Accessing The Magic Door with Sunny Xiang
Most films about time travel profess the idea that its mere existence causes a ripple effect which almost certainly changes the world in a negative way. The Magic Door is a new film which rebukes this idea, partially because it takes place in a fantasy world and partially because it displays the eventual end which all things meet and thus the benefits of appreciating the present. Producer Sunny Xiang was not only the driving force behind this film, she inspired it. Amazingly, during 2020’s unique global circumstance, The Magic Door garnered a number of awards including: Best Short Film at the London Independent Film Awards, the Silver Award at the LA Shorts Awards, and wins from the Global Film Festival Awards, International Filmmaker Festival of World Cinema, Amsterdam International Filmmaker Festival, among others.
While it’s not common place for a producer to be so deeply intertwined in every aspect of a film from the very inception, Sunny Xiang is not a typical producer. The script was developed with the film’s writer and Executive Producer Hugh Litfin from real life stories of Sunny’s experience with her own father. Xiang reveals, “Art comes from life. I believe true stories are the foundation of a good story. Whenever the writer finished each draft of the script, Hugh and I would initiate a creative meeting to discuss notes with him. Our notes covered our opinions about the plot, structure, characters, dialogues, and even the marketability. The script was finalized after three drafts.” The resulting film The Magic Door, is a surrealistic journey by a girl who comes to understand the potency of time and comes to respect the gift of the present. Though there are elements of fantasy, the core of the film is the eternal love between parent and child.
The practicality of casting a father/daughter duo along two different timelines who resembled each other was the most obvious and initial obstacle for this production to overcome. Notably, John Carney of the action series Fist2Fist and Action on Film International Film Festival Award Winner Jake’s Dead delivers a deeply moving performance as the elder father. Dream sequence sets and scheduling around child actors expertly handled by Sunny, her greatest coup for The Magic Door was seeing the film through to completion and its Amazon Prime distribution during Covid-19. The effect of the pandemic has essentially halted nearly all film and television production across the planet, forcing progressive and proactive filmmakers like Sunny to adopt new methods to ensure that the industry does not falter under present circumstances. Producers and distribution executives like her are inventing the template that will be utilized in the near future and possibly longer to establish a safe environment for creatives. The Producer/distribution executive relates, “During the whole QC period for distribution, we had to communicate remotely due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which lowered the efficiency of the communications. However, we still passed the QC successfully through our efforts and eventually landed our distribution on Amazon.”
Like all great stories, The Magic Door has a lesson that applies too much more than the obvious tale communicated. The young girl central to this film is also a proxy for the audience; one which implores us to appreciate the good things we have in our lives now and plan for what the future could bring. Sunny Xiang has shown with this film that a great producer and distribution executive can impact every aspect of filmmaking; a fact substantiated by the accolades and awards which continue to accumulate for The Magic Door.
