For ten years, Chinese orphan Mei Mei (Zhu Lin) has been supported by donations from her Australian sponsor Dean Randall (Guy Pearce) – who sends her postcards that describe his idyllic family life.
At 16, when the orphanage choir tours Australia, Mei Mei discovers the shocking truth – Randall, who she thought was the perfect father figure, is actually a convict in prison for manslaughter.
Randall never imagined he would ever meet Mei Mei and wants nothing to do with her. His donations were just an attempt to dull the guilt of his past crimes. But, undeterred by his reluctance and recognising his loneliness, Mei Mei slips away from the choir every day to visit Randall in prison.
In order to make money to stay in Australia, Mei Mei naively becomes entangled with Randall’s crooked associates. To save Mei Mei from this fate, Randall must make an impossible sacrifice.
But by making it – he might not be just saving Mei Mei – he might be saving them both.
According to Director Pauline Chan, 33 Postcards looks at two social misfits whose lives come together despite their different cultures, ages and circumstances.
“Peeling away the layers of their differences, I hope to explore the similarity of what lies in the depth of the human heart,” Pauline Chan said.
“The film has been inspired by real life stories. They provided the shape of the key characters, whose paths were interwoven to explore the main themes of family connections, self-redemption and growth. Through telling their stories, I wanted to show that hopes and dreams can possibly become a reality.
“By Mei Mei turning up and shattering the illusion, both their dreams and ultimately their lives, are turned upside down. Through their two worlds colliding, I wanted to emphasise the vast cultural and personal disconnection experienced by the two key characters. I was interested in depicting their different perspectives – by creating rapid changes in tones and pace. Is his world imploding because of her? … or has it been enriched? Is her hardship easing because of connecting with him or becoming increasingly difficult?
“For me, the making of this film has been a personal journey on many levels – not least the wonderful opportunity to work in my mother tongue, the Chinese language, but also to collaborate with the most talented cast and crew from East and West.
“Like Randall’s gift for Mei Mei in the film, I fantasise about living in a spiritual space where cultural and physical boundaries do not exist.”
