Tribeca Review: Violet Du Feng’s ‘Hidden Letters’
deadline.comThe past, present and future of women in China’s oppressively patriarchal society is a big topic to address in under 90 minutes, but Violet Du Feng’s unassuming but very moving documentary Hidden Letters covers a lot of ground.Visually, it has the immediate, low-key digital-video look that’s increasingly typical of festival docs, and which may restrict its audience to the specialist circuit.
But there’s a lot going on under the surface in a film that looks at the subject of Nushu, an ancient secret language used by Chinese women to talk to each other without their husbands, fathers, and even their sons knowing.“Nushu is mostly about misery,” notes Hu Xin, a tour guide at the Nushu Museum in Jiangyong County.
Hu Xin is our port of entry into this secret world, depicting a time still in living memory when women were subordinate to men, foot-binding was common (as were arranged marriages), and divorces were out of the question.
From the despair came Nushu, written on fans and handkerchiefs in delicate calligraphy or sung a capella and handed down through generations.
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