The Cinematheque

“For years unduly forgotten and neglected, They Say the Moon Is Fuller Here may be one of Law’s most personal works.”

M+ Cinema (Hong Kong)

The hallmarks of Clara Law’s diasporic cinema were firmly in place for her auspicious debut, a 16mm graduation film that the study-abroad student, enrolled at the National Film and Television School in England, fought the department to develop into a full-fledged feature. Set on the campus of a London university, the film portrays, with impressive lyricism, the alienation faced by two foreigners who find solace in each other’s shared cultural estrangement: an arts student from Hong Kong (Law herself) adapting a Chinese ballet for British dancers; and a Chinese engineering student on state scholarship, whose artistic life is smothered by conflicted, communist ideals. Drawing on Law’s experience as an outsider in the West—“I felt a deep sense of loss, of yearning, of nostalgia”—the film also taps into the acute sense of uncertainty surrounding the future of Hong Kong, itself torn between Eastern and Western identities. This digital restoration premiered at the 2022 Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival.

In English and Cantonese with English subtitles

Silver Plaque Award
Chicago International Film Festival 1985

Virtual Q&A with Clara Law and Eddie Fong on January 18.