Taiwan Cinema: Old, New, and Newer
- Taiwan Cinema:
- Old, New, and Newer
From August 6 through 31, the Gene Siskel Film Center, in partnership with the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Chicago, presents Taiwan Cinema: Old, New, and Newer, a series of eight films representing one of the most important modern national cinemas. The older films, whose original negatives and surviving prints have been ravaged by time, are being presented in new digital restorations.
The series highlights the auteur-driven Taiwan New Cinema movement of the 1980s, which captured the film world’s attention with its distinctive use of long-take aesthetics, autobiographical content, and elliptical narratives. The series opens on August 6 with IN OUR TIME (1982), the four-part omnibus film that heralded the arrival of Taiwan New Cinema. The second episode of IN OUR TIME was directed by Edward Yang, one of the three great directors to emerge from the movement, along with Hou Hsaio-hsien (represented by his 1985 autobiographical masterpiece A TIME TO LOVE, A TIME TO DIE) and Tsai Ming-liang (represented by his stunning 1992 debut REBELS OF THE NEON GOD). Chang Yi, who directed the fourth episode of IN OUR TIME, is also represented by his moving 1985 feature KUEI-MEI, A WOMAN. Also included in the series are two films (OYSTER GIRL, AUTUMN EXECUTION) that represent the pre-New Cinema era and two recent works (THE FOURTH PORTRAIT, MONGA) that carry on the New Cinema legacy while merging it with other influences.
Identity--divided, shifting, and ambiguous--is a central issue of Taiwanese cinema, as it is of Taiwan itself. An island roughly two-thirds the size of Illinois, located between China, Japan, and the Philippines, Taiwan was colonized by the Dutch in the early 17th century, annexed by China in 1683, and ceded to Japan after the Sino-Japanese War in 1895. Following the 1949 Communist victory in mainland China, Taiwan was “invaded” by two million exiles who established an authoritarian regime that depended heavily on U.S. support while suppressing the native Taiwanese language and culture. Taiwan experienced another identity crisis in the 1970s when many nations, including the U.S., withdrew their recognition in favor of the People's Republic of China.
The 1980s inaugurated a movement toward liberalization that continues to this day, marked by political reforms and official restoration of native culture. However, the question of Taiwan's identity--as a part of China, an independent entity, or a "post-national" player in the global arena--remains unresolved. Lee Teng-hui, the country's first ethnically Taiwanese president, finessed the question with the phrase "creative ambiguity"--a description that could also be aptly applied to many Taiwanese films. Several commentators have suggested that Taiwanese cinema--especially the New Cinema movement--has been a key force in defining the embattled and floating identity of its nation. As Emilie Yueh-yu Yeh and Darrell William Davis write in Taiwan Film Directors: A Treasure Island, “Taiwan New Cinema helped put Taiwan--an island without a political identity--on the map...Taiwan is no longer a site for occupation and transplantation of the occupier’s mentality, but the birthplace of contemporary cinematic virtuosity.” We invite you to sample that virtuosity--and the rich and complex culture that produced it--in this brief but fascinating series.
Co-presented by the Gene Siskel Film Center and the Government Information Office of the Republic of China (Taiwan), with cooperation from the Chinese Taipei Film Archive and the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Chicago. Special thanks to Yuchia Chang, Chicago Taiwanese American Professionals, and Pace Systems, Inc., for their support of the series.
IN OUR TIME
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- IN OUR TIME
- (GUANG YIN DE GU SHI)
- 1982, Tao Dechen, Edward Yang,
- Ko Yi-cheng, and Chang Yi,
- Taiwan, 109 min.
- With Sylvia Chang, Li Kuo-hsiu
In the early 1980s, increased competition from home video and Hong Kong created a crisis in Taiwan's film industry that led to the hiring of young, innovative directors. Four of them contributed to this anthology that is considered the founding film of Taiwan New Cinema. The four parts move from the 1950s to the 1980s with progressively older protagonists whose ages reflect the coming of age of the filmmakers. The first, Tao's "Little Dragon Head," is a sweetly funny tale of a lonely 1950s schoolboy whose only friend is a Godzilla-like toy...until a pretty cousin comes along. Set in the 1960s, Yang's "Expectation" centers on a pubescent girl whose romantic longings might be too much, too soon. Ko's "The Jumping Frog" is a comic look at a 1970s college boy who is luckier at sports than with women. Chang's 1980s-set "Say Your Name" depicts the farcical misadventures of a young couple who get locked out of their new apartment. In Mandarin with English subtitles. HDCAM video. (MR)
THE FOURTH PORTRAIT
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- THE FOURTH PORTRAIT
- (DI ZHI ZHANG HUA)
- 2010, Chung Mong-hong, Taiwan, 104 min.
- With Bi Xiao-hai, Hao Lei
Chung's award-winning (Golden Horse Award for Best Director; Taipei Film Festival for Best Narrative Feature and Best Actor) follow-up to his acclaimed 2008 debut PARKING, this episodic coming-of-age tale gives a fresh spin to many of the central elements of the Taiwan New Cinema: autobiographical content, family drama, displaced mainlander characters, search for identity, striking visual style. Following the death of his father, 10-year-old Hsiang is reluctantly taken in by his prostitute mother (Hao in an excellent, unexpectedly sympathetic performance) and abusive stepfather. Haunted by the mystery of his long-missing older brother, Hsiang finds escape in the company of a petty thief and, more rewardingly, in his aptitude for drawing, which produces the four portraits that structure the film. In Mandarin, Min Nan, and Hakka with English subtitles. HDCAM video. (MR)
AUTUMN EXECUTION
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- AUTUMN EXECUTION
- (QIU JUE)
- (aka EXECUTION IN AUTUMN)
- 1971, Li Xing, Taiwan, 99 min.
- With Ou Wei, Tang Pao-yun
Li Xing (aka Lee Hsing) is best-known as a pioneer of the "healthy realism" genre (see OYSTER GIRL), but he carried over that genre's moral dimension to this superb costume film. During the Han Dynasty, a thoughtless young man, spoiled rotten by his manipulative grandmother, is condemned to death for three brutal murders. The execution is delayed for nearly a year, during which the question of his escape becomes secondary to his growing awareness of love and conscience. A strong sense of set design, atmosphere, and the passing seasons illuminates this powerful drama of regeneration. In Mandarin with English subtitles. HDCAM video. (MR)
KUEI-MEI, A WOMAN
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- KUEI-MEI, A WOMAN
- (WO ZHE YANG GUO LE YI SHENG)
- 1986, Yi Chang, Taiwan, 120 min.
- With Yang Huey-sian, Lee Li-chun
"Lacking a famous director but packing in a lot of pleasure...KUEI-MEI, A WOMAN is a classicist’s melodrama, a dry-eyed tear-jerker, because of its restrained direction and the impressively controlled, realistic star performance of Yang Huey-sian."
—Mike Hale, The New York Times
"Honest and poignant."
—Ted Shen, Chicago Reader
Director Yi Chang, one of the contributors to the groundbreaking anthology IN OUR TIME, makes effective use of the long-take style favored by the Taiwan New Wave, but he takes a more direct approach to storytelling in this tremendously moving saga of a woman whose shifting fortunes (à la Fassbinder's Maria Braun) reflect the history of modern Taiwan. Arriving in Taiwan in the 1950s, Kuei-mei makes a disadvantageous marriage to a widower with three unruly kids and a bad gambling habit. Beautifully portrayed by celebrated actress Yang, she weathers pregnancies, her husband's infidelity, her daughter's resentment, a stint as servant in Japan, divorce, and illness while struggling to keep the family restaurant business afloat. In Mandarin with English subtitles. HDCAM video. (MR)
A TIME TO LIVE, A TIME TO DIE
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- A TIME TO LIVE,
- A TIME TO DIE
- (TONGNIAN WANGSHI)
- (aka THE TIME TO LIVE AND THE TIME TO DIE)
- 1985, Hou Hsaio-hsien, Taiwan, 136 min.
- With You An-shun, Tian Feng
When A TIME TO LIVE, A TIME TO DIE had its Western premiere at the 1986 Berlin Film Festival, where it won the Golden Bear, the film caused a great ripple of recognition that Hou had moved to a new level of mastery in his still-short directorial career. Semi-autobiographical, it charts the story of a family very much like Hou's own: reluctant émigrés from China to Taiwan. The elders of the family find meager solace in unrealistic hopes, while their kids run wild, exhilarated and daunted by a new and unfamiliar world. What passed for nostalgia and poignancy in Hou's previous work takes on a new edge here, as he looks at life and death in the family with a power and utter frankness that is without precedent. In Mandarin, Min Nan, and Hakka with English subtitles. HDCAM video. (BS)
OYSTER GIRL
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- OYSTER GIRL
- (KE NU)
- 1964, Li Xing and Li Jia, Taiwan, 98 min.
- With Wang Mo-chou, Chiang Ping
OYSTER GIRL is a key film in Taiwanese film history, representing both the 1960s revival of the Mandarin-language film industry and the arrival of a new genre known as "healthy realism," which borrowed Italian neorealism's use of real locations and working-class characters but toned down the social criticism in favor of positive messages. Oyster-gatherer Ah-lan (like her catch, she is hard-shelled but tender inside) is in love with the often-absent fisherman Chin-shui, but a bout of premarital sex leaves her pregnant and vulnerable to malicious gossip. The first color film by Taiwanese filmmakers, OYSTER GIRL's picturesque delights include a free-for-all catfight in the surf and stunning shots of the oyster girls pushing their sail-borne baskets across the golden strand. In Mandarin with English subtitles. HDCAM video. (MR)
MONGA
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- MONGA
- (BÁNG-KAH)
- 2010, Doze Niu, Taiwan, 140 min.
- With Mark Chao, Ethan Ruan
"★★★★ An entertaining, and very welcome, addition to the jaded Asian gangster genre."
—Edmund Lee, Time Out Hong Kong
A huge hit in Taiwan, where it outgrossed AVATAR, this kinetic, Scorsesesque gangster saga was also the country's official Oscar submission. The title refers to Taipei's venerable, crime-ridden Wanhua District (aka Monga), where most of the story takes place. Fighting back against high-school bullies, Mosquito (Chao) comes to the attention of a local gang and becomes fast friends with their second-in-command Monk (Ruan). Graduating to the big time, the boys are enlisted into a gangster organization run by an old-school boss whose sense of honor is pitted against the more ruthless methods of a rival gang from mainland China. In Min Nan and Mandarin with English subtitles. HDCAM video. (MR)
REBELS OF THE NEON GOD
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- REBELS OF THE NEON GOD
- (CHING SHAO NIEN NUO ZHA)
- 1992, Tsai Ming-liang, Taiwan, 109 min.
- With Lee Kang-sheng, Chen Chao-jung
"A funnier, sexier Antonioni...REBELS is the most spot-on portrait of the fluorescent mall culture of a decade past, and of its attendant adolescent anomie, that I have ever seen."
—Nick Pinkerton, ReverseShot.com
Taipei by night, with an array of cheap hotels, electronic game parlors, clubs, and horrifyingly dank basement apartments, is as much a character in REBELS OF THE NEON GOD as its four belligerently alienating protagonists. A seemingly model student (Lee) becomes involved--at first accidentally, then obsessively--with two young thieves who rip off video arcades. Director Tsai, in his first feature, indicates the direction of a new generation of filmmakers--life in a city that is simultaneously hellish and beckoning, a place where childhood is a non-existent state. In Mandarin with English subtitles. HDCAM video. (BS)
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HDCAM???