Recovery Through Film

I love having conversations about film. Film represents so much to so many different people, with a plethora of connections being made through the audience. Films will never mean the same to two people, no matter how closely they are connected. When you have an opportunity to discuss your opinions with others, there’s the possibility for a beauty of discovery.

As a journalist, I have the opportunity to talk directly with the filmmakers, the magicians behind glorious stories. I have had some amazing ones over the years, but the discussion I conducted with Roberto Saieh, one of the writers of the poignant short ASIA A, was eye opening. I saw a whole new version of the film through the eyes of the creator, and he helped me see beyond my own personal connection to see the potential I missed because I was too focused on me.

ASIA A is a film about Marquise (London Brown), a talented basketball player who suffers a life-altering injury during a college game. As he tries to navigate through his new reality, he re-evaluates his relationships and questions his place in their, and his own, world.

I watched this film at an interesting point in my life, having just made it through another physical injury that was preventing me from full mobility. Since this was the second in a handful of  years that made me static, I attached myself to the emotional rollercoaster of what it’s like to go through something that changes an aspect of who you are. It’s hard wrapping your head around the difficulty this presents, and I believe it was conveyed well in the film. 

What I failed to recognize, however, is that beyond the situation presented in the film, these characters are dealing with more than just life altering situations or physical abilities. In essence, these are people living through a story.

“When I first read Andrew Reid’s original draft of ASIA A, I was mostly drawn to the characters and the story. Marquise’s anguish and grief felt very real to me and they were something I could empathize with even if I’d never been in his shoes,” Saieh said. “In my writing, I tend to explore challenging situations and difficult decisions and I was just drawn by how raw and personal Marquise’s story felt.”

Both Saieh and I connected to the personal struggles explored in the film, but we saw them represented in different ways. He reminded me that stories are never niche, as “sports films don’t only find an audience in players and fans or war films only resonate with veterans.” I limited my experience with this film by placing the majority of the importance on the story on the injury itself instead of the emotional story Marquise was going through.

“It never crossed my mind that the film wouldn’t connect with the masses,” Saieh added. “It was written for the masses, both as a way to open a dialogue about disability and as a very human story anyone can relate to.”

The core ignition of the film for Saieh was also the internal turmoil of changing situations. As a writer, it’s easy for the words on the paper to represent that, but movies are moving stories and that also doesn’t translate well. He acknowledges this, in fact, as a recurring challenge for screenwriters. The way Saieh and Reid handled this internal conflict was through the world they created on film.

“Marquise’s struggle to decide how to face his new life: by self-pitying or to stand on his own (no pun intended), was visually present throughout the film in several ways,” Saieh added. “The wheelchair ever-present in the room, Camilla’s constant calls, and her appearance in the dream, among others, just to name a few.”

However these filmmakers decided to showcase it, or how the audience interprets it, the story always moved forward towards Marquise’s decision. One aspect that both Saieh and I both identified with was the concept of an old life versus a new one. We all have constant change in our lives, and while some are more powerful than others, there is always a part of us that changes as we go through life. It’s how we handle this change that is important. While it differs for most of us, bringing a shared experience to the screen is a welcomed challenge for writers.

“The idea of the old life versus the new isn’t restricted to disability. There are many things that can split a person’s life into a “before” and “after” the event, some positive and some negative,” Saieh explained. “I’ve gone through the grieving process of letting go of the old life and learning to embrace the new. So in order to connect emotionally with the material and write that aspect of the story for Marquise, I turned to personal experience.”

As our engaging conversation continued, it became clear that no matter how we personally viewed details of the film, the emotional outcome was the same. We both saw that the task at hand was to move past a life road block and become the best person you can be with your ever changing situations.  

At first glance, ASIA A was personal to me because I’ve gone through injury recovery, where my spirts were broken because I felt physically broken. However, after proposing a question to Saieh, I was awakened. There are so many times that we view things through our selective environments. This isn’t a bad thing, but at times it restricts us from seeing the beauty in how it’s connecting to other people outside out box.

“While ASIA A deals with a subject matter not many have experience with, it is, at its core, a human story that anyone can relate to,” Saieh explains. “Stripping away the subject matter of disability, it is a story about making those hard decisions in your life that will hurt, but are the right ones to make. It is about learning to be okay by yourself before you can be okay with someone else.”

Written by Lisa M Mejia
Images provided by London Flair PR