Always
Southeast Asian Premiere
Chen Deming US, France, China,Taiwan 2025 88 min PG (Some Disturbing Scenes)
Children’s poetry and a boy’s life in rural China frame this beautifully atmospheric, arresting and sensitive rumination on childhood.
Eight-year-old Gong Youbin writes and reads a short melancholic poem about uncertainty to his class. At ease in his surroundings, he plays with friends and in the fields and forests between helping on the farm. Life appears simple in mountainous Shangzhi County, Hunan, but given what little they have, Youbin’s disabled father and elderly grandparents grapple with decisions for their continued survival while flanked by promises of a better future. Profound poetry by the village’s children, rendered in expressive calligraphy, punctuate patient observations of the sky, trees, labour, animals, fog and inner thoughts, as they swirl with unseen forces of nature, policy or fate. Time passes, childhood becomes memory.
Synopsis Writer: Godwin Koay
Q&A with Filmmaker(s)
3 Dec, Wed 7:00PM / 88 min
Golden Village Suntec, Hall 5
Q&A with Filmmaker(s)
4 Dec, Thu 9:00PM / 88 min
Golden Village Suntec, Hall 4
AT THE FEST!
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RUSH QUEUE:
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Always
从来
Chen Deming
US, France, China,Taiwan
2025
Chinese, Mandarin, English
English
88 min
PG (Some Disturbing Scenes)
Southeast Asian Premiere
Chen Deming
Chen Deming is an independent filmmaker and has received multiple accolades for his first documentary feature Song of Shiratori (2022). Filmed between 2018 and 2023, Always premiered at CPH:DOX and was awarded its main prize. It also won the Best Film Award in the International Competition at Jeonju.
Youbin Gong
Hansen Lin
