The Spatial and Aural Expression of Displacement in Jia Zhangke’s Mountains May Depart

Volume 20, Number 2, Fall/Winter 2021
by Xaviera Xiao


Article Description

With an exacting eye, Xaviera Xiao dissects Jia Zhangke’s Mountains May Depart (2015) and the migration and disintegration of a family as the son, Dao Le, is taken from his mother in Fenyang to live with his father, first in Shanghai and then in Melbourne. In the Melbourne segment of the film, which is performed in English, Dao Le’s accent is neither American nor Australian. Western critics roundly panned the dialogue and performance as inauthentic—wholly missing the point that Dao Le’s un-placeable accent was a comment on the identity-scrambling experience of migration.


Related Keywords

Xaviera Xiao, Jia Zhangke, Mountains May Depart, film, migration, identity