SYNOPSIS

"Born in Riverside Town" is the most intimate film I have ever made. It contains moments I never thought I would share—my abortion, the nudity, the bleeding. When I finished the film, I kept it to myself for months. I didn’t tell my friends or family. It existed, but only in isolation. Yet, as time passed, I began to realize that showing it to people—especially strangers who had no prior connection to me—gave the film a new identity. At its core, this is a film about being muted. The muted sound at the water purifier meeting, the deaf-mute father and son, the phone that stopped recording on its own at the end—these were not just moments in the film; they became part of its language. This silence, this interruption, mirrors how life arrives and departs—unexpectedly, given and taken away. The histories in the film are fragile. A grandmother I had never met. A school for the deaf-mute that disappeared without a trace. A pregnancy that ended in a hospital bathroom. Stories swallowed by time, like a shelter built in the mountains only to be abandoned. And yet, in their absence, they linger. This film is my attempt to listen to those fragments, to piece together what remains of what has been muted. Even though the filming is over, the people in this film stay with me. After spending time with the deaf-mute father and son, I began learning sign language. It’s a slow and imperfect process, but it feels like a way of continuing the conversation that was left unfinished in the film. Though our encounter was brief, they are still with me. This film continues to vibrate in my life, shaping how I see the world long after the camera stopped recording.

GÉNÉRIQUE

• Director

  Kexin Zhang

• Production

  Kexin Zhang

• Referent

  Kexin Zhang

• Sales

  Kexin Zhang