Dust in the Wind (Lian lian feng chen)

DUST IN THE WIND (Lian lian feng chen)      A                    

aka:  Love, Love, Wind, Dust

Taiwan  (109 mi)  1986  d:  Hou Hsiao-hsien

The final installment of Hou Hsiao-hsien's coming-of-age trilogy featuring three different coming-of-age stories by three prominent Taiwanese screenwriters, where A Summer at Grandpa's (Dong Dong De Jia Qi) (1984) was inspired by the childhood memories of Chu Tien-wen, A Time to Live and a Time to Die (Tong nien wang shi) (1985) was inspired by Hou Hsiao-hsien’s own childhood, while DUST IN THE WIND (1986) was written by Wu Nien-jen, who played the father NJ in Edward Yang’s YI YI (2000).  In keeping with the tone of authenticity, each of the three films was shot in the actual childhood home of each writer.  The setting of this film takes place in the picturesque mountain village of Jiufen in the northeast part of Taiwan, which was used again in A City of Sadness (Bei qing cheng shi) (1989), Hou’s first entry into his historical trilogy, where the shot from the mountain to the hillside inlets and cliffs jutting out into the bay below offers a spectacular panoramic vista (third photo shown here:  Two kinds of Hou Hsiao hsien | Notes on The Cultured Life), perhaps the most identifiable, signature shot of Taiwan throughout the director’s career.  This early coming-of-age trilogy is also significant for the director’s initial use of non-professional actors, a key component in establishing a natural style of realism that reflects an unembellished world stripped of all artifice, using extensive improvisation to arrive at the final shape of his scenes, where his film aesthetic is reflected in sparse dialogue with long stretches of silence, long takes and minimal camera movement, where the story advances by the reading of letters, the telling of stories, a change in hairstyle, or barely perceptible shifts in the inner lives of characters.  Unlike films of the West, Hou’s films offer no unnecessary explanation, where the use of close-ups and point-of-view shots are nonexistent, while the key to understanding the poetry of his films is recognizing the rhythm and sequence of his shots, which are often expressed with great visual grace and beauty, most notably through a lifelong collaboration with cinematographer Mark Lee Ping Bin which began in A Time to Live and a Time to Die (Tong nien wang shi), developing a familiarity with the lives shown onscreen, offering insights that can only be obtained through the perception and imagination of an ever vigilant viewer, where Hou’s films are increasingly challenging and unorthodox.      

This is a small film which paints a beautiful portrait of impermanence, evoking poetic moods and shifting tides that affect the fate of our lives.  The film is set in 1965 in the small mining town of Jiufen, featuring a gorgeous opening shot sequence of rapidly approaching train tracks seen through the windows of a train as it passes through the darkness of tunnels, exposing the foliage of lush verdant mountainsides.  This is the first of a series of films to star Li Tien-lu from The Puppetmaster (Xi meng ren sheng) (1993) as the aging and eccentric Grandpa, who for the most part improvises his own dialogue, telling original stories that are woven into the fabric of the film, not in narrative but in tone, offering a unique flavor in a cast of non-professionals, including his son’s family and his grandchildren, which includes his teenage grandson Wan (Wang Chien-wen), the stand-in for the writer.  One of the smalltown joys is watching outdoor movies on a giant tarp, like a ship’s sail, where the community collectively meets, yet inevitably the power would go out during the movie.  Hou establishes a rhythm of life reflected in these earlier times, with children playing on the street, neighbors helping one another, where they knew everyone, all captured with extreme calmness, as the 60’s was an era when people left the rural villages to seek work in Taipei, where they knew no one.  Instead of going to high school, Wan joins his girlfriend Huen (Shufang Chen), the hometown girl next door, in Taipei, disinterestedly working odd jobs, living in a loft above an old movie theater with several artists, where one can’t help but think of Tsai Ming-liang's GOODBYE, DRAGON INN (2003).  Hou’s customary cinematographer Mark Lee Ping Bin shoots the first of his memorable table sequences, most notably the opening shot in Flowers of Shanghai (Hai shang hua) (1998), capturing the vibrant energy of social settings that are featured in nearly every film, including one here where a group of friends meet to celebrate the sendoff of a friend joining the army for three years, drinking beer and singing songs over a festive meal, where Huen hesitatingly takes her first drink, then another, causing Wan shame and internal distress, which is shown by his increasingly anxious mood smoking cigarettes.  The passing of time is established by his repetitive visits to Huen where she works as a seamstress, saving money by living on the premises, where she grows distraught when he doesn’t visit regularly, or hear the latest news from her family, as she routinely sends money home.  

Ultimately, this is a heartbreaking story of lost love, quite reminiscent of Jacques Demy’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Les Paraplegias de Cherbourg) (1964), where the essential characteristic expressed throughout is a youthful sincerity.  Using trains traveling through a countryside, motorbikes through the streets of the city, or a young man drifting aimlessly through meaningless jobs, the film contrasts the harshness of the country with the equally bleak city life, examining the problems of surviving without an education in an unsympathetic environment.  Without an actual plot or storyline, the director uses a series of vignettes connected by utterly sublime guitar music by Ming Jang-chen where over a ten year time period, people continue to look the same but something in their lives has changed, where doors that open ever so briefly are also quickly closed by a turn of events.  While Huen’s hauntingly quiet beauty represents a purity and innocence of youth, Wan is a very unrefined young man with suppressed emotions, a very closed personality, unlike his grandfather who is often seen sitting outside smoking, where he talks to all the neighbors and doesn’t miss a thing.  The couple is always shown together in the first half of the film, where there are no hugs or kisses, only an established intimacy, but when Wan is drafted into the army, the separation has untold consequences, as Huen begins seeing the postman, eventually getting married, causing a shock to the local families, leaving Wan stupefied from afar, showing how one leaves the carefree moments of youth with a great deal of reluctance, a theme that returns again in MILLENNIUM MAMBO (2001).  Much like Japanese director Ozu, Hou uses transitional shots of telephone lines, railway switches, balconies overlooking the street, train shots through the mountainsides, wash hanging on the lines in alleyways, or street scenes with the inevitable stacks of food lined up, often shown glowing in the dark.  Actually the entire film is composed of transitional shots, like reflections of childhood memories, expressed in the continual railway travels back and forth in their youth or the suspension bridge of Jiufen, where a train passes in the background leaving behind a trail of smoke.  The village is literally set on a mountainside, where one must climb a steep set of stairs just to get there, young and old alike.  Using brief images of landscapes or a quiet, recurring musical guitar theme, the film evokes great sympathy for its characters, using a slow, unhurried style of long takes that captures the hardships and humor of everyday life.  But it’s a frail balance holding it all together, so when a single thread breaks loose, one can easily lose hold of one’s bearings. 

The Puppetmaster (Xi meng ren sheng)

THE PUPPETMASTER (Xi meng ren sheng)          A                   

Taiwan  (142 mi)  1993  d:  Hou Hsiao-hsien

Hou Hsiao-hsien:

Taiwan has inherited a legacy of influences from Japanese culture….  During the Korean War, we drew closer to America and imbibed its culture and influence.  I feel our generation has a responsibility to conserve the beauty of our own traditions, and to disseminate them using the tools of our age and from our own perspective.  In this way, the best and most worthwhile of our traditions will be passed on to the next generation.

The second installment of Hou Hsiao-Hsien's historical trilogy, which also includes A City of Sadness (Bei qing cheng shi) (1989) and Good Men, Good Women (Hao nan hao nu) (1995), THE PUPPETMASTER is based on the life of famed Chinese puppet master Li Tien-Lu. Spanning the years 1909 to 1945 and covering major historical events in China's occupation by the Japanese, the film is epic in scope, yet highly personal in focus. Influenced by Chinese painting and the aesthetic concept of "liu-pai" (the idea that what is visible within the frame can open the mind to the world that extends beyond its parameters), the PUPPETMASTER is visually stunning.  Hou's use of deep-focus composition, long fixed shots, and lack of close-ups create an onscreen tableau evocative of a puppet stage.  It is on this stage that Chinese history unfolds, interwoven with the simple narrative of Li's life, which is performed by various actors and is related anecdotally by Li himself, who appears onscreen as a humorous and engaging raconteur.  For Hou fans, Li is a familiar presence, having acted in several of the director's previous films.  Through this quietly complex film, Hou offers a slow meditation on the relationship between man, his art, and the world around him.

China ceded Taiwan to Japan after the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-95) and it remained in Japanese hands until the end of World War II.  A City of Sadness (Bei qing cheng shi) is the first film of this trilogy of historical films on Taiwan and covers the period from the Japanese surrender at the end of World War II in 1945, including the massacre of Taiwanese by government troops in 1947, and the failure of Chiang Kai-Shek’s Nationalist troops in their attempt to regain the Mainland, retreating to the island of Taiwan in 1949.  THE PUPPETMASTER covered the earlier period 1909 to 1945, the time from the Japanese occupation to Japan's surrender, and the third, Good Men, Good Women (Hao nan hao nu), covers the period of 1949 to the present.

Perhaps most unique of the three, as there’s really nothing else in cinema history to compare, the film is based on the memoirs of celebrated Taiwanese puppeteer Li Tien-lu, who narrates directly to the camera in this biographical film, which at the same time reveals a country’s history of 51 years under Japanese occupation.  Now in his eighties, the film follows the story of his life, as he joins a traveling puppet theatre as a teenager in the first half of the century and subsequently makes a career as one of Taiwan's leading puppeteers.  During World War II, the Japanese rulers of Taiwan shut down the puppet troupes and use the traditional Chinese puppet theatre exclusively for their own war propaganda, which Hou uses to considerable humorous effect.  Only after the war do street theatres start playing again, and the population’s appetite is ravenous, as they consider it a style and culture that is uniquely their own.  Despite the dramatization of life under foreign rule, the film is notable for its non-judgmental restraint, for filming entire scenes in long takes, for its motionless camera and lack of close ups, but also for its painterly visuals and deeply humanistic style.  The film celebrates, in such a theatrical way, the beauty of a vanishing culture, a time filled with harshness and death, but without a hint of artifice or nostalgia.  In fact, what is especially unique and inspiring about this film is its warmth and humor, much of it based on the charm of myth and folk tales learned from the times Li spent with people in the mountains, yet always what stands out is how surprisingly human this man is.  To conceive a film around Li’s all-too-real autobiographical accounts is astonishing.  Li is like everybody’s grandfather, the one we wished we had, as he is a remarkably skilled storyteller, cigarette butt in hand, down to its last dregs, taking a swig afterwards.  His stature as a performing artist was so revered that he was on the same social status as a Japanese officer, higher than all the other Japanese troops who considered other Taiwanese “third class citizens...colonized islanders.” This film pays homage and a particular reverence to his elder statesman stature, as in this film, he is used like an African griot, continuing the tradition of oral history passed down through the generations, as it has been done before, probably for centuries.  

In an interview Hou has stated that in this film he is “exploring the values of traditional culture which we have lost…. We have distanced ourselves from nature and man has become like a puppet—he has lost his power to be his own master. THE PUPPETMASTER…represents the lament which I feel for the loss of our culture.”  Li narrates the story in the tradition of professional Chinese storytelling, a popular form of entertainment in which a story is told by a single performer in daily installments over an extended period of time.  The film intersperses Li's narration with indigenous music and with examples of performances and theatre, including Peking Opera, musical skits, puppetry and propaganda plays written for the Japanese, usually preceded by the crackling noise of firecrackers.  Hou utilizes long static shots to convey the experience of distance, as if the viewer is watching a theatrical performance from the audience.  As the film so accentuates the life of a single character, with the history of the country paralleling that of the unforgettable Li Tien-lu, he comes to personify the identity of that nation, as he is someone who has survived the brutal past with his wits and his dignity intact.

A City of Sadness (Bei qing cheng shi)

A CITY OF SADNESS (Bei qing cheng shi)      A                    

Taiwan  (158 mi)  1989  d:  Hou Hsiao-hsien

Jonathan Rosenbaum:

It’s also worth remarking that City of Sadness, one of Hou’s more difficult films for Westerners in terms of plot, was his biggest hit in Taiwan; by broaching historical and cultural issues that couldn’t be discussed when the island was under martial law—that is, for the entire century until 1987—it caused a major sensation.

A devastating, densely constructed, and complicated film that unravels very much like a novel, set in 1945 with the surrender of the Japanese after 51 years of colonial rule in Taiwan, while at the same time a child is being born into the Lin family, a name that means “light,” and the film follows the travails of that family, which coincides with true references to historical events.  While the Taiwanese celebrated their liberation from Japan, there was a national upheaval when it became clear that the Mainlanders intended to continue the colonial structures of exploitation, only with Chiang Kai-Shek's Nationalist Chinese as the sole party in control.  When the Taiwanese rebelled against the Nationalist's implementation of martial law in 1947, effectively turning the country into a police state in what is known as The February 28 Incident, anywhere from 18 – 28,000 or more Taiwanese were massacred by Nationalist troops, the same party currently ruling the country, which effectively banned any reference to this subject until martial law was revoked in 1987, allowing, for the first time, a film like this to be made.  So this is considered a highly significant nationalist work, using an exceedingly complex plot reconstructing the nation’s history as a backdrop for following the daily routines, personal dramas, and eventual destruction of a single family, something resembling The Brothers Karamazov.  Much of the film’s power comes from placing so much of the violence off in the distance, or even off-screen, heightening the internal experience of the viewer.  The film ends in 1949 when the Chiang Kai-Shek Nationalist’s attempt to regain the Mainland fails and the Kuomintang retreat to the island of Taiwan. 

    

Headed by the humorously candid, always-wonderful father, Li Tien-Lu, so extraordinary in The Puppetmaster (Xi meng ren sheng) (1993), he was an acknowledged gangster who spent much time during the war in and out of the Japanese jails attempting to sabotage the Japanese rule.  His family consists of 4 sons, 1st brother is another low-life gangster who turns his Japanese-style bar into a restaurant called “Little Shanghai,” largely a front for his own proclivity for gambling, while 2nd brother has disappeared in the Philippines fighting the Japanese, 3rd brother (Jack Kao) returns from the war mentally unstable, yet collaborates on the black market with drug smugglers, requiring the rescuing intervention by the 1st brother that nearly leads to the entire family’s demise, while the 4th brother, a photographer played by Tony Leung, is deaf.  Nearly everyone in the family is either arrested or attacked in this film, as after defeating the Japanese, Taiwan becomes a brutal police state that coincides with the corrupt rule of the gangsters, so after fighting the Japanese as well as the Mainland Chinese, they still have to fend off wave after wave of more Taiwanese Chinese.  There is a beautiful extended sequence early in the film where a happy group of friends and brothers drunkenly sing “A Song of Exile” out the window, which seems to represent an obvious theme of displacement.  

Xin Shufen, who played the young girl friend in DUST IN THE WIND (1986), is nothing short of heartbreaking in this film as Hinomi, the quiet, beguiling sister to the 4th brother’s best friend, Hinoe (Fang Wou Yi), a girl who works tirelessly as a nurse at the hospital.  She actually narrates the film and can frequently be seen writing her thoughts in her diary.  She is the closest companion to and secretly loves the deaf 4th brother, played with complete understatement by Tony Leung, whose character was changed to a mute as he didn’t speak Mandarin, so the couple communicate by handing each other written notes.  Their quiet sensitivity is stunningly contrasted against the violence of the gangsters and the soldiers.  And if anything, that is the heart of this film, intermingling the deeply personal interior world with the deeply disturbing exterior political world.  Hinoe is repeatedly arrested for secretly spreading his Socialist beliefs on the island, a belief shared by the 4th brother, believing that is the best way to repel outside colonialist forces.  The deafness of the youngest brother becomes a metaphor for the muted voices of opposition.  In one of the most shocking scenes, he is jailed, awaiting his name to be called, but he hears nothing, while off-screen, execution shots can be heard.

Of note, Hou seems to be more comfortable with his film style, which uses poetic innertitles to reflect appropriate philosophical thought and also several repeated static shots from a distance, each with moving objects or people in the foreground while something entirely different is happening in the rear.  One is at the local hospital, as patients or family members arrive, others are seated waiting, someone is mopping the floors, something is happening outside on the street, but everything is choreographed into this small, restricted space.  Also, there are multiple table shots at the restaurant, so much so that this familiar scene actually becomes a symbol for the family, as people are eating in the foreground while others are in a room in the back, and people move easily in and out of the scene.  There is an interesting use of still photographs, 4th brother’s profession, each of which places the story of the events being shown in a deeper historical context.  As usual, the music is carefully interwoven into the emotional fabric of the film.  Probably the most stunning sequence comes at the end, the last 15 minutes of the film, where the sadness of the family becomes the mourning of the nation, and where the life cycles of death-rebirth and death again are so poetically rendered.