Mulberry Child

MULBERRY CHILD is based on Jian Ping’s book Mulberry Child: A Memoir of China, the history of her coming-of-age under the brutality of Mao’s repressive Cultural Revolution.

Told with the help of never-before-seen film footage inside the Cultural Revolution, MULBERRY CHILD, more than a journal of individual survival and family principles, is a lucid account of a dramatic period in China's history.

Seeking a better life for herself and her daughter, Lisa, Jian Ping left China in 1986 to pursue graduate studies in the U.S. She left behind her parents, former senior government officials, but not the memory of their shattered lives. Jian’s daughter, Lisa, joined her in Queens, New York when the girl was four-and-a-half. They moved to Chicago, where Jian joined corporate America, eventually becoming the national director of Tsingtao Beer. Lisa’s childhood was the reverse of her mother’s, growing up as an utterly unencumbered American girl; living in suburban Chicago Lisa earned a great education, built a successful public relations career and learned to enjoy the best parts of life: good friends, worldwide travel and partying. However, both mother and daughter felt an ever-widening breach in their relationship. The more Jian longed for a closer relationship and for Lisa to know her family roots, the further she pulled away, culminating in Lisa’s disinterest in Jian’s memoir, which had taken her eight years to write.

The stalemate broke when Jian convinced Lisa to return to China during the triumphant 2008 Beijing Olympics in a desperate attempt reconnect Lisa with her extended family. As Lisa’s family embraces her, her eyes open to the complexity and nobility of her own past. Her heart opens to her mother and the world from which her mother felt compelled to protect her, yet longed to have her understand. It was after this bittersweet reunion that Lisa finally agreed to read her mother’s manuscript.

In telling this story, Cooper puts China’s recent history in a personal context. The witty and sometimes painful sub-text of MULBERRY CHILD is that raising a child in America and creating a revolution in China are not without similarities. Each forces a confrontation with cultural roots and a past that haunts the present and shapes the future. MULBERRY CHILD shows a nation and a family recovering.

Narrated by Jacqueline Bisset, with music composed by Kyle Eastwood and Matt McGuire, the film has been widely recognized with prizes at the Palms Springs and the Madrid International Film Festivals.