Wayne Wang Returns to His Roots With A Thousand Years of Good Prayers and Princess of Nebraska

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers (Wayne Wang/USA/2007) is, according to the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival catalogue, "a film of precise, carefully orchestrated scenes, privileging quietness over emotional fireworks, simple observation over fussy camera movement."

Mr Shi has come to the US to visit his estranged daughter. It has been years since they last met and in that time she has settled into her life in the US. But for her father, the states and her community is an unfriendly place.

Mr Shi is played by the outstanding Chinese-American actor Henry O. Mr O delivers a superbly low key delivery, allowing his body language and restrained delivery to bring depth to his role. It is through the small items (a decorative piece on the door, the lack of a wok) that Mr Wang makes the point that these two have been disconnected for years. She has lost her Chinese heritage.

A Thousand Years is not hurried, Mr Wang does not rush the storyline, taking a look at the small, everyday tensions between the father and daughter. Well paced, the film builds to a dramatic dénouement.

Mr. Shi finds his daughter too quiet, living in a nondescript apartment complex and leading what seems like an empty routine existence. To learn more about her, he goes through her things while she’s at work – listening to a CD on her bureau, looking in a drawer. In the evening he cooks up multi-course dinners for her, and tries to engage her in conversation. Yilan remains cautious; she doesn’t want to share her private life with him. His prying and lecturing are becoming a nuisance.

Mr. Shi cannot understand what is happening to his daughter. He comes from a generation when parents remained part and parcel of their children’s lives as long as they lived. The only person he feels close to in this cold new universe is Madam (Vida Ghahremani), an elderly and vivacious Iranian woman living with her son and his family. They begin to meet regularly on a local park bench. Since they can’t speak much English, they end up conversing in a mix of their own language and a smattering of English words. The miracle is that they seem to communicate easily, in stark contrast to Mr. Shi's inability to communicate with his daughter.

Article Author: James McCaskill

I began writing for my small town newspaper while still in high school. Off and on since then I have worked for publications both online and print in the US and Europe. Have lived and worked in Germany, Scotland and the US. …

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