The Farewell (2019)
Director: Lulu Wang Run Time: 100 min. Rating: PG Release Year: 2019
Starring: Awkwafina, Diana Lin, Hong Lu, Tzi Ma, Zhao Shuzhen
Country: United States, China
Language: Mandarin, English, Japanese, Italian
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About the film:
A headstrong Chinese-American woman returns to China when her beloved grandmother is given a terminal diagnosis. Billi struggles with her family’s decision to keep grandma in the dark about her own illness as they all stage an impromptu wedding to see grandma one last time.
“The Farewell is a comedy of warmth and bracing honesty. Simply put, it’s one of the best films of the year.”
—Clarisse Loughrey for the Independent (UK)
About the filmmaker:
Lulu Wang is a Chinese-American filmmaker born in Beijing, China and raised in Miami, Florida. She attended the prestigious New World School of the Arts in Miami for piano performance and showed immediate promise as a classical pianist. Wang attended Boston College, where she majored in literature and music. After graduation, she moved to Los Angeles to pursue filmmaking. While working as a film producer’s intern in L.A., Wang met fellow aspiring filmmaker Bernadette Burgi, with whom she co-founded the production company Flying Box Productions. With Burgi serving as producer, Wang released her directorial debut with 2014’s Posthumous. That film, which starred Brit Marling and Jack Huston, was written and directed by Wang. Wang’s follow-up film, The Farewell (2019), premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Wang is currently working on a TV series, Expats for Amazon, and an as-yet-untitled third feature.
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