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| "She intentionally stops talking and reverses her role from acting others, most importantly, she acts like no one." Persona Director: Ingmar Bergman Main Cast: Liv Ullman, Bibi Andresson Year: 1966 
In Edward Yang’s A One and a Two (一一), there is a boy states that we can only know half of our world at most, as we can only know what we see in front but never know what is really happening behind ours. So he keeps on taking photography of people's back. In Chinese we have Yin and Yang, for Kant he believes in Metaphysical and Transcendental, in A One and a Two we have the ideas of front and back, all of them relate to the idea of different aspects on the world’s view, most importantly, they build the bridge to know another side of the world. Ingmar Bergman, the director who devotes all his life asking the value of god, as well as meaning of death throughout his successful cinematic career. In Persona, we witness another bridge to know the other side of the world, partially thanks to Freud, is to know another side of human. Persona is a film opened to interpretation. Asking how the story Persona is just like asking what human being means. At one moment during acting for cinema, Liv Ullman consciously stops talking anymore. She means to do it without physical or mental problems; Bibi Andersson is the nurse taking care of her, the only speaking person. Therefore, we sensually know more how problematic Bibi Andersson is because we just don't know what's going on for Liv Ullman. The story goes on, we see Bibi Andersson is going mad, and Liv Ullman still keeps silence even she thinks it is interesting to learn from Bibi Andersson. 
For Bibi Andersson, she shifts from the role as a nurse to be a patient; for Liv Ullman, things seem more complicated. She stops talking means she gives up her presupposed role as a film actress. She intentionally stops talking and reverses her role from acting others, most importantly, she acts like no one. Her problem is unnamable, unspoken, opened to interpretation. Her unnamable behavior makes no one can identify who she is, meanwhile, making 'who she is' becomes a question towards Bibi Andersson. In linguistics, asking 'who she is' actually is asking 'who she is not'. Put it simply, if she is something that means a conclusion of she is not Peter, not a ruler, not a key, not her father……every little things counted. In the case between Bibi Andersson and Liv Ullman, it is the clash between 'who she is (Bibi Andersson)' and 'who she is not (Liv Ullman)', or Yin and Yang, or metaphysical and transcendental, or conscious and unconscious, or the front and the back. Bibi Andersson just faces to faces with 'who she is not' and going mad as the non-responsiveness is so echoing, 'who she is not' says nothing to her, means nothing to her so she finds no way to know who she is. Bibi Andersson is going mad between meanings and meaningless. I would like to end this passage with a wonderful story of German philosopher Nietzsche, the writer of Beyond Good and Evil. The story is about a shepherd who has a habit to talk with a cow about all of his discontents. He frequently asks why the cow looks happy everyday. By and by, through the monologue of the shepherd, cow learns human intelligence through listening, and tries to figure an answer the question why I am happy everyday. At a moment cow finally knows the answer, yet it never tells the shepherd. The answer is the cow can forget, so it does not remember what sadness is; but when the cow wants to tell the answer, it has already forgotten to tell him every time. So it looks happy everyday and still keeps silence. That is the story coming out my mind after my second viewing of Persona. I am not sure whether Liv Ullman is happy, yet, she smiles at least. 
Obscure Rating: 9/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060827/ | | |
| "No matter you agree or not, Edward Yang suggests the real murderer is Taiwan itself."
Mahjong (麻將) Director: Edward Yang (楊德昌) Main Cast: Ko Yue-lun (柯宇綸), Chang Chen (張震), Wong Chi Zan (王啟讚), Tang Cong Sheng (唐從聖), Virginie Ledoyen, Elaine Jin (金燕玲), Yeh Chuan Chen (葉全真) Year: 1996 
It is pretty questionable why Taiwanese cinema suddenly comes to the world stage at late 1980s to 1990s with full of gloominess and hopelessness. City of Sorrow (悲情城市) by Hou Hsiau Hsien (候孝賢) has already linked the connotation between Taiwan and misfortune, Tsai Ming-liang's (蔡明亮), a Malaysian-born Taiwanese director, rebels without a clear cause in his debut Rebels of Neon God (青少年哪吒), Chu Tien-wen (朱天文), long time screenwriter collaborating with Hou Hsiau Hsien including City of Sorrow and Dust in the Wind (戀戀風塵) etc., wrote her most famous novella The Glamour of Fin de Siecle (世紀末的華麗), its name is the best conclusion about how I am impressed with the Taiwanese cinema in 1990s. Among all the dispirited, I love Edward Yang the most. I always think parallel between Edward Yang and Michelangelo Antonioni. The Italian director is widely regarded as the master of alienation; we can find the collapse of relationship and trust, the meaninglessness of life, with somewhat surrealistic or existentialistic elements such as make somebody cinematically disappearing (Blow Up, L'Avventura, or even Eclipse, if you regard somebody is actually missing in the ending sequence). Edward Yang his interest is not in disappearing, but murder. In his films I have ever watched, Terrorizer (恐佈份子), A Brighter Summer Day (牯嶺街少年殺人事件) and Mahjong (麻將) all involved murders. No matter you agree or not, Edward Yang suggests the real murderer is Taiwan itself. Actually, it is quite a terrible thinking. Wong Kar Wai would say you have been dead since you born in Aesop Fable style, but he just states it for stylishness; Godard makes lot of things die in his cinema, yet he just did it for his own rebels; but why Edward Yang's Taiwan is really murdering somebody? I mean why does he that serious? I cannot find the answer in Mahjong, all other his films neither. Mahjong is not same category as Terrorizer and A Brighter Summer Day. We find overwhelming absurdity throughout whole film; illogic is not the matters in director's mind. Also, emergence of Viriginie Ledoyen brings a globalized image of Taiwan. For me, it is pretty uncanny while I am watching the scene that Ko Yue-lun and his father running a hostel for foreigners, as I also lived in similar hostels in Taipei with a Westerner owner who can speak fluent Mandarin. The ending seems optimistic, but don’t forget kiss on lips would bring you bad luck. As a fan of Edward yang, it is pretty warm to see Chang Chen and Wong Chi Zan again, the two outstanding youngsters in A Brighter Summer Day; as a person can never get out from the shadow of Rebels of Neon God, I feel pretty surreal about the similar appearance between Ko Yue-lun and Chen Chao-jung (陳昭榮); as a witness of murder in Edward Yang's Taiwan again, I still feel puzzled yet deeply associated with that obscure hopelessness. Obscure Rating: 9/10 http://imdb.com/title/tt0116962/ | | |
| "We are born to have a pair of legs." Days of Being Wild (阿飛正傳) Director: Wong Kar Wai (王家衛) Main Cast: Leslie Cheung (張國榮), Maggie Cheung (張曼玉), Rebecca Poon (潘迪華), Carina Lau (劉嘉玲), Andy Lau (劉德華), Jacky Cheung (張學友), Tony Leung (梁朝偉) Year: 1991 
For me, Days of Being Wild is undeniably the highlight of Hong Kong cinema. It presents the proximity of farness at a nostalgic era of 1960s; it presents the warmth of alienation in the struggling relationship between Leslie Cheung and Rebecca Poon; it makes John Osborne's Look back in Anger shame on the way Leslie Cheung says he would never look back in the Philippines; it defines love at first sight in one minute, it goes beyond time in the same minute; it is the triumph of dissatisfaction, it does not give happy a meaning or respect, it makes me happy without happiness; it ends suddenly, it apocalypes now. Godard said car is made to move but not to stop, that why we aren't Leslie Cheung. We are born to have a pair of legs. Obscure Rating: 9/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101258/ | | |
| "We never be able to see anything clearly, that is the most terrible thing in this film, as the most visible and understandable scene is the abortion surgery. " 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days Director: Cristian Mungiu Main Cast: Anamaria Marinca, Laura Visiliu Year: 2007 
Abortion is always not a topic appealing me. What this Romanian film, also the Golden Palm Winner at last year, impresses me is that this film also does not say how meaningful or immoral abortion is. I think it is a thriller film and I feel like watching a process such as a robbery or a traffic accident, but just this time I am watching abortion only. No matter robbery, traffic accident or abortion, either one can make a good film once you get the dramatic moment inside, I think this is the way how this Romanian film to be one of the best last year. It is the way how to narrate the abortion story makes this film unique. The main character is played by Anamaria Marinca, a university student on that day helps her friend Laura Visiliu to prepare abortion surgery on that day. Helped by Laura Visiliu's indecisive and rather innocent charater, the more mature Marinca is the one get contact with the underground surgery doctor and strives to find a hidden room in hotel for the surgery, which is a serious crime during that time in Romania. Except the surgery, it is still an ordinary day for Marinca, and a working day for communist Romania. What mesmerizing is how the surgery interlinks with the ordinary life happened in Romania. Marinca left Visiliu in the beginning of the surgery, as she needs to go to her boyfriend's mother party. We see how class difference is so indifferent in this communist country. Marinca sits at the centre of dining table, facing to us, thinking about her friend’s condition and no one cares about her. It is a scene reminds all our experience that we are into some occasions we find no reasons to stay but we still exist in there unbearably, and it is still realistic someone’s life is on the verge in Marinca’s case. As a film audience, we wait as impatient as Marinca to leave the party. After she leaves, we can still feel the upset about the poor transport and possibly hidden crime in Romanian society. Through the eyes of Marinca, we experience ordinary life in Romania can always be that dramatic. Through the master class of cinematic manipulation with the help of Kenji Mizoguchi (溝口健二) trademark “one-scene one-shot”, we never be able to see anything clearly, that is the most terrible thing in this film, as the most visible and understandable scene is the abortion surgery. We physically experience how terrible abortion is; what's more is we unconsciously fear how God has made a country like Romania.
Obscure Rating: 8/10 http://imdb.com/title/tt1032846/ | | |
| "Everyone can be an amateur poet; as a special agent after special training can be Tarkovsky's father." Nikita Director: Luc Besson Main Cast: Anne Parillaud, Tchkey Karyo, Jeanne Moreau, Jean Rino Year: 1990 
Luc Besson's Nikita tells us what the best way is to deal with criminals and as a strong proof against death penalty. Nikita, a fallout, drug addicted girl who does not really care about anyone;s and her own life. She kills a police officer while he shows certain sympathy to her. She is charged as death penalty. But thanks to the French government, she receives a special training programme for 3 years and graduated as a special agent in service for the country. Finally, it proofs that it is a new and (already) much better life to Nikita. This special training programme shows much more effective, fraternal and humanitarian (Confucian!!) than any education policies in Hong Kong. I believe Luc Besson intends making this film as subterranean, it turns out unexpectedly utopian. Luc Besson's magic also finds in two scenes of this film. One scene we find Jeanne Moreau, the muse in Truffaut's Jules et Jim as well as Antonioni's Le Notte, as a similarly special advisor during the special training programme. She puts My Fair Lady element into the programme by teaching Nikita to smile and use lipstick. What magical is that on the mirror they use for training, I find the shadow and feel the chill of Bibi Andersson and Liv Ullman. Another magical scene while Nikita's trainer, Tchkey Karyo, visits Nikita as the role of her uncle, and is asked by her boyfriend about her childhood, the biggest challenge for people with invented identity. He answers calmly, story-tellingly, most important, poetically. He convinces me everyone can be an amateur poet; as a special agent after special training can be Tarkovsky's father. I am puzzled with his memory while Tarkovsky narrates his father’s poem in his films, while I am being moved by Tchkey Karyo's improvised story about Nikita as a girl who likes to pretend a frog beside the pond when she is eight. I feel a bit ironic that something moves me usually fake. Obscure Rating: 7/10 http://imdb.com/title/tt0100263/ | | |
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