The Day, at the Beach: Di Xin Studies Communication

On her new short film, The Day, at the Beach, director Cindy Di Xin has stated: “This film is based on my own personal story. This story also is a lesson that I am still learning since I was 15 years old. First, my feature concept came out in my mind, which is about an Asian family that has been through separation and reunion over time and what they have been through individually.

The day at the beach is one of the important moments in the feature story, and it was the real moment that I had when a man came to visit me in the U.S. and I discovered his secret. It was a five-day stay with my dad, but it has affected me for more than ten years.” She continues, “I want my audience to have a moment to rethink or to find out how they have been affected by their own family relationships, and how their families shape their personalities and journeys. In addition, I want to share my thoughts with my audience about how life is built up around family. Family is a root for everyone’s life.”

This is evident in what The Day, at the Beach, shows rather than tells. Once again, in a similar fashion to the more emotionally brutal and darker Voiceless, Di Xin is able to simultaneously showcase cultural differences and highlight thematic universality. The distant relationship shown at the beginning of the story between father and daughter may be rooted in certain, cultural mores, norms, and challenges unique to a Chinese-American perspective.

But then, with certain dramatic plot points, the incredible and bridge-crossing themes of family, secrets, and coming into one’s own take hold. It’s a beautiful process, in part because Di Xin lets everything unfold so naturally, and so gracefully. It’s all about the little moments, with Di Xin trusting the audience to put the big picture together themselves. As a result, this frees her creatively to tell the story on her own terms.

The kind of honesty Di Xin thrives on as a filmmaker is also evident in the film’s polished, but relatively modest technical specs. Predominantly there’s a lot of handheld camerawork, juxtaposed with closeups of characters’ faces so one gets just enough of a sense of emotional intimacy, while simultaneously being somewhat held back. There’s almost a sense you’re consistently reminded by the style of being a guest, something of a non-invasive spectator, and as such the film is able to communicate its themes semi-objectively, with enough emotion but never tipping into overt sentimentality.

This makes the poignancy of the plot that much richer, because you come away with a sense of being able to see all sides of the communicatory aspects of the two main characters. It bolsters the power of the two lead performances, making even moments as small but significant as the film’s opening inside the car have this magnetic frequency.

Levi Colston, posted by Samuel Pratt