Post by NZBC on Aug 1, 2008 19:09:50 GMT 12
www.trythisfilms.com/stories.html
Capsule Synopsis
Filmmaker John Helde sets out to understand his father Tom's remarkable childhood as a white American growing up in 1930's China. Navigating his father's reticence, he tracks down Tom's China-born peers, a unique community of Americans who grew up with a foot in two cultures. But when cancer intervenes, John's hope for his father to return to the home he left behind fades - and John's ensuing solo journey across modern China, guided by new friends, becomes an exploration of what "home" really means.
Synopsis
Made in China is a personal story exploring themes of identity, sons and fathers, and the yearning to understand where we come from. In 2002, I sit down with my father to try to understand his childhood as a white American growing up in 1930's China. His past is a mystery to me - why did he never talk about it? Why has he never gone back? Beginning with my father's remarkable birth on a remote Sichuan mountaintop, Made in China uncovers the stories of China-born Americans who grew up with a foot in two cultures, in a home that was never what their parents called "home."
Along the way, my father and I begin to find a way to talk to each other and we grow closer than we've ever been. I propose a trip to China - thinking that if we find the places he long ago left behind, we'll share in this past together. But his death cuts short our plans, and China falls to me alone. My solo journey across the country - from modern Shanghai to industrial Changsha to a rugged mountain in Western Sichuan - becomes a journey through a state of mind. Guided by new friends, the search for my father's past becomes an exploration of the meaning of home, of what lasts, and what doesn't
Capsule Synopsis
Filmmaker John Helde sets out to understand his father Tom's remarkable childhood as a white American growing up in 1930's China. Navigating his father's reticence, he tracks down Tom's China-born peers, a unique community of Americans who grew up with a foot in two cultures. But when cancer intervenes, John's hope for his father to return to the home he left behind fades - and John's ensuing solo journey across modern China, guided by new friends, becomes an exploration of what "home" really means.
Synopsis
Made in China is a personal story exploring themes of identity, sons and fathers, and the yearning to understand where we come from. In 2002, I sit down with my father to try to understand his childhood as a white American growing up in 1930's China. His past is a mystery to me - why did he never talk about it? Why has he never gone back? Beginning with my father's remarkable birth on a remote Sichuan mountaintop, Made in China uncovers the stories of China-born Americans who grew up with a foot in two cultures, in a home that was never what their parents called "home."
Along the way, my father and I begin to find a way to talk to each other and we grow closer than we've ever been. I propose a trip to China - thinking that if we find the places he long ago left behind, we'll share in this past together. But his death cuts short our plans, and China falls to me alone. My solo journey across the country - from modern Shanghai to industrial Changsha to a rugged mountain in Western Sichuan - becomes a journey through a state of mind. Guided by new friends, the search for my father's past becomes an exploration of the meaning of home, of what lasts, and what doesn't