Beyond the Bridge
Beyond the Bridge
Can a promise be repaired?
Written by: Ian Masters & Jon Smith Status: Released, 2016
Genre: Drama |
Romance | Historical
Producer: Hanuman Films
Format:
40' In Association With: Japan Foundation
Directed by: Kulikar Sotho
Festivals: Tokyo International Film Festival, 2016 Cambodia International Film Festival, 2016
Malaysia International Film Festival, 2017 Fukuoka International Film Festival, 2017
Logline
Logline
Japanese engineer Fukuda returns to Cambodia after the peace talks in 1992 to rebuild the destroyed Japanese-Cambodia Friendship bridge, a bridge that he had first built as a young man in the 1960s. Crossing the repaired bridge for the final time, Fukuda is able to finally repair the psychological break to his own past when he fulfils a promise to his lost Khmer love.
Pitch
FUKUDA (60) returns to Cambodia as the wealthy owner of a successful construction and engineering company to rebuild the Japanese-Cambodia Friendship bridge after the peace accords in 1992. During this time, a relationship develops with his interpreter and PA, SOTHEARY (40s). Upon completing the bridge, and attending an event to thank him for his personal and generous donations to a number of cultural projects, Fukuda is about to return to Japan.
The night before he leaves, he invites Sotheary for dinner to thank her for her service over the preceding years, unaware of the respect and deep affection which she holds for him. Emotionally repressed and formal, Fukuda had no idea of this, just as she, adhering to the social conventions of their different status, had been unable to express her feelings for him. Moreover, she did not realise he was leaving.
This awkward leave-taking prefigures a final crossing of the bridge by Fukuda. During that crossing we come to learn that he had been a member of the original team who built it, some thirty years before. Standing at the apex of the bridge, the missing section bombed out by the Khmer Rouge in 1973, we realise that as a younger man he had fallen deeply and profoundly in love with a young Khmer woman, MEALEA. Their long relationship could not be countenanced by Fukuda’s father, but as the war encroached on Phnom Penh, they finally made a plan to marry, escape, and return to Japan.
Before they could leave, she was killed making the dangerous journey to bring her mother to Phnom Penh. The bridge was destroyed and Fukuda was left an emotional wreck, finally being evacuated out of Phnom Penh before its fall in 1975.
The night before Mealea left for the last time, she had sung to him a Khmer song, which he recognised as a version of a popular Japanese ballad from the 60s. He promised her that he would sing her the Japanese version when they were together again in Tokyo, a promise he was never able to fulfill.Standing on the bridge for the last time, Fukuda opens up emotionally to fulfill his promise, in the only way he can. His car arrives to take him away. He leaves Cambodia.
