2003. Dir: Hou Hsiao-Hsien.
Context:
Initiation: Made for the centenary of Yasujiro Ozu. Project was brought to Hou via his connections with Shochiku studio and this ended up being his fourth film co-produced by that studio. The only condition was that he had to film in Japan. The film ended up subtly entering into dialogue with Ozu's style but also showing the difference between it and Hou's own style.
Thursday 17 December 2015
Millenium Mambo (Film)
2001. Dir: Hou Hsiao-Hsien.
Context:
Transition for Hou to contemporary themes: This film marked a return (after the tentative effort of Daughter of the Nile) for Hou to dealing with modern, urban Taiwan, and came after some failed projects for multi-stranded films (including a project to make films distributed online which the viewer could edit however they choose), one of which involved the magician who ends up in this film. Hou had also experienced for himself the techno scene in Taipei and been impressed by it and its atmosphere and energy. He tries to translate this into the nightclub scenes of this movie.
First film with Shu Qi: Shu Qi previously had only acted in mainstream comedies and sex comedies, but when Hou saw something in her and decided to work with her, she was introduced to a very different kind of cinema. She was made to act in ways that were wholly new to her experience, and in ways that perhaps she had not even previously thought herself capable of. The collaboration would be beneficial for her, as for Hou, and this was the first of their to-date three films together.
The Film:
Narration from 'future': Vicky narrates from 10 years later, as if she is not herself anymore, a different person, standing outside of her own self, of her own body, of her story, narrating her own story as is it were someone else's. (Hence fitting with Hou's detached distanced style).
"Hou and screenwriter Chu T'ien-wen, who has written or co-written thirteen of Hou's films, diffuse whatever dramatic tension might be found in this narrative through their circuitous and elliptical storytelling. Vicky’s voiceover sometimes relays plot information before events are depicted onscreen; in other moments, the voiceover takes the place of dramatization altogether, while individual scenes appear to have no narrative consequence."
Dichotomy between Taipei and Yubari, snowy landscapes of Northern Japan.
Context:
Transition for Hou to contemporary themes: This film marked a return (after the tentative effort of Daughter of the Nile) for Hou to dealing with modern, urban Taiwan, and came after some failed projects for multi-stranded films (including a project to make films distributed online which the viewer could edit however they choose), one of which involved the magician who ends up in this film. Hou had also experienced for himself the techno scene in Taipei and been impressed by it and its atmosphere and energy. He tries to translate this into the nightclub scenes of this movie.
First film with Shu Qi: Shu Qi previously had only acted in mainstream comedies and sex comedies, but when Hou saw something in her and decided to work with her, she was introduced to a very different kind of cinema. She was made to act in ways that were wholly new to her experience, and in ways that perhaps she had not even previously thought herself capable of. The collaboration would be beneficial for her, as for Hou, and this was the first of their to-date three films together.
The Film:
Narration from 'future': Vicky narrates from 10 years later, as if she is not herself anymore, a different person, standing outside of her own self, of her own body, of her story, narrating her own story as is it were someone else's. (Hence fitting with Hou's detached distanced style).
"Hou and screenwriter Chu T'ien-wen, who has written or co-written thirteen of Hou's films, diffuse whatever dramatic tension might be found in this narrative through their circuitous and elliptical storytelling. Vicky’s voiceover sometimes relays plot information before events are depicted onscreen; in other moments, the voiceover takes the place of dramatization altogether, while individual scenes appear to have no narrative consequence."
Dichotomy between Taipei and Yubari, snowy landscapes of Northern Japan.
Daughter of the Nile (Film)
1987. Dir: Hou Hsiao-Hsien.
First Hou film to take place in Taipei.
"Hou does everything to make the film as far from a disposable, star-geared, impersonal commodity as possible. Employing his trademark long shots and long takes, Hou disinvests the viewer of comfortable, familiar entryways into the emotional and psychological lives of his characters even as he tailors the “teen” movie to his social and cultural concerns."
"the motorcycle ride points to those of Goodbye South Goodbye, while a brutal crime perpetrated in front of a static-camera long take would be expanded upon just a film later in City of Sadness"
"Kasman believes Hou’s shift from male protagonists in films set in the past to female protagonists in those taking place in the present comes from a clear “line of thought”: “the opportunities missed by the socially empowered males in the mid-twentieth century have given way to modern, contemporary opportunities similarly being missed by Taiwan’s women. . . . Hou sees these new women—strong-willed, romantic, partially socially conscious and vaguely looking for something to do with their lives—as the hope for dragging Taiwanese society out of the qualms of the modern life.” That Hou associates women with contemporary urban settings isn’t surprising—he’s commented that he believes that the virile, tough men of his youth have slowly died out, and that attitude is reflected in the decentralizing of Hou’s gangsters to the margins of narrative."
First Hou film to take place in Taipei.
"Hou does everything to make the film as far from a disposable, star-geared, impersonal commodity as possible. Employing his trademark long shots and long takes, Hou disinvests the viewer of comfortable, familiar entryways into the emotional and psychological lives of his characters even as he tailors the “teen” movie to his social and cultural concerns."
"the motorcycle ride points to those of Goodbye South Goodbye, while a brutal crime perpetrated in front of a static-camera long take would be expanded upon just a film later in City of Sadness"
"Kasman believes Hou’s shift from male protagonists in films set in the past to female protagonists in those taking place in the present comes from a clear “line of thought”: “the opportunities missed by the socially empowered males in the mid-twentieth century have given way to modern, contemporary opportunities similarly being missed by Taiwan’s women. . . . Hou sees these new women—strong-willed, romantic, partially socially conscious and vaguely looking for something to do with their lives—as the hope for dragging Taiwanese society out of the qualms of the modern life.” That Hou associates women with contemporary urban settings isn’t surprising—he’s commented that he believes that the virile, tough men of his youth have slowly died out, and that attitude is reflected in the decentralizing of Hou’s gangsters to the margins of narrative."
Wednesday 16 December 2015
Goodbye South, Goodbye (Film)
1996. Dir: Hou Hsiao-Hsien.
Context:
A tale of modern Taiwan: The 'south' of the title refers to Taiwan, defined and labelled as the south in relation to some colonial other, China or Japan, but now independent on its own. Yet the characters of this film still seem somewhat lost, meandering aimlessly. This connects with what Hou has described as Taiwan's struggle to assumes its new status as independent and affluent nation-state. Even though all characters in this film wish to leave Taiwan or think about it at some point, in the end none of them can go ahead with it as they are still too tied to their homeland, stuck there with this impossible desire to leave 'the south'.
Connection to previous Hou films: the film GSG most closely connects back to is The Boys from Fengkuei, in its depiction of the languorous lazy days of a group of petty hoodlums wasting the time away.
Shochiku co-production: for the second time, Hou worked with Japanese producer Shozo Ichiyama, then of Shochiku studio.
"Without affectation, without visible effort, he transforms a staple of pulp fiction—the gangster trying to go straight—into a melancholy meditation on time, place, subjectivity, and Taiwan."
"One of his more languorous movies, Goodbye South, Goodbye is almost too successful in conveying the stagnated, going-nowhere lives of layabouts. Like all Hou movies, Goodbye South, Goodbye is uninflected and detached, demands active engagement, perhaps more so than most of his other films. (It’s probably the most uneventful movie about gangsters ever.) Like all of Hou’s works, it is also rich, lustrous, profound, and affecting."
"There are shots of car rides through crowded city streets, idylls on lush country roads, trains snaking into the mountains. These moments are invariably gorgeous, graceful, swoony—they’re as beautiful as anything Hou has committed to film. The most transfixing is a motorcycle jaunt in the countryside, a lovely, wending tour through rural, overgrown Taiwan."
"Throughout Goodbye South, Goodbye are unexpected cuts to strange angles and puzzling perspectives. In one, there is a close up of snowglobe, with a man’s tattoos in the blurry background beyond it. In another, the camera tracks into a restaurant dining room, except everything is in an orange tint and the soundtrack is silent. Each time, Hou pulls back, revealing that those images were seen through someone’s eyes—in the former, Gao’s girlfriend dawdling in bed, in the latter, Flat Head dishing out orders while wearing orange sunglasses and a walkman."
Context:
A tale of modern Taiwan: The 'south' of the title refers to Taiwan, defined and labelled as the south in relation to some colonial other, China or Japan, but now independent on its own. Yet the characters of this film still seem somewhat lost, meandering aimlessly. This connects with what Hou has described as Taiwan's struggle to assumes its new status as independent and affluent nation-state. Even though all characters in this film wish to leave Taiwan or think about it at some point, in the end none of them can go ahead with it as they are still too tied to their homeland, stuck there with this impossible desire to leave 'the south'.
Connection to previous Hou films: the film GSG most closely connects back to is The Boys from Fengkuei, in its depiction of the languorous lazy days of a group of petty hoodlums wasting the time away.
Shochiku co-production: for the second time, Hou worked with Japanese producer Shozo Ichiyama, then of Shochiku studio.
"Without affectation, without visible effort, he transforms a staple of pulp fiction—the gangster trying to go straight—into a melancholy meditation on time, place, subjectivity, and Taiwan."
"One of his more languorous movies, Goodbye South, Goodbye is almost too successful in conveying the stagnated, going-nowhere lives of layabouts. Like all Hou movies, Goodbye South, Goodbye is uninflected and detached, demands active engagement, perhaps more so than most of his other films. (It’s probably the most uneventful movie about gangsters ever.) Like all of Hou’s works, it is also rich, lustrous, profound, and affecting."
"There are shots of car rides through crowded city streets, idylls on lush country roads, trains snaking into the mountains. These moments are invariably gorgeous, graceful, swoony—they’re as beautiful as anything Hou has committed to film. The most transfixing is a motorcycle jaunt in the countryside, a lovely, wending tour through rural, overgrown Taiwan."
"Throughout Goodbye South, Goodbye are unexpected cuts to strange angles and puzzling perspectives. In one, there is a close up of snowglobe, with a man’s tattoos in the blurry background beyond it. In another, the camera tracks into a restaurant dining room, except everything is in an orange tint and the soundtrack is silent. Each time, Hou pulls back, revealing that those images were seen through someone’s eyes—in the former, Gao’s girlfriend dawdling in bed, in the latter, Flat Head dishing out orders while wearing orange sunglasses and a walkman."
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