Exploring the complexities of identity, belonging and desire through a deeply personal lens is a stunning motivator in any field of art. Accordingly, the new romantic drama, Ephemera, ponders that journey by blending dance and film to craft an intimate character study.
Throughout the film, the expressive physicality of dance serves as both a narrative language and an emotional release. At the same time, it emphasizes LGBTQIA+ and women’s perspectives through its main characters to shape a portrait of relationships that resist simple definition or resolution.
Bringing that vision to life, Shan Jiang wrote and directed the movie. Additionally, she served as a producer alongside Sol Ye and Yinx Zhou. The drama’s cast is led by Shu-Yi and Yvonne Shuyu Zhang.
Set against the backdrop of post-pandemic Shanghai, Ephemera follows 23-year-old Asher (Zhang) as she prepares to leave the city and return to Los Angeles. On one of her final nights there, she asks her hip-hop dance teacher, Tori (Yi), out for coffee.
What follows is a casual outing that transforms into something neither of them expected. They wander the streets of the former French Concession, share stories and laughter, sneak into a closed mall and slowly discover how much they have to offer each other, just as the clock runs out. Ultimately, by dawn, they must reckon with the bittersweet reality of a connection that arrived exactly one night too late.
Ephemera had its World Premiere in the U.S. Narrative Competition of this year’s Tribeca Festival. The festival hosted the drama’s premiere on June 7 at the Village East by Angelika theater in New York City.
To celebrate and help promote Ephemera‘s world premiere at the Tribeca Festival, Jiang generously took time to discuss penning, helming and producing the feature during the week of its debut screening. During the conversation, the filmmaker reflected on the project in an exclusive interview, whose video can be viewed above.
Director: Shan Jiang
Writer: Shan Jiang
Producers: Shan Jiang, Yinx Zhou and Sol Ye
Cast: Yvonne Shuyu Zhang and Shu-Yi
Genre: Romance Drama
Original Language: English and Mandarin Chinese with English subtitles
Runtime: 1hr 23m
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