When grapes grow on a willow tree
Director: Lu Meng
Cast:Yin Tong, Dilly Evans-Smith, Noemie Asbyornsen
Crew:Directed by: Lu Meng - Written by: Lu MENG - Produced by: Lu Meng - Director of Photography: Lu Meng - Set Designer: Zhang Zhongjin - Editor: Lu Meng - Costume: London Chinese Opera Studio - Make-up and Hair Designer: Beatrice Vincenzi - Music by ELCONESTHAROE
Email:mslumeng@gmail.com
Synopsis
When Grapes Grow on a Willow Tree is an art film about interpreting the mise-e-scene of the oriental representation on western cinema. Exploring the power of representation and psychoanalysis of the stereotype. The film speaks to its audiences as well as the film speaks for its audiences’ unconsciousness. The film is a language that I composed to depict the enigmatic signifiers of representation. The film is asking the questions, who has the power to represent other culture? how do they represent it? The stereotypes of the orient on representation in western cinema based on imagination, fantasy, fetishism and binary structure... the enigmas came from the untranslatability of cultures and languages. My film is imagining and re-imagining/translating and de-translating the western representation of the east. The “mise-en-scene” of my film is signifying the the ‘un-say’, what is left is to be filled with my viewer’s imagination and the interpretation of the enigma.
About the director
Lu Meng, Born in China, studied Fine arts and holds a degree at CSM, in the United Kingdom. She will be continuing her master’s studies at Royal College of Art with a focus on contemporary art practice. Over the years she has created multimedia artworks, photography installations and multi-screen video art. She has also published a photography travel log based on her trip to North Korea (2019). She has had her art exhibited in America, UK, Europe and in China.