Watch HER LAST DAY short film. Female Film Festival August 2024
Drama, Independent, Short Films
HER LAST DAY, 14min., China
Directed by Jiacheng Wang
A woman “Meizi” with her child who has lived in domestic violence for years travels back to her past wedding with her abusive husband while facing the decision to change her marriage.
Watch the Audience Feedback Video:
https://www.wildsound.ca/videos/audience-feedback-her-last-day
Director Statement
Her Last Day is the birth of a subversive and primordial poem from a generational capsule of family memory. Growing up as a witness and survivor of domestic violence in the world within and around me, I saw countless tears and desperate fear from the victims who are trapped by physical and invisible shackles of abuse. How do they go on and live their lives, and how do they make their decisions under restraints? I was urged to lift the voices long buried under the deep sea of constraining norms off the shore, with the bravery to face tensions and unspoken trauma in families still affecting millions of families in China and across the globe.
Unhealthy family structures universally maintain a discipline driven by fear and violence without listening to and representing the oppressed individuals’ voices. I attempt to rewrite the contemporary narrative and am driven to ignite the innate power in us to conquer with love. I intend to set a path that breaks the generational chains which restrain and shackles families across time, cultures, and countries universally beyond. We can dive into Meizi’s hesitations and motives under each intricate and threatening puzzle that she faces — How and why did we build the cage? Who is the bird? Why isn’t the bird flying away when the cage door is opened? It is a constant battle and inner labyrinth of conflicting desires for Meizi to deal not only with her family, but also herself, her beliefs, her karma, and the society in which she ultimately lives. Her last Day centers on forging raw life forces of hope and critical conversation through a transcendental gateway for silenced survivors of family violence to be healed by being heard and empowered.