Return to Burma & The Palace on the Sea

Part of Homecoming Myanmar: A Midi Z Retrospective (March 6 - 13, 2015)

Return to Burma

Directed by Midi Z
2011.Taiwan/Myanmar. 84 min. DCP. English subtitled.
Cast: Wang Shin-Hong, Lu Jiun

Preceded by short film

The Palace on the Sea  

Directed by Midi Z.
2014. Taiwan/Myanmar. 15 min. DCP. English subtitled.
Cast: Cast: Wu Ke-Xi, Wang Shin-Hong

Post-screening Q&A with director Midi Z and actress Wu Ke-Xi, moderated by La Frances Hui, Asia Society Film Curator.
A video recording of the Q&A is available here.

Return to Burma
Myanmar holds its first parliamentary election in two decades. Many Myanmar natives living overseas return home in anticipation of peace and prosperity. Xing-hong, who has worked as a construction worker in Taiwan, arrives home to find his brother getting ready to go to work as a laborer in Malaysia. As he looks without much luck for business opportunities in his hometown, a sense of disillusionment and alienation pervades. It seems as though nothing much, after all, has changed. Midi Z’s directorial debut feature, Return to Burma symbolizes the filmmaker’s personal homecoming in 2008, ten years after he moved to Taiwan to pursue an education and career.

The Palace on the Sea
“The Palace on the Sea” was once a luxurious floating restaurant in Kaohsiung, a city in southern Taiwan. Now it’s an abandoned vessel sadly chained to the dock without a purpose. A woman in a Myanmar traditional dress makes a ghostly entrance and dances with the past. This experimental short makes an interesting counterpart to director Midi Z’s feature films, which adhere strictly to reality.

Watch the trailer:

Read Asia Society's exclusive interview with Midi Z

Read Asia Society's exclusive interview with actress Wu Ke-Xi

Support for this series is provided in part by Taipei Cultural Center of TECO (Taipei Economic and Cultural Office) in New York.

This film series is part of Myanmar's Moment, a season of programming on Myanmar at Asia Society, New York.