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Pop Stop

Wang Kar-Wai is so cool, he wears sunglasses inside at night and releases movies only when the mood suits him. PHOTO: TAIPEI TIMES

In May, when Wang Kar-Wai's (王家衛) 2046 was screened at the Cannes Film Festival to generally rave reviews, there were reasons to believe the film was in the bag and would be coming soon to a theater near us. But the latest from the Edinburgh International Film Fesitval bodes ill. The movie was dropped as the festival's closing film, reportedly because it's still incomplete. So Wang's famously quirky work methods, characterized by filming without a script and doing endless re-edits in the post-production phase, are in full effect and 2046's sweep of the year's festivals simply isn't going to happen. Oh well, maybe next year.

On the music front, Jerry Yen (言承旭), the lead stud of the boyband F4, released a solo album a couple weeks ago to a lukewarm reception and has since been buzzing around the region on one of those promotional tours filled with autograph sessions and two-song live appearances. One of the shows was in Ximending Sunday and some overzealous fans weaseled their way to the front and goosed Jerry as he made his way through the crowd. After that annoying encounter, photographers from Hong Kong followed the singer snapping shots inches from his taxi's window, triggering a frenzy from the normally stone-faced Jerry. He got out of the taxi and made a lunge toward the photographer while exchanging some unprintable words, but was restrained by a friend. It was the first time cuddly Jerry displayed a rough and rugged side. A bit surprising for an F4 member.

Ok, who goosed me? PHOTO: TAIPEI TIMES

There was another wandering hand in Taipei last week, which landed on the breast of singer A-Sa (阿Sa) of the cutesy Hong Kong duo Twins, who were in town for the premiere of the film Twins Effect II, starring Jaycee Chan (房祖明).

Breasts were actually front and center in the gossip rags and on TV this week, with continued rumors of enlargement operations on Taiwan's ubiquitous top model Lin Chi-ling (林志玲) and cover-story prominence in Next Magazine (壹週刊) given to Jolin Tsai's (蔡依林) new voluptuous look, aided reportedly by a "miracle" tanktop.

Pop Stop was on hand at Zhongzheng High School last Saturday for the final of the Taipei Hoop Dreams tournament, won by the team including Channel [V] VJs Jason (唐志中) and Blackie (黑人). Blackie was out with an injury, but Jason showed he's got some genuine hoop skills to back his b-ball wardrobe.

With the back-to-school season upon us, it's also time for a fresh round of live concerts, with boyband 5566 kicking things off next weekend, followed by S.H.E the next week and finally Jay Chou (周杰倫) on Oct. 2. Tickets for the Jay show are available already through the National Theater and Concert Hall ticketing system.

On a sad note, the 23-year-old model Hsu Tzi-ting (徐子婷), who starred in the most recent Taihsin Bank commercial as the office lady who strides through a virtual window and emerges on the other side in a bikini toting a surfboard, committed suicide on Saturday following an argument with her boyfriend.

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