the background is China society, I believe audience from Asian culture background will have a deeper resonance.

Visual and Narrative Style
I want to tell the story in a realistic way. I hope it could be simple but strong, and could close to their real life, can be easier to resonate with audiences and evoke empathy. A blue, cool tone is mostly close to my ideal visual style of the film. And the acting that no shouting and fighting but could show the angry and collapse. Also, because the story is set in the time of new year, in Chinese culture, red is a vital color, it means lucky and happy. Since I want to show contrast, the color of elements is in red or blue, the setting will also show warm and cold outside and inside the room.

Director’s Vision
I hope this short film could be the starting point and booster for me as both director and script writer. Although it still has a huge improving space, I am satisfying Spring Festival can be my first narrative film, as a newbie in the film making industry. I consider this short film as my first step toward the industry. Hope I could have passion to explore my value of philosophy in my life. At last, I am so proud I could work with my fantastic crew.