Seasoned Actor Dong Zijian Talks Directorial Debut ‘My Friend An Delie’ And The Importance Of Trusting His Instincts

Sara Merican
·4-min read

Based on the novel by Shuang Xuetao, My Friend An Delie marks seasoned actor Dong Zijian’s directorial debut.

Dong has starred in Jia Zhangke’s Mountains May Depart and Ash Is The Purest White, as well as Han Han’s Duckweed, among others.

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Dong tells Deadline that he spent nearly six years developing My Friend An Delie, which tells the story of Limo (played by Liu Haoran) who travels back to his hometown in northeastern China after his father’s death. While on a flight, he spots his childhood friend An Delie (played by Dong himself) on the plane, but An does not recognize him. Their flight is diverted due to severe weather and the duo go on a journey that brings back long-forgotten memories and pushes Limo to confront the demons of his past.

“I was very moved by the depiction of youth in the novel and also felt a strong sense of yearning and nostalgia about my own childhood,” says Dong. “The novel did not share much about the future of these two characters but I’ve always wondered how they would turn out.”

The film will screen at the Red Sea Film Festival from December 11. My Friend An Delie had its world premiere at the Tokyo International Film Festival in late October.

“As I was trying to dig up memories from my childhood, I realized that I’ve forgotten quite a lot and even the parts that I can recount, the details are hazy and the lines between fact and fiction feel blurred,” says Dong. “I also realized that the very painful memories I have repressed over the years are very important for me to embrace, to keep moving forward.”

Dong says that he did not really enjoy going to school when he was younger.

“When you’re young, you want to be free and independent and grow up quickly,” says Dong. “However, now that I’m an adult, I sort of think that growing up is a bit of trap and things have turned out very differently from what I expected.

“Every step of making this film was very difficult, as I had never learned how to direct or make a film. I went to university for acting and performance,” says Dong, who attended the Central Academy of Drama in Beijing. “But I did have the experience of acting in films for 10 years. Every step was a huge learning experience.”

While developing My Friend An Delie, he shared the screenplay with other directors to seek their feedback.

He also shared the screenplay with editor Chang Sukping.

“His advice to me was that instinct is number one and this gave me a lot of strength,” says Dong.

Reflecting on his directorial debut, Dong repeatedly brings up the importance of trusting his artistic instincts while making a film.

“I realized that I’m someone that works off my instinct a lot,” says Dong. “After finishing this film, I have acquired a lot of new knowledge and if I could make this film again, I do have thoughts about how I could have made certain aspects better. But actually, I also feel like I couldn’t have made a better film because instincts are so important and even when there are flaws, flaws are in a way, beautiful too.”

With the story of My Friend An Delie unfolding over just a few days, Dong decided to shoot primarily with natural light to mark the passage of time, working with cinematographer Lu Songye.

“Even though I didn’t get to spend much time with the cinematographer before filming, we pretty quickly had an understanding of how we wanted to light the film,” says Dong.

“There was a night just before production started where I had trouble sleeping and was tossing and turning until 6 or 7 a.m.,” adds Dong. “I decided to go down to eat some breakfast at the hotel and bumped into the cinematographer, who also had a sleepless night. We had actually been thinking about a certain aspect of lighting in the film and decided that we should go with an entirely different approach — one that was simpler.”

Dong said that he will definitely direct another film. He is currently developing two projects — one is inspired by a novel, while he is writing an original screenplay for the other.

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