Just as Taiwan sits atop our latest headlines, with China once again threatening to squash the country’s need for independence, I sat down with KEFF, the young Taiwanese-American filmmaker whose latest work, his feature debut world premiering in Critics’ Week, sits very high on the list of my favorite films in Cannes this year. And that’s saying a lot, as masterpieces abounded!
Back in March, the Doha Film Institute sent me the list of assigned projects I would mentor, in press etiquette, during this year’s Qumra, the cinematic organization’s annual industry incubator held in Qatar each spring. Among those projects sat KEFF’s Locust, a first feature for this self-described “third-culture multidisciplinary artist currently based in Taipei.” Among KEFF’s talents are DJ’ing and producing and Locust is also written and co-edited by the filmmaker, who is responsible for the 2019 short Secret Lives of Asians at Night — supported by the Spike Lee Film Fellowship — which was awarded the Jury Prize for Best Asian-American Film by the Directors Guild of America.
That first viewing of Locust, at the time on my laptop and without any of the bells and whistles the film would benefit from at the later stages of post-production, blew me away. Its filmmaker’s vision was a blend of Taiwanese New Wave, a-la Edward Yang, but also a tenderness often seen in Ang Lee’s work — also a fellow Taiwanese. Most of all, that package was perfectly tied by a kind of Tarantino-esque vision which makes Locust very contemporary and powerful. And worldly.
Later, right before Cannes, I watched the picture-locked version of the film on the big screen and noticed an even stronger masterpiece emerging, due to some cuts which made the narrative and haunting ending of the film more powerful. There were still no titles on the film at that press screening in London.
Fast forward to a serendipitous chance encounter at the DFI reception in Cannes, when I learned that writer and editor extraordinaire Sebastián Sepúlveda (Jackie, Spencer, Queen of Bones) had been the project’s editing mentor for Qumra and that explained it all for me. No one can pull a film together to its absolute essential best like a great editor, and Sepúlveda is the best of the greats.
Filmmaker, artist and DJ KEFF
Sitting down with KEFF at the Semaine de la Critique beach was also a revelation. Back in Doha, I’d only met the film’s producer Anita Gou, founder of Los Angeles based production company Kindred Spirit, as KEFF was busy in post production for the film. He appeared a figure bigger than life and I knew to expect someone both stylish and talented. But what I got was also someone who connected very deeply to what is important in cinema — the ability to inspire and educate, without preaching or teaching.
With soft music playing in the background on the beach, I ask KEFF about his inspiration for Locust. “My parents are both Taiwanese, born and raised. I grew up in Taiwan and Hong Kong but then I left Asia for an extended period of time and I moved back to Taiwan in 2019. And it was interesting because I moved back right when the Hong Kong protests were happening.” Locust opens with scenes of Taipei viewers watching on the TV the revolts unfolding in Hong Kong that year, but also their interest switching to the opening of a new upmarket French bakery in their city which offers a specially themed “Taiwan eclair.”
KEFF plays with the attention given to each subject, highlighting the power of the media in making things seem important. Or not.
“Much of my reintegration into Taiwanese society was also linked with the Hong Kong protests, which I, of course, cared about,” the fashionable, dressed in black from head to toe, filmmaker explains, “and I was split between these two viewpoints — because there's a more international side of me that understood how important what was happening in Hong Kong was to Taiwan but then at the same time, I was also entering a local perspective and understanding that there might be bigger things or bigger problems and trying to find the balance between all that.”
KEFF continues to explain his creative process. “After living in Taiwan for a number of years, I wanted to make a film about Taiwan, I wanted to make a film about people I've met and seen. But then I realized that as I was telling this story, it was a chance for me to try and answer a question that has kind of bothered me for a longest time, and that I didn't have the answer to,” which is “why didn't more of us care about what happened in 2019? I think that a lot of people cared. But I also think there should have been more.”
When I tell him the pandemic squashed those revolts, KEFF explains further “I think the pandemic certainly squashed the movement itself in Hong Kong, but I’m talking about 2019 and in that moment.” That’s what he means by local vs. global thinking.
The question turned into what KEFF calls “an interesting experiment, because not only does my answer to this question change every 20 minutes in the movie, and I think for the audience it changes too, as you discover, as you understand Taiwan more and more.”
The story of Locust revolves around two characters, Zhong-Han (played by Liu Wei Chen), a mute twenty year old who leads a double life and Kobe (played by Devin Pan), the young gangster he works for after dark, after he finishes his day job as a busboy at his adoptive family’s humble restaurant. These two young men each represent a side of Taiwanese society which goes beyond their actual characters and allows us to understand more deeply a place often seen as simply “a point on the map where everyone thinks the eventual confrontation between the East and the West, WWIII is going to begin,” as KEFF puts it.
A still from ‘Locust’ featuring Liu Wei Chen and Devin Pan
At the core of Locust is a question, as KEFF explains, “in some way, because of this experiment,” what he calls the film, “we accidentally dove into the soul of Taiwan. And I think we started looking deep into not just Taiwan's history, but Taiwan's values within Taiwan's context, and getting at something bigger and deeper and asking even bigger questions about what has Taiwan been? What is Taiwan now and what does Taiwan want to become?”
Or several questions rather, as KEFF continues, “I think one of the most interesting questions which I won't give the answer to by the way, that I start asking by the middle or towards the end of the film is who is Taiwan's real enemy? And our inquiries take us deeper and take on kind of universal questions too about, you know, the nature of power, the nature of human nature itself, and all sorts of things.”
Is the enemy the silent majority, or the violent minority? That’s such a current question as many of us watch in horror what is happening in Gaza, yet those perpetuating the violence could so easily be stopped. If the majority were in agreement and stepped in. But that is the nature of politics, and its spokepeople, the media — divide and conquer.
Even in Cannes, those attending the world premiere of Locust realized the film’s universal message. It was “nice to confirm as of the screening yesterday that this is really a universal story to universal things because this is a story about something that happened in Taiwan or just as a Taiwanese story,” KEFF says, “but, you know, people from all over the world see their own countries and their own realities, reflected in this Taiwanese story.”
So does KEFF write himself into his characters, I ask? “I think naturally, all the characters that I love and care about are in the film,” he admits, “but there is a war in my heart between Kobe and Zhong-Han because I believe we are all born Zhong-Han’s — it is our human nature to be kind and open. And I think in order to survive in a society that crushes its weak — especially in urban societies — we become Kobe’s. And we lose track of who we were.” KEFF concludes, “I feel very much that I was a Zhong-Han and became a Kobe in my twenties. And in my thirties, now, there is a war in my heart and some days Zhong-Han wins and some days Kobe wins — it’s currently a war of attrition but if I’m rooting for anyone, I hope Zhong-Han wins.”
And that’s the most important thing to remember in life, as in film. The bad guys aren’t always bad, and the good guys aren’t angels all the time. Most of life, and great cinema, is lived in shades of grey.
About casting his leading man, KEFF has this to say. “Liu Wei Chen blew me away. he had only really been in some small TV dramas before he came to see me, so I wasn't really sure about it. In those TV dramas the standard of acting isn’t very high.” But the actor “came to the meeting in character and he didn’t say anything for two hours. And then the way he looked at me, just shook me to my core. I could see the story of Zhong-Han was already in 50/60 percent of his space.”
KEFF admits that finding the right leading man was crucial to making Locust, “I was ready, if we didn’t find the right someone, to just say this movie can’t be made. So thank god for him!” The rest is cinematic history.
Was the film, shot in Taiwan, subjected to pre-approvals or government censorship, I ask? “The interesting thing about Taiwan and also I think why there was such a great urgency for me to tell this story is that, you know, I have friends and acquaintances, who live in many places now where they're not allowed to say what they want to say, because they'll be because there'll be imprisoned, and thankfully we don't have that problem,” KEFF explains, continuing that “the problem in Taiwan, is that more often than not we censor ourselves. There is no need for a government to censor us because we're too shy or too afraid or we think we don't want to cause problems. So we hold back a lot of things that we wish we could say. And I feel if the worst should happen that we will regret it.” He admits that he would be very happy if “people disagree or criticize the film or criticize me for it. I'm happy to have this discussion and I would rather make a film that encourages this kind of discussion and elicits new thoughts and thinking than one that does not say anything at all. Isn't that the greatest shame, to sensor yourself before someone else can do it?”
I also ask KEFF about the messiah-like vision of the future that filmmakers seem to naturally possess and whether he thinks that is true. “Honestly, to agree with that would be almost like anointing myself a messiah, which I would never do!” He says, laughing. “I think we’re sensitive. Not just filmmakers, artists in general are sensitive.” Having just spent a month in Paris, going to museums and galleries, KEFF admits he observed that “a lot of artists foreshadowed a lot of problems, or they were speaking of problems that never went away. As an artist, our job is to listen to the world without any judgment — with open eyes, ears and open hearts. And to interpret what it means. And, myself included, instead of trying to pretend we know what the answer is, all we could is try to ask the right questions. And I think the right questions, asked at the right time, can reverberate universally. I think the questions Edward Yang was asking about Taiwan and about society in the 80’s and the 90’s still echo today. Because he didn’t pretend to know what the answer is. You just ask the right questions.”
“It’s not that we’re a messiah, it’s more that we are fortune tellers, or tarot card readers. And of course, we’re wrong sometimes! But even if they’re wrong, they offer an outcome or a conclusion or a warning of a possible future that should be avoided.” Brilliantly put.
Finally, I wish to know what KEFF would like audience members to come away feeling having watched Locust, his premiere masterpiece. “If the Taiwanese reaction to this film is an outpouring of people suddenly raising up and speaking to and saying “How dare you say this about me, I’ve always cared,” that’s not necessarily a bad thing,” he says, “because they are not quiet anymore. If I’m the one that has to endure the fury of waking a sleeping giant, at least I will be that.”
And for the non-Taiwanese audiences out there? “I’ll say what I’ve been saying at the beginning of every screening,” he begins. “I’m sure everyone has some familiarity with Taiwan, but for me, for us, Taiwan is not just a headline in the news. It’s not a point on the map where everyone thinks the eventual confrontation between the East and the West, WWIII is going to begin. And it’s not just this treasure trove of semiconductors, an area that has to be exploited or protected.” KEFF concludes, “for me Taiwan is an island of 23 million people — and every single one of them has their own life, their own story, their own hopes and fears, and their own dreams and despairs, just like you. And for me, if the film can humanize Taiwan and if people can watch the film and see their own country but also feel they understand Taiwan, develop an intimate love for the place and its people, then I think that the film will have been successful.”
Worldwide sales for Locust are being handled by MK2 Films.
Images courtesy of Critics’ Week and MK2 Films, used with permission.