How to Divorce During the War highlights how families can be torn apart, sometimes because of politics (Film review)

Display of posters of films, including that for How to Divorce 

During the War, screened at the 50th Hong Kong

International Film Festival 

 

  

Lithuanian filmmaker Andrius Blaževičius at the Q&A

session after a Hong Kong International Film Festival 

screening of his film 

 

How to Divorce During the War (Lithuania-Luxembourg-Ireland, 2025)

- Andrius Blaževičius, director-scriptwriter

- Starring: Marius Repšys, Žygimantė Elena Jakštaitė, Amelija Adomaitytė

- Part of the HKIFF's Young Cinema Competition (World) program 

 

I don't know if others feel the same way about this but How to Divorce During the War strikes me as a title for an absurdist comedy rather than, say, an utterly serious drama.  As it turned out though, there is very little to laugh about in this work, set in 2022 Lithuania, about a nuclear family whose world is turned upside down by the parents splitting around the time that the Russians attacked Ukraine.

 

Vitas (played by Marius Repšys) is a filmmaker who spends more time daily cleaning the family home and being the main caregiver for pre-teen daughter Dovile (essayed by Amelija Adomaityte) than on the latest script that he's working on but has writer's block over.  In the eyes of his high-flying media exec spouse, Marija (Žygimantė Elena Jakštaitė), he is a shadow of the interesting, intelligent man that she married -- and so she wants out.  (She's also in a lesbian relationship with a colleague who seems to have egged her to divorce her husband.)

 

Since their house was in Marija's name, she had the legal right to ask Vitas to move out of it.  Which he reluctantly did.  Their daughter Dovile stays with Marija while Vitas moves back in with his parents, who he finds increasingly hard to get along with; especially after he finds -- via their doing such as spouting pro-Russian propaganda about the Ukraine war -- that they do not share his political views, which are more aligned with that of his now-ex-wife along with their daughter.

 

Consequently, Vitas finds himself part of not just one but two families at war with themselves at a low point in his professional life.  And, truly, it's hard not to feel for him.  And, also, Doville.  Who doesn't say much but watches, observes and knows far more -- about the family situation and also what's going on in the world at large -- than her parents and other adults may realise.  

 

On the other hand, Marija is not always as easy to have sympathy for; and is someone whose actions I sometimes could understand but I disagreed with at others.  The most complex character in the movie, it is through her that one is shown the domestic and internal conflicts that can arise from a woman becoming the main provider of the family -- something that still is the exception rather than the rule.  Also the conflict that a working person has with regards to how much one should -- or, maybe the better word is can -- professionally and financially sacrifice for one's ideological beliefs.  

 

My sense is that many Hongkongers who viewed this film will most relate to Vitas: particularly, his experiences with his parents.  Because of what happened here in 2019 and after China imposed a national security law on Hong Kong (in 2020), and how what happened were covered and portrayed by media on different sides of the political equation, conflicts (have) ensued between many parents and their (adult) offspring; and resulted in the breaking up of families -- or, at the very least, an increasing number of (adult) offspring deciding to move out of family abodes to live on their own.    

 

Part of me wanted to ask How to Divorce During the War's director-scriptwriter, Andrius Blaževičius, whether he was aware of Hong Kong's situation during the Q&A that was held after the screening I attended of his film.  Also, whether he knew that many Hongkongers feel a kinship with Ukrainians (and why).  But while I didn't, I do get the sense that he wasn't entirely clueless about why this sensitive dramatic offering is one that can resonate with people here even though they live thousands of kilometers away from Lithuania and Ukraine.

 

My rating for this film: 7.0 

Remembering Apple Daily and those who worked for it one year and one day after its final issue came out

Display at a "yellow" shop around this time last year

 

Another sad anniversary came and went yesterday.  Specifically, yesterday was the one year anniversary of the last issue of Apple Daily, Hong Kong's last democratic newspaper.  I must admit: I still find myself looking for copies for Apple Daily at news stands in Hong Kong from time to time.  I guess I still can't completely believe or accept that it's really gone.  And if I feel bad about Apple Daily being no more, how much worse must those who used to work there feel.

A piece in The Guardian by former Apple Daily features editor Norman Choi gives some idea, and also about what is life now is like.  For those who are fine with just a summary, consider its title: 'My career is finished, my friends are in prison and I'm an alien in my city': Life after Hong Kong's Apple Daily".  Some excerpts from the article:   

Sometimes I feel like a garden gnome, hunkered down and being comfortably ignored. Other times I feel anxious and helpless when I think about my former colleagues in custody. 

I have known some of them for many years. In our old life, one joined me on a 100km charity walk in Japan, another often went trekking with me. Surrounded by nature we watched the sunrises and sunsets together. We shared hot dumplings on a chilly day after another exhausting hike. We laughed and cried together.

While they have been detained for almost a year., I still feel their presence...

It is a struggle to try and put my emotions at what has happened to us all into words, so instead I will share an excerpt from a letter I received from a fellow journalist, now in prison.

“Life will nevertheless push us forward, like a stream that brings both hungry and sleeping fishes downstream. Strong wind will lead us towards tomorrow, no matter if we are anxious or calm.”

A Radio Free Asia article attempts to paint a more positive picture of life post Apple Daily for some of its former journalists. "One year after the paper was forced to shut down and several senior editors arrested by national security police, former reporters at Hong Kong's pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper are still writing the stories the paper might have run, and posting them to social media", it reports.  "The Apple Daily shouldn't be allowed to just disappear like this," it quotes one of them as asserting; "I figured there had to be some work I can keep on doing."

 

These ex-Apple Daily journalists are providing us with profiles in courage.  One that the head of the Foreign Correspondents Club in Hong Kong (who also happens to be the current head of the journalism school at the University of Hong Kong) should draw inspiration from but won't.  

 

More than incidentally, a group of former Apple Daily journalists went to the site of their old office on Thursday night to literally shine lights there and leave the message that "They tried to bury us but didn't know we're seeds."  Their presence and actions prompted the arrival of police officers to harass them but -- touch wood -- there have been no reports of arrests.  

 

On a related note: Inmedia (an independent Hong Kong media platform which has not shut down but, instead, relocated to Singapore carried a piece this week about what had happened to plants "rescued" from the Apple Daily building by members of the public when the paper closed.  Hong Kong journalist turned London-based journalism professor, Yuen Chan, relayed the story in English on Twitter.  The final Tweet on the thread is as follows: "These plants are hardy, like the former Apple Daily staff, they have dispersed to different places, finding new meaningful roles. One former worker says his plant is a living connection to the company: "And behind its life there is a spirit, a spirit that pursues freedom".  

 

And yes, I realize that this may sound rather pathetic and like grasping at straws to some folks.  But from a little hope, much can grow.  And, as Claudia Mo relayed to people, it's important -- especially in these current circumstances and time -- to hold on.  And not forget.  And also to feel like there still is support from other out there.     

 

Speaking of which: The Consulate General of Ireland in Hong Kong put out the following Tweet yesterday: "On this significant date of 24 June - the first @UN International Day of #WomeninDiplomacy - we were delighted to welcome back to the office - fresh out of #Quarantine - our Deputy Head of Mission, Katrina Devine."  "What does this have to do with Apple Daily?", I can hear you ask.  Well, if you clicked on the supplied link, I'll ask you to cast your eyes on the photo and what can be seen in it (along with Ms Devine and the flags of Ireland and the European Union): i.e., a plate of apples, and a framed copy of the final issue of Apple Daily.   

Hong Kong Olympic joy threatened by killjoys unwilling to take advantage of golden opportunities to bring society together

Yet another emotional rollercoaster of a day in Hong Kong

 

There was more glory to Hong Kong at the Tokyo Olympics today thanks to swimmer Siobhan Haughey.  Just two days after becoming Hong Kong's first ever medalist in a swim event, she won another Olympic silver medal -- this time in the 100 meters freestyle final.  In so doing, she became Hong Kong's first ever Olympic multi-medalist.  Together with gold medal-winning fencer Edgar Cheung Ka-long, Haughey also has doubled Hong Kong's historical medal count in the Olympics (as prior to these Olympics, Hong Kong's athletes had won a total of three Olympic medals – one gold, one silver and a bronze)!    

 

This morning also saw badminton mixed double players Tse Ying-suet and Tang Chun-man bid to garner Hong Kong more glory in the bronze medal match.  And although they were ultimately unsuccessful, I reckon they did Hong Kongers proud by putting up a good fight and pushing their Japanese opponents pretty much all the way in a contest that I can imagine would have been exciting to watch for neutrals as well as those of us with a vested interest in the results.

 

Even as I was watching the Olympic events (on TV) though, I must admit to feeling butterflies in my stomach: less so from what was unfolding in the sporting arenas and much more because the verdict with regards to Tong Ying-kit -- the first man charged and then put on trial under China's national security law for Hong Kong -- was scheduled to be announced at 3pm this same day.  At dinner last night with friends, a Mainland Chinese-born friend vouchsafed that, if the trial had taken place on the other side of the Hong Kong-Mainland China border, Tong would be sentenced to life imprisonment.  In view of his only being 24 years of age (born in 1997 -- the same year as Olympians Haughey and Cheung, as it so happens), how absolutely tragic would such a sentence be.  

 

As it turned out, the judges for Hong Kong's first ever security law case look to have ignored the prosecution's suggestion to look to Mainland Chinese legal practices when deciding on the sentence to give out.  Even so, the six and a half years jail term for the incitement to secession charge and eight-year prison term for committing acts of terror is plenty harsh indeed; and this even after having Tong serve part of those terms concurrently makes it so that he will spend a total of nine years behind bars (in addition to the one year or so that he's already spent behind bars while awaiting trial).  

 

We're talking after all about a young man who is a first offender and also someone who volunteered as a first aider during the extradition bill protests.  Nicknamed "Heavy Armour", he is credited with having helped people and looked after injured folks hit by the police's pepper spray and blue dye (the latter from water cannons).  Also, look carefully at the photo of him on his motorbike -- with which he allegedly deliberately rammed into the police and you'll notice a red cross badge and related symbols on the bag strapped on him.

The sentence meted out against Tong appears particularly unjust when one compares it to the treatment accorded to the policeman who very obviously deliberately rammed his motorcycle into protestors back on November 11th, 2019.  Just minutes before Tong Ying-kit's sentence was made known this afternoon, the Hong Kong Free Press published an article about that offending officer only having been issued with a “suitable written advice”.  Yes, you read that right: no jail time for him; no sacking; no real black mark on his record; etc.

 

For further examples of contemporary Hong Kong (in)justice, consider that today also has seen the police arresting a man on suspicion of insulting the national anthem when crowds gathered in a shopping mall to watch Edgar Cheung Ka-long's gold medal awards ceremony.  Yes, there now is a law against booing or otherwise disrespecting The March of the Volunteers (passed, lest we forget, on June 4th of last year).  But in the videos I've seen (and heard) (like this one), people are delightedly chanting "We are Hong Kong" rather than negatively making abusive sounds when the Putonghua language song played!  (Also, there appear to be hundreds, if not thousands, of people at the venue concerned.  So how does one decide on arresting just one particular individual for the perceived offence?!)

As Hong Kong Free Press' Tom Grundy was moved to Tweet upon hearing that the police were investigating the crowd assembled to watch the Olympics at Kwun Tong's APM mall, "For those who thought the Hong Kong authorities might seize a golden opportunity to bring society together in a moment of city-wide unity and goodwill..."  When you add this to the badminton player black attire fiasco, one can't help conclude that there are a good number of killjoys in Hong Kong -- and that they tend to be over in the pro-Beijing camp.

 

To summarize: in a happier, alternative universe, Hong Kongers would be able to be 100 percent happy about their fellow Hong Kongers' exploits at the Tokyo Olympics. Instead, Hong Kong's Olympic glory has actually been bittersweet. As Bloomberg's Matthew Brooker explains about the scenes that have unfolded in recent days of Hong Kongers gathered in malls throughout the territory to cheer on the likes of Edgar Cheung and Siobhan Haughey, and more:

For anyone from outside Hong Kong, the sight of local fans cheering a home-town favorite must have seemed unremarkable. For anyone familiar with the city’s past two years of trauma, it was striking. Such gatherings have been vanishingly infrequent since 2019, when shopping malls were a popular site for flash protests. Crowds often assembled to sing “Glory to Hong Kong,” an unofficial anthem that has since been banned in schools. Hong Kong’s Covid rules still limit gatherings in public places to no more than our people, an interdiction that has been enforced zealously by the police when there is any hint of a political motive...

It has reached a point where the mildest assertion of Hong Kong idiosyncrasy is at risk of being branded potentially subversive or secessionist. Yet the Olympics is a reminder of how a distinctive and different Hong Kong identity might have sat comfortably within a more expansive conception of Chinese nationhood.

The high point of China’s popularity in Hong Kong came during the 2008 Games in Beijing, when observance of “one country, two systems” caused a groundswell of good feeling toward the mainland and the city’s residents were happy to adopt athletes of both teams as their own. Hong Kongers were far more willing to identify as citizens of the People’s Republic when they sensed a willingness to accept the city without insisting on changing it.

That makes the Hong Kong team’s presence in Tokyo poignant, pointing to the opportunity missed, the road not traveled, in which a more tolerant and more confident China embraced the nation’s cultural diversity rather than seeking to stamp it out in pursuit of socially engineered Communist orthodoxy. For the truth is that Hong Kong is different, and this is its strength and its value to China. The city is an outward-facing society that has been exposed to the influence of multiple global currents and traditions. That heritage was brought home again on Wednesday in the form of silver-medal-winning swimmer Haughey, the daughter of an Irish father and a Hong Kong mother. 

From Hollywood blockbuster to uncommon animation at the Hong Kong International Film Festival (film reviews)

The way to the university auditorium that's 

one of my favorite HKIFF screening venues this year

Heat (USA, 1995)

- Part of the HKIFF's Restored Classics program

- Michael Mann, director, writer and co-producer

- Starring: Al Pacino, Robert de Niro, Val Kilmer

A friend of mine recently complained about how many of the films I review on this blog are very hard to get access to over where she lives (in small town USA).  But she should have no problems being able to view Heat, the 1995 Hollywood crime drama that's probably raked in the most money at the box office of any of the Hong Kong International Film Festival offerings I'm viewing this year (and may well have had the largest budget too).

Al Pacino and Robert de Niro head a strong cast featuring many familiar faces and names (including Jon Voight, a teenaged Natalie Portman and a young Dennis Haysbert, who I now forever associate with 24's President David Palmer).  The former plays a Lieutanant Vincent Hanna, an LAPD detective leading the pursuit of a gang of skilled robbers headed by the latter's Neil McCauley, an ex-con who these days favors suits and the kind of confident demeanor and swagger that one associates with successful businessmen.

The cinematic remake of a failed TV pilot that Michael Mann had worked on, Heat clocks in at close to three hours long and features three sub-plots that look to flesh out the characters played by Pacino, de Niro and Val Kilmer by way of their relations to the key females in their lives.  While they do add dimensions to those characters, I still felt like the scenes in which they are shown interacting with the women in their lives are by far the weakest of the film.  For one thing, none of the female characters in this offering come across as anything but disappointingly one-dimensional.  For another, the best chemistry displayed between any two people in the movie occur in the too few scenes that have Pacino's Lt. Hanna and de Niro's Neil McCauley interacting with each other.

Where Heat really gets the adrenaline going and temperatures rising is in its detailed action scenes, which reputedly have inspired real life copycat crimes as well as the designers of one of the Grand Theft Auto video games.  Also elevating the film beyond that of an average actioner are the characterizations of McCauley and his team, notably explosives expert Chris (Val Kilmer), in such a way that you get to realizing that they may be hardened criminals who won't hesitate to kill on the job but nonetheless are men who want to do good for those they love, and the depiction of its nominal hero, Lt. Hanna, in such a way that it seems inevitable that the more intent he is to nail the bad guys, the more he'll neglect the females in the life and suffering he'll bring on them as well as himself.

     

My rating for the film: 8.0

The Breadwinner (Ireland-Canada-Luxembourg, 2017)

- Part of the HKIFF's Animation Unlimited program

- Nora Twomey, director

- Featuring the voices of: Saara Choudry, Laara Sadiq, Soma Bhatia, etc. 

At the Hong Kong International Film Festival three years ago, I viewed my first animated Irish film.  The Song of the Sea is the kind of the movie one would feel comfortable to bring children to go see.  But while The Breadwinner comes from the same Irish production house, Cartoon Saloon, as that magical movie which introduced me to selkies, I must admit to being rather startled to catch sight of young tykes in the audience of the HKIFF screening that I was at yesterday afternoon.

We're talking after all of a film that, even while it is indeed animated rather than 'live action', is set in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan, where women are liable to get beaten up if they venture out of their homes unaccompanied by men and a booklover who was a teacher in peace-time can end up not only missing a leg after being taking part in the war but also confined to a prison far away from home.

After her father is unjustly convicted, and with her mother (voiced by Laara Sadiq) and adult sister not allowed to leave their house without a man at their side, preadolescent Parvana (voiced by Saara Choudry) cuts her long hair short and dresses up as a boy to go out and do such as buy food for the household and become the family's breadwinner.  Her days are enlivened by her encountering and deciding to work in tandem with a former schoolmate who has similarly disguised herself as a boy (Soma Bhatia) and she helps banish away fears and nightmares before her baby brother goes to bed by telling him the fantastical story of a brave boy who goes off to confront a scary Elephant King.

But for every little triumph, and joy at discovering the many things she can do and places she can go when people think she's a boy, Parvana also experiences the kind of disappointments and setbacks that people shouldn't have to deal with at least until they grow into adulthood.  Put another way: there's no disguising that The Breadwinner tells a heart-breakingly sad tale, whose many injustices one will find oneself thinking of far more than any of the developments that we're supposed to be (temporarily) happy about; and this not least because it's so very easy after viewing this offering to imagine that there are so many real life equivalents of Parvana and her family out there in our troubled world.

My rating for this film: 7.0

Song of the Sea at the 2015 Hong Kong International Film Festival

The sea off Okinawa may be the most beautiful

I've ever seen -- and surely should inspire some songs ;)

Song of the Sea (Ireland-Denmark-Belgium, 2014)

- From the Animation Unlimited programme

- Tomm Moore, dir.

- Featuring the voices of: David Rawle, Fionnula Flanagan, Brendan Gleeson, Lisa Hannigan

When I told a friend of mine that I'd be seeing an animated movie at this year's Hong Kong International Film Festival, he asked me if it was a Studio Ghibli production.  Although Song of the Sea is not, it actually did call to mind Hayao Miyazaki's Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea -- this not least on account of its characters featuring a mix of humans, sea creatures and mythical beings, the film's main human characters living in a dwelling atop a cliff by the sea and its main female character being at home both in the sea and on land.

At the same time, this animated drama purports to be inspired less by Miyazaki's 2008 anime (or, for that matter, Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid) and more by Celtic myths of selkies, seals that shed their skins and take human form -- often with tragic consequences.  Lest there be any worry, however, rest assured that this magical animated film is by no means a sad one, though it's also true enough that it has a few scenes that may get viewers tearing up!

Song of the Sea's story begins in a lighthouse on a small island that's home to lighthouse keeper Conor (Brendan Gleeson), his darling wife Bronagh (Lisa Hannigan) and young son Ben (David Rawle).  Heavily pregnant, they are preparing for the arrival for the new addition to the happy family by doing such as painting beautiful pictures on the wall of what looks like it'll be the nursery.  

But as the birth of the new child nears, it's clear that something's amiss -- and after the story flashes forward by six years, we find not only that Bronagh is no longer living on the island but that Ben is not the loving older brother to the latest addition to the family.  Then there's the not insignificant fact that even at six years of age, Ben's sister, Saoirse (Lucy O'Connell), still cannot speak a word -- and, most worryingly of all their father and his mother (Fionnula Flanagan) is Saoirse having an uncommonly strong attraction to go into the sea.

After Saoirse is found lying on the beach, being lapped by the waves, one night, Granny decides she's had enough and opts to bring the children back to stay with her in her home in a town far inland.  Upset with this development (not least because he couldn't bring the beloved family dog Cú with him), Ben decides to escape from his Granny's grasps and head back home, with his silent sister in tow.  But upon leaving their grandmother's house, the pair end up getting into way more adventures than Ben had bargained for -- over the course of which he learns a lot about Saoirse that he had not previously realized and, consequently, to appreciate and love her more too.

A beautiful -- visually and otherwise -- offering which gives a nice contemporary twist to a tale rooted in Celtic mythology, Song of the Sea deserves to be the Best Animated Film Oscar nominee that it was and in a year with a less strong field than this (whose other nominees included Disney's lovable Big Hero 6 and Isao Takahata's sublime The Tale of Princess Kaguya), would have been a deserving Academy Award winner.  In any case, it's one more European entry -- along with the likes of France-Belgium-Luxembourg co-production Ernest & Celestine -- that shows that wonderfully hand-drawn animation actually is not the sole province of Studio Ghibli nor old Disney movies! 

My rating for this film: 8.5