Some good came out of the events chronicled in this documentary, but not a
happy ending. Life can be disappointing that way, especially in today’s China.
Nobody understood those harsh realities better than Sun Yi, a Falun Gong practitioner
who was sentenced to the infamous Masanjia labor camp. When a woman from Oregon
found a note he hid in a box of Halloween decorations it became an
international media story that continues to reverberate across China. At great
personal risk, Sun Yi set out to further document Falun Gong persecution and
the horrors of Chinese labor camps in Leon Lee’s Letter from Masanjia (trailer here), which screens
during the 2018 Asian American International Film Festival in New York.
Two
years after she originally purchased it, Julie Keith found the fateful letter
Sun Yi had written (in English and Mandarin) in the box of a Styrofoam tombstone
purchased at Kmart. She took the letter public, as he beseeched his unknown
reader—and it quickly ignited a firestorm. Many criticized her for supposedly endangering
the mystery writer’s safety, but they were really acknowledging their own moral
cowardice. Halfway around the world, Sun Yi felt vindicated and deeply moved by
Keith’s proactive concern. In fact, he was inspired to renew his activism.
Released
through the efforts of a human rights lawyer who would later be held incommunicado
by the police, Sun Yi had been lying low, doing his best to renew his
relationship with Ning Fu, his ex-wife, who had been forced to divorce him
during his time in Masanjia. However, the Communist government is so embarrassed
by the subsequent revelations regarding the torture and slave labor happening in
labor camps, Sun decides to document his story while the time was ripe. Soon,
he is collaborating with Lee over secured skype chats and clandestinely filming
around Masanjia. Unfortunately, it is not long before the authorities suspect
he is up to something, or they just intend to sweep him up with a regular Falun
Gong round-up. Regardless, the cops start harassing Ning and his family, forcing
him to go underground for their safety.
At
times, Letter is unspeakably intense,
because the danger is so real and palpable. The bespectacled Sun is also an
acutely human everyman protagonist. You would almost call him nebbish, were it
not for the aura of dignity that surrounds him. Of course, by documenting his
own travails, Sun and Lee have produced a searing expose human rights violations
in China. This is a case where the personal is political and the political is
personal.
Letter was exceptional well
cut together by editor Patrick Carroll because it largely plays like a thriller,
but functions as an airtight indictment of CP crimes against humanity. Frankly,
the final scenes have the force of a 2x4 to the face. Not to be spoilery, but
Sun will not be available for the post-screening Q&A—and that really stings.
This
is a frightening film for many reasons, starting with the suspected Chinese
agent, who if he got to Sun, did so on foreign soil (Indonesia, who did nothing
about it). More fundamentally, it
depicts the sadistic torture endured by Falun Gong practitioners. We know
several practitioners, so it chills us to the bone thinking of what they could
face from China’s terror machine, even if they never set foot on the Mainland.
Like Anastasia Lin, Sun also makes the point that consumers should do their
best to only purchase products made by democratic countries.
Letter is a scary film,
but it is also deeply moving. It serves as Sun’s epitaph, but it also gives him
the last word. Ultimately, it is a fitting tribute to a brave man. Highly and
urgently recommended, Letter from
Masanjia screens Saturday afternoon (7/28), at the Village East, as part of
this year’s AAIFF.
