by MATTHEW HAYS

For her directorial debut, Vancouver-based Julia Kwan faced a series of daunting tasks. She was working with child actors. She was delving into religious themes. And, of course, she was making a feature film in Canada. But Eve & the Fire Horse, her meditation on the quest for spirituality, childhood and family, is a smart and melancholic film, and one that’s ultimately proven triumphant, winning a Special Jury Prize at Sundance in January.

Eve is a keen nine-year-old who was born in the year of the Fire Horse. In Chinese tradition, this means she will be prone to being particularly bratty or troublesome. When Eve and her older sister Karena must suffer through a series of family sorrows—Mom miscarries and Grandma dies—they begin to seek out the answers in other religions. It doesn’t help that Mom cut down a tree in the yard—something that’s doomed to bring bad luck, according to Chinese superstition. Eve and Karena begin trying to hedge their spiritual bets, delving into Catholicism and Buddhism all at once.

With Eve & the Fire Horse, Kwan manages to show us the world of ’70s Vancouver through the eyes of these innocents. Awash with autobiographical detail, this movie does what My Life As a Dog did so well: allows us into the world via the imagination of children. Kwan let her imagination roll with this script, letting her characters’ religious search run a bit wild. At times she veers a bit too closely to the maudlin, but that’s a malady most family melodramas of this sort suffer.

Montrealers will notice a name in the credits: filmmaker Léa Pool is cited as a “director consultant,” something that makes perfect sense. Eve & the Fire Horse, after all, deals with issues of cultural identity—a Pool favourite—and there are flashes of magical realism (a highlight arrives when Jesus and Buddha dance together).

Eve & the Fire Horse is an affecting bit of nostalgia from a promising new director. Kwan perfectly captures a family caught in crisis, in between faiths and cultures.

Eve & the Fire Horse opens Friday, March 17

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