‘Brief History Of A Family’: Sundance Review

Dir. Lin Jianjie. China/France/Denmark/Qatar. 2024. 99mins

China’s strict one-child policy may have been rescinded in 2016, but how this population planning initiative continues to pervade the country’s growing middle-class is scrutinised in Lin Jianjie’s remarkably assured debut feature. Brief History Of A Family examins how the fragile bonds of an outwardly perfect family of three are tested when the son’s mysterious classmate becomes a defacto fourth member.

 Elusive quality and uniquely disquieting tone

It is a premise that facilitates a forensic examination of China’s family planning model within the quasi-futuristic trappings of its urbanised present. It is also paradoxically highly specific in its subject yet incredibly difficult to pin down in terms of its broader identity, as it skilfully skirts genre lines. There are fleeting echoes of 1990s home invasion suspensers, while it sometimes plays as a junior take on Patricia Highsmith’s consummate shape-shifter Tom Ripley or a Chinese cousin of Emerald Fennell’s class satire Saltburn (2023). Yet such comparisons fail to describe its elusive quality and uniquely disquieting tone.

Premieing in Sundance, Brief History of a Family will put Lin on the map as it tours high profile events (its next stop is the Berlin International Film Festival). Beyond the festival circuit, it could well become an indie breakout at the domestic box office if smartly handled in urban markets. The film also has considerable international art-house potential considering its stylish presentation and taut execution, although prospective theatrical distributors will likely have to compete with offers from leading streaming platforms. 

The film starts in a schoolyard where teenager Shuo (Sun Xilun) is exercising on parallel bars, only to fall and sustain a leg injury when hit by a basketball. The student responsible is Tu Wei (Lin Muran), who tries to make amends by accompanying Shuo to the doctor. Shuo is a quiet, even enigmatic loner, but eventually accepts an invitation to play video games at Wei’s home.

Through regular visits, Shuo ingratiates himself with Wei’s family. Wei’s mother (Guo Keyu), a former flight attendant, is moved by details of Shuo’s apparently difficult single-parent home life (thrifty eating habits and accounts of an abusive father). Mr. Tu (Zu Feng) is less immediately taken with his son’s reserved friend, but softens upon realising Shuo shares his love for classical music and has an academic work ethic that is lacking in Wei, who prefers athletics.

For the most part, Wei is nonplussed about Shuo’s presence as his friend provides help with homework. But when a tragic incident leads to Shuo moving in indefinitely, dynamics significantly shift and Wei starts to feel unfairly rejected.

At first glance, this is an interloper story. Shuo sincerely expresses a belief in self-improvement that seems to extend to social status: in one of the few shots taken straight from the thriller handbook, he is seen looking up at the Tu’s apartment as if plotting an accession. If not quite an urban oasis to rival the eminently desirable home in Parasite (2019), this modernist high-rise residence is tastefully decorated with all the latest technological advancements and a well-stocked kitchen that seemingly has every variety of soy sauce. Shuo remains unknowable throughout, but is malleable enough to insert himself in this comfortable domestic space before anyone can spot the red flags.

Yet just as Lin seems poised to take the art of manipulation to the next level, he pivots to Wei’s parents whose eagerness to make Shuo a permanent part of the family stem from a traumatic decision related to state policy (Wei’s mother believes Shuo is a “second chance”). Shuo is especially perceptive, but is his change of fortune due to an unerring knack for reading others or simply the result of Wei’s parents projecting unfulfilled dreams on to him?

This ambiguity is maintained through a finely modulated quartet of performances which are in-synch with the film’s technical elements. Zhang Jiahao’s glacial cinematography maintains a coolly observational distance from the characters while toying with identities and perspective through clever use of mirrors. An iris motif is also strikingly utilised, with Wei’s family literally placed under the microscope in an early overhead shot and later replaced by a biological cell which begins to destabilise when it comes into contact with another molecule.

Adding to the peculiar ambience is Toke Brorson Odin’s excellent electronic score which is effectively mixed with the surrounding urban noise and the irritating sound effects of Wei’s video games. It also emphasises the (possibly one-sided) battle of wills that occurs in the Tu home by alternating between low-key soundscapes that take their cue from Shuo’s inscrutable nature, and pumping rhythms that convey Wei’s boiling resentment. This unnerving aural juxtaposition enables Lin to build tension without succumbing to genre tropes.

Brief History Of A Family is not so much of a critique of China’s middle-class (depicted here as fundamentally decent, if emotionally pent-up) as the conditions that have shaped its evolution. To this end, clever location work seamlessly combines the looming architecture of various major cities to create an anonymous metropolis that is characterised as much by a lingering sense of emptiness as its gleaming surface.