THE HOME SONG STORIES
Australia, 2007, 104 minutes, Colour.
Joan Chen, Joel Lok, Steve Vidler, Kerry Walker.
Directed by Tony Ayres.
If you google Tony Ayres, you will find an article from The Age by Anne Crawford (April 4th, 2003), ‘Going Beyond the Pale’. She gives an overview of his life: his unstable mother, a Hong Kong singer who married an Australian sailor and came to live in Melbourne, walking out on him and going to Sydney, eventually returning to Melbourne. She was suicidal and ultimately successful. She had her two children, a boy and a girl always in tow. At the end of the article, she mentions that Ayres was starting work on a new film, Home Song Stories. Over four years later, the film is being released. And Anne Crawford’s biographical summary is almost exactly a brief synopsis of the film.
Ayres had directed Walking on Water, a sensitive film about a young man dying of AIDS. Home Song Stories is written and directed by him. He invests a great deal of energy into this portrait of his mother and of himself as a little boy.
The fascinating aspect of this memoir is the characterisation of the young boy, Tom (Joel Lok). Much of the action is shown from his point of view. At other times, the camera is focused on his face, often Orientally impassive, but now and again revealing, especially through his eyes, both his gaze and his glances, that he sees clearly what is going on. This is especially true of his appraisal of his mother (Joan Chen), of her relationship with young local waiter, Joe. The audience is invited to share his emotional and mental judgments.
It is dangerous to speculate too deeply on the psychology of a pre-adolescent child. However, the portrait of Tom is so well done that it is difficult to resist the temptation.
In The Home Song Stories, Tom is possibly ten. In terms of nurture, he has a terrible life with his crazily emotional mother. He has learned a control which manifests itself in a logical manner with outbursts of chaotic emotion: angry shouting attacks on his mother, weeping in the school toilet (weeping is something he never does) when he overhears his school friend mocking his mother).
However, it is clear from the writing and performance that Tom is an introverted boy, able to be by himself, getting energy more from his inner world than the dysfunctional outer world. Interestingly, Anne Crawford in her Age article on Tony Ayres has an insightful description of the man himself which gives a clue to Tom’s character: a self-depreciating humour and warmth – and a subversive mind.
Tom’s inner world is one of imagination and thought. We are alerted to this early by his surprising fantasy suddenly dramatised on screen: he is a martial arts warrior in conflict with a villain – who turns out to be his adoptive father’s mother with whom the family lives and who clearly disapproves of her son’s marriage as well as not understanding, or wanting to understand, Chinese manners and traditions. He vanquishes her. He will later have another fantasy with an unseen foe (which is inserted just after some difficulties with his mother’s latest boyfriend from the restaurant).
And he reads all the time, Chinese comics but also the Encyclopedia. He wants to read it from beginning to end, so that he will know everything.
The film opens and closes with Tom at his desk writing his memoirs and his often rueful tribute to his mother. This is what he knows and does best. His sister, who managed the disruption and traumas more openly than her brother, is now a psychologist. She reaches out to others in personal interaction. Tom is alive in his inner life and wants to communicate this vitality and insight.
This is a film which should fascinate Australian and Chinese audiences, an opportunity to look at race relations in retrospect as well as dysfunctional relationships.
1.The film as a memoir, the writer and his memories, writing novels, making a film? The effect for him? For audiences? For Australian audiences, Chinese?
2.Hong Kong in the 1960s, the visual style, the restaurants, the singers? Melbourne in the 1960s and 70s, Sydney? The Chinese community? The Australian suburbs? Homes, schools? The outings, the beach? The musical score – and the range of Chinese songs?
3.The title, the Hong Kong songs? Rose as a singer?
4.The story told from Tom’s perspective? His visual point of view? The film’s frequent focus on his face, his eyes, his expressions, his judgments? His voice-over? Trying to give his life some meaning? The emotional effect of his mother? The opening and his typing, the end and his typing? The picture of his mother, his sister, of himself? The adults? The photo gallery of characters during the final credits? Homage to his mother?
5.The portrait of Rose: an impossible woman, highly emotional, with a death wish? Her real story being told only at the end, the flashbacks and the revelation about her character, her background, influences? The back-story and her relationship with her mother, her being bought by Mr Sun, her relationship with his brother, the scandal, ousted, illness and death? Her going to Hong Kong, a singer, with the sailors? Bill and his love for her? Following him to Australia, the ship? Taking her two children – and her story about her earlier children’s deaths? The wedding – and her leaving Bill after a week? The Sydney years, the range of uncles, from club to club? The decision to return to Melbourne, contacting Bill, on the train, with the children, the bond with each of them, their experience of continual move, Tom and his being upset, her playing with him and his smile? Bill meeting them? Bill’s mother moving in, the arrival at the house, settling in, the Australian food and their not liking it, fixing the bead curtain, Bill’s mother looking on, their calling her an old cow in Chinese? Going out, the drinking, meeting Joe, the restaurant and her smooth talk, the bonds, Winnie and Bing? Bringing the children to eat? The friendship with Joe, the affair, the outing on the beach? Tom enjoying it? Bill’s mother and discovering what was happening, ousting them? Bing offering a dilapidated accommodation, left badly by the Australian tenants? The illegals? The rent, Joe paying? Setting up their life there, Rose and her emotions, Joe finding it heavy, playing mah-jong with his boss? Rose working at the restaurant? Friendship with Winnie? The effect on Joe and his wanting to escape? Joe driving the kids to school, flattering May, the talk about the music? The event, the movies, Rose and her anger? May and her attempted suicide, the hospital? Rose and her death wish, suicide attempts, going to the hospital, the institution, getting out? Joe and his support? Her embarrassing Tom? The schoolboy seeing her and gossiping about her afterwards? Bill and his taking the family back, his mother leaving? His going to sea again, Rose and her emotive tantrums, wanting to go back to Hong Kong, Tom and his outburst? Rose and her hanging herself? Tom and his grief?
6.The portrait of Tom, a young boy, his age, Hong Kong, going to Australia, the years in Sydney, going back to Melbourne, the train? The bonds with his mother, his exasperation, saying he could never understand her doing the things she did? His love for Bill, seeing him as a father? Settling in, his not liking the food, his mother making him eat it, pay compliments to Bill’s mother? His fantasies, martial arts hero, the combat with Bill’s mother? His later dreams of being a fighter hero? Going out to the restaurants, Joe and playing on the beach, their being ousted and his having to settle into the new place, going to school, Joe and his realising what was happening, his tensions, telling his mother about May and Joe, May’s attempted suicide, his still going to school? Rose and the pills, his exasperation with his mother, her coming home again, Joe and the effect? Bill and his coming back, the bonding with him again, the hospital, school, his mother being seen by the boy, the friendship and talk about the bike, the gossip at the school, his going into the toilet and crying? His outburst against going back to Hong Kong? His being Chinese, reading, the comics, reading the encyclopaedia so that he would know everything, his becoming an Australian, sounding Australian?
7.The portrait of May, the older daughter, her mother relying on her, back to Melbourne, school and study, homework, her settling in, the flattery by Joe, her being infatuated, playing the guitar, Tom telling on her, her attempted suicide, the hospital? Her relying on her mother? Her admiring Bill? Her mother’s suicide attempts, hospital? Her mother’s death and her weeping and grief?
8.Joe, young man, illegal, cook, the flattery from Rose, the affair, moving with them, his supporting them, paying the rent, finding it hard, Rose’s being oppressive? Going out to play mah-jong? Leaving, coming back?
9.The restaurant, Bing and his friendliness, Winnie – but their later turning on Rose?
10.Bill, a good man, Rose continually saying this? On naval leave in Hong Kong, returning to Australia, the wedding, her suddenly leaving him, his patience over seven years, his relationship with his mother, her looking after the house, receiving the family again, their settling in, leaving the money? The mother ousting them? Coming back, helping again? Rose’s death? The epilogue and the visuals of his looking after the two children until his death?
11.Bill’s mother, tough, silent, prejudiced, her looks, the bowling ladies, her being sent away at the end? Appearing as a fighter in Tom’s fantasy?
12.The Chinese background, language, customs, food? Adapting to Australia, keeping together? The second generation and their becoming Australian? Settling down?
13.The postscript and seeing Tom and May as adults, studies in Canberra, becoming a writer? May and her psychology? Never talking about their mother?
14.An emotional memoir?
