Sundance Interview: Zhang Yuan

We weren't able to catch up with Little Red Flowers director Zhang Yuan before Sundance ended, but he very kindly obliged us with an email interview during his downtime at the Berlinale. Little Red Flowers is a film about a little boy sent to a boarding kindergarten in China, who refuses to let his spirit be bent by the school's rules, which are designed to make students conform to the model of an "ideal student". Cinematical asked Zhang about making a film with a cast full of four and five year old children, and what statement his film makes about the human spirit.

Cinematical: The theme underlying Little Red Flowers is independence and non-conformity. No matter how hard they try, the teachers cannot break the spirit of young Qiang. Did you identify with him?

Zhang Yuan: I’m interested (in) the loneliness of children because I believe that no matter how small children are, they have souls like adult. Their loneliness deserves representation on the screen.

Cinematical: There are similarities between the boarding kindergarten in the film and American public schools – the emphasis on rules and conformity, behavior modification through rewards. Do you think American audiences will look at your film and see the similarities to our own schools?

Zhang Yuan: The world of children is a refraction of the adult world, which is the same everywhere. If American audiences see similarities between the film and their own experiences, it’s no accident. I deliberately left the time and space of the film vague to make the story more universal.

Cinematical: Were you nervous about making a film with a cast of unpredicatable four and five year olds?

Zhang Yuan: Yes. While making the film, I felt like I had a dagger hanging over my head for fear that something might happen to the children on the site. This film is the most challenging film I have made so far because the children are so young and there were so many of them.

Cinematical: How much coaching did you do with the young actor who played Qiang? Were we seeing acting on the screen, or just his genuine responses to the situations he was in?

Zhang Yuan: He is a very intuitive kid. What you see on the screen is a mixture of acting and genuine response to the situations he was in.

Cinematical: There are scenes in the film that seem more scripted and other scenes, particularly when the children interact with each other, which seem to just be the children being children. How much of the film involved just you capturing the children in their natural interactions and dialogue with each other?

Zhang Yuan: The script was carefully crafted to provide guidance for the children. The children did a good job following the script. However, their acting was full of surprises throughout the shooting, which were captured by our cameras.

Cinematical: Did you have concerns at all about making a film that focuses on individuality in China? Any issues with government censors over the content of your film?

Zhang Yuan: The question makes me think of two analogies: crossing the river by feeling the rocks, which means one has to fumble one’s ways across uncharted territories. The other analogy is  “walking the hanging cable like the acrobats.”  Fortunately, the film passed the censorship.

Cinematical: What do you see as the overall message of your film? Do you see Qiang as a heroic character?

Zhang Yuan: I’d rather refrain from stating the themes of the film. As for Qiang, he’s indeed a little hero.

Cinematical: Why did you decide to base the film Little Red Flowers on only the first third of the book? Will there be more films about Qiang and what he does next?

Zhang Yuan: The process of socialization of children at that particular age interests me.  The rest of the story in the novel goes on to tell how he becomes an adult. As for a sequel, it’s a possibility.

Cinematical: What do you see as the biggest challenges facing independent filmmakers today?

Zhang Yuan: The challenges to independent filmmakers are the same all over the world: investment, market etc. There is an added challenge to Chinese filmmakers however. That is censorship.