Life Is Snow

In director ZHANG Yaoyuan’s film Life is Snow, identity, father-son relationship, labor disputes, and the plight of Japanese war orphans are all condensed within the vast snowscapes of Hokkaido.

Handheld cinematography creates a raw sense of immediacy, presenting a desperate yet useless struggle. The protagonist is an absolute outsider: abandoned in childhood and turned into a war orphan, alienated from society in adulthood, later watching his family fall apart, and ultimately aging without any social security. Through the director’s lens, the oppressive interiors and the boundless, desolate snowscapes outside form a subtle echo of the protagonist’s cramped existence and profound loneliness. In the end, the film moves with difficulty toward an ambiguous reconciliation — all sealed in silence.

– ZHANG Xuliang