Let the Scenery Pass through You: An Open-Ended Journey
Written by Pecha Lo
Translated by Lin Yi-Hua
“When I say someone, I mean someone who has been isolated, someone who has been considered on himself, separated from social conditions where he is. Like extracted from society and observed by you. I think there is always something in the self, in you, that society cannot reach, something insurmountable, impenetrable and decisive.” ——Marguerite Duras, Cahiers du cinéma (trans. Esmeralda Barriendos)
Through these penetrating, soliloquy-like words, Duras tears open the rift between individuals and the social order. At that very moment when people break away from the social structures, they enter a space of their own beyond reality. Thus, they set out on a journey of wandering—roaming and lingering in this ungoverned realm—to seek an uncompromising path forward.
In Claudia von Alemann’s Blind Spot (1980), wandering turns into a journey through history. Working in the context of second-wave feminism, von Alemann focuses on women’s voices neglected by mainstream narratives. In the film, the protagonist Elisabeth, guided by the writings of Flora Tristan, sets foot in Lyon and traces the steps of this 19th-century socialist-feminist thinker. Tristan was acutely aware of the inequities women faced in legal and social systems. In the 1830s, she travelled and wrote about the social conditions in Europe and Latin America. She published the Peregrinations of a Pariah and others, to argue that the liberation of women was inseparable from that of workers.
Blind Spot is also praised as a “real sound film”. For von Alemann, history lies not only in archives but also in sound, space, and sensory experiences. The city’s stone steps, historical sites, and everyday sounds preserve traces of women’s lives. At the same time, the film explores how Elisabeth as a West German woman reflects upon contemporary family life. Elisabeth’s wandering is not merely an homage to first-wave feminism; it also reflects her inner world.
In contrast, Lebanese director Jocelyne Saab depicts a harsher political plight in The Razor’s Edge (1985), in which the act of wandering takes place on a battlefield: a girl travels through the smoke-filled streets of Beirut, moving among the ruins. The city is no longer a backdrop, but an injured body in its own right. The girl enters a state of exile without leaving her hometown, a form of wandering where the scars of the buildings mirror her own inner wounds.
Free of conventional romantic tropes, the encounter between the girl and the painter brings together two people at very different stages of life. The young girl strives to preserve her curiosity, desires, and sense of beauty amid the ruins, while the older painter seeks to reconstruct his inner world on canvas. “I’ve invented places, as if by making a work of fiction about them, I could preserve them, ” Saab once noted. Art and memory are her means of resistance against a crumbling world. As a seminal filmmaker in Arab cinema, Saab moves between documentary, narrative cinema and art film, forging a realistic yet poetic cinematic language.
A more unruly wandering emerges in River of Grass (1994) by American director Kelly Reichardt. In the film, the spacious highway unfolds like a narrow hallway as the protagonist drives through desolate landscapes in bewilderment, losing her bearings in her attempt to flee. While the film captures the themes of freedom, wandering, and rebellion typical of American road movies, it also rewrites the male-centric myth of escape and subverts the romanticized idea of Bonnie-and-Clyde adventure. Against an Americana soundtrack and rhythmic drumbeats, the film blends a noir narrative with humor to create a breezy yet absurd atmosphere.
The motifs of “moving” and “searching”—central to Reichardt’s works—continue to resonate in her later films, including Wendy and Lucy (2008). Recognized as one of the defining figures in American indie cinema and slow cinema, Reichardt resists the modern culture of speed. In an era dominated by fast-paced media consumption, she invites the audience to rediscover the time and space in the theater.
In an age marked by increasing displacement, moving and searching have become ways of exploring and reshaping identity. In Where Comes Mulan, emerging Chinese director Zheng Tianyi reinterprets the Mulan legend through a queer lens. Here, the legendary figure, traditionally defined by loyalty, filial piety, and sacrifice, is transformed into a fluid figure drifting between cultural expectations and gender roles.
Together, Zheng and artist Guo Qiaochu embarked on a journey to explore the question of “where”—examining how individuals understand their relationship with a place whose name and story are relentlessly being rewritten, displayed and consumed. To embody this fluidity of identity, the hybrid film weaves together the memories of ordinary people, travelogue, performance, and directorial intervention.
While Where Comes Mulan steers us into the fissures of the legend, Zheng Lu Xinyuan’s WIND GAP draws us deeper into a more private experience. As the scenes shift among the forest, the border, and the rain-soaked night, the boundary between dream and reality gradually dissolves. The changing landscapes become more than scenery passing before our eyes. Instead, they give form to the character’s internal state.
Zheng Lu has noted that some feelings elude language and thus can only be conveyed through light, space, smell, and other senses in the moment. It is in these moments—a gust of wind, a sudden rainfall, a moment of silence, or an unexpected encounter—that she finds cinematic quality and opens the door to understanding life. Despite the sense of insignificance and bewilderment in the face of nature, a spirit of freedom and resilience still shines through. For the new generation of Chinese directors who have witnessed a world rapidly transformed by globalization and digital media, the places and memories captured on screen offer a way to challenge established conventions and to seek a true sense of direction within themselves.
French director Lila Pinell also delves into individual and collective experiences. Her film Shana, set in the margins of the modern city, reveals how a woman struggles to find her footing in a fragmented life. Shana’s life is riddled with unresolved problems—from a toxic relationship and family trauma to financial pressure. Her wandering is far from a leisurely stroll. Rather, she charges headlong through life’s quagmire.
The film is profoundly moving because it refuses to reduce Shana to a one-dimensional character. Although she is impulsive, stubborn and clumsy, she also possesses the humor and vitality needed to begin again. In fact, the film is less about whether people can overcome predicaments, and more about how they sustain their own rhythm amidst chaos and uncertainty. Alongside the delineation of everyday struggles, the unpredictability of fate and the strength of female bonds combine to give this modern fable of survival its richness.
Taken together, these films present various interpretations of wandering. Some protagonists resist a mundane life, some follow the traces left by history and war, while others ponder the meaning of life amidst displacement and daily routines. The wanderers may neither escape nor arrive at any definitive destination. Instead, they let the scenery pass through them as they move forward. As Duras reminds us: there is always something in the self, in you, that society cannot reach. On those days off the prescribed track, take your time to go the long way around, linger for a while, and breathe.
