To make a college campus movie, Taiwanese film director Alex Yang (楊順清) went to a college campus. Not just any college campus, but the scenic Chung Cheng University (CCU) in Chiayi. Enlisting the enthusiastic support of CCU president Ren Luo and the student body, Yang and his production team shot My Fair Laddy, with several well-known Taipei television and film stars as the leads, among them Lin Meng-ching (林孟瑾) and Bobby Dou.
Filmed during a 30-day period in June and July, the film crew lived free-of-charge on campus at a CCU guest house, hired a supporting cast of extras from the student population and made My Fair Laddy -- yes, a play on My Fair Lady -- on a shoestring budget. Using nearby locations for background scenes, in addition to many campus locations, the movie has a southern Taiwan feel to it, according to those who have seen it, and it is poised to do well on the international film festival circuit next year. The romantic comedy had its nationwide premiere last month at CCU.
Yang said that word-of-mouth advertising via e-mail, Internet sites and bbs chatrooms will hopefully play an important part in the film's success. The Chinese title translates roughly as "My Happy and Unfettered Study Partner."
Eight more campus screenings are scheduled nationwide over the next few weeks, in Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taichung, Hsinchu and Tainan, an appearance at next year's Berlin Film Festival is planned, and a DVD will be released in early next year. The theatrical release of the film in movie theaters around the country is set for early next month, according to Steve Cheng, a professor of marketing at CCU and one of the associate producers of the film.
In a recent e-mail interview, Yang, 40, spoke about the genesis and background of his new film, which he hopes to take later to audiences in Japan, Hong Kong, North America and Europe. The up-and-coming director, a graduate of the Taipei National University of the Arts, where he studied film with internationally-acclaimed director Edward Yang (no relation), has produced two well-received movies, The Trigger in 2003 and Taipei 21 last year.
When asked what kind of audience he was trying to reach with this campus comedy and how he did his pre-production research, Yang replied: "It's important to know the potential market and your target audience, of course, before you make a film, because a movie is more than just a mere work of art -- it is also a business enterprise, a product. In the last 20 years, almost every Taiwanese film has faced the same problem of how to market your film and find your audience, but in the end, a director has to go on his personal vision and intuition. That's what I've done for all my films."
In My Fair Laddy, the lead female character played by Lin, is named Sophia, has 108 study partners as the movie opens. While the theme of the movie is youth and how young people go about trying to make their dreams come true, the film is also about friendship, love and romance, Yang says.
"The movie has its elements of comedy, of course, and also of irony," Yang says. "For example, Sophia wants to find true love but how can she do this when she goes around accumulating 108 study partners? That is part of the theme of the movie: how to be really free and unfettered in life and love."
The main characters in My Fair Laddy are a male university student and two college coeds, according to the shooting script that Yang wrote earlier in the year. The young man, named Tong-tong, writes a play that becomes a big hit on campus. Sophia, one of the most beautiful girls on campus, says she wants to perform in Tong-tong's stage play, and during rehearsals, the two start to fall in love with each other. However, Tong-tong's girlfriend, named Ann, becomes worried that she might lose him.
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