The director (Hanxiong Bo) captured a beautiful narrative and used darkness as his muse. Use of light (artificial and natural), aspect ratio, direction, and cinematography were the staples.

The effects of China’s “One Child” policy has been the subject of so much art I’ve consumed from the region over the past few years. “漂流 (Drifting)”  is like the live-action continuation of an animated stop motion short film “妹 妹 (Sister)” I had screened at the 2019 Atlanta Film Festival, and the film’s artistic take on the controversial policy has stayed with me since.

Yan (played by Junxiong Wang) is a young adult who struggles with gender identity after years of posing as a girl to hide his illegal status under the country’s population control policy. Yan used drifting his father’s old taxi as a means of escapism, but also served as a metaphor for his gender expression drifting cultural/societal norms in his conservative environment.

There’s a scene that stood out to me where Yan is met by bullies on a bridge that was featured throughout the film, and these rainbow-colored lights flash during the confrontation. The irony was beautiful, and (I’m assuming) intentional.

Aspect ratio + cinematography were important. So much of this film’s beauty was in how it was captured. The direction was specific. There were three specific scenes that I admired most, and all were zoom ins/outs:

🎥 Yan as a child standing alone on the stoop.

🎥 Yan dancing alone.

🎥Yan’s father sitting in the chair, the camera zooms in through the window after Yan and the mom run off post-familial confrontation.