Before the advent of OEM animation production deals with Disney in the 1970s, Taiwan was home to several companies that produced original work. The prospect of earning large sums working on OEM productions, however, created a brain drain and local talent left the budding animation businesses, which then either closed down or switched to OEM production. "It was a catastrophe still remembered by veteran animation professionals," said Teng Chiao (鄧橋), production director of Chinese Cartoon Production (CCPCO). One of the country's few animation studios that stayed in production over the past three decades (making Taiwan's first animation feature Feng Shen Bang (封神榜) in 1974), the company was set up by Teng's father, Teng You-li (鄧有立), in 1971.
Five years ago Teng Chiao returned from the US with a business-management degree and a plan to build the company into a brand name producing international quality animated features. Three years of laborious production and NT$70 million later, the first project, Mazu, an adaptation of the legend that features Taiwan's most popular deity (often romanized as Matzu or Matsu), is ready to hit the big screen.
Set in China's Fujian Province during the Song Dynasty, the film begins with humans inadvertently creating mutant creatures by polluting the seas. Upon discovering the looming crisis, the bodhisattva of mercy, Guanyin, gives a baby girl, Lin Mu-niang (林默娘), to a fishing family in the hope that she can protect the village.
PHOTOS: COURTESY OF CHINESE CARTOON PRODUCTION CO LTD
Born with divine powers and a compassionate heart, Lin studies under Guanyin's pupil, the Taoist priest Shun Ton (玄通). During her apprenticeship in white magic, Lin vanquishes two goblins, Far-seeing (千里眼) and Far-hearing (順風耳), who after their defeat befriend the young sorceress.
Before long, the troupe of mutants led by a three-headed sea monster attack the fishing village. As in all fairy tales, good triumphs over evil. The heroine, however, collapses having used the last of her strength to save the villagers. Leaving the mortal world, Lin ascends to heaven and becomes the highly revered deity of the title.
Instead of inviting pop stars to lend their voices to the characters a la Hollywood, the production relies on cinema veterans Huang Hsi-tien (黃西田) and Fang Chun (方駿), and has made a couple of unusual choices to voice the main roles: Sun Cui-feng (孫翠鳳) of Ming Hwa Yuan Taiwanese Opera Company (明華園歌仔戲團) and Non-Partisan Solidarity Union legislator Yen Ching-piao (顏清標). Yen is also the chairman of Tachia's Chenlan Temple (鎮瀾宮), an important religious site from where the annual Mazu pilgrimage sets off.
The unusual choice of voice artists is part of Teng Chiao's marketing strategy, which focuses on the estimated 8 million Mazu devotees in Taiwan.
"If young people were our primary target audience, we wouldn't tell the story of Mazu in the first place since they are not necessarily interested in the ancient legend, neither do they have loyalty to made-in-Taiwan productions," said Teng Chiao. "When you look to global markets, the question that foreign buyers always ask is, what can best represent Taiwan. The story about a magic girl and two cute sidekicks spiced up with a strong local flavor will appeal to the international market."
The company's long-term goal, Teng Chiao said, is to foster a local animation industry that produces work with a wide appeal.
As for the voice artists, each successfully gives their animated character a vivid personality. Legislator Yen admitted he was extremely nervous as a first-time voice actor. "I was doing Shun Ton and unlike me, this character can get quite crazy sometimes. I should have drunk some whisky before going to the recording room," said Yen, adding that he didn't ask for the deity's permission as "he has known Mazu since childhood."
For the well-known Taiwanese opera performer Sun, the voice-over assignment was the result of fate. Having staged numerous performances about Mazu at temples around the island, the veteran actress said she felt honored to lend her voice to "the most amiable deity who feels like a next-door neighbor."
"As a performer, I am used to bringing out emotions through bodily movements. But for professional voice artists, they just stand in front of the microphone and deliver all kinds of tones," said the novice voice artist who took three days to wrap up the job.
The low voter turnout for the referendum on Aug. 23 shows that many Taiwanese are apathetic about nuclear energy, but there are long-term energy stakes involved that the public needs to grasp Taiwan faces an energy trilemma: soaring AI-driven demand, pressure to cut carbon and reliance on fragile fuel imports. But the nuclear referendum on Aug. 23 showed how little this registered with voters, many of whom neither see the long game nor grasp the stakes. Volunteer referendum worker Vivian Chen (陳薇安) put it bluntly: “I’ve seen many people asking what they’re voting for when they arrive to vote. They cast their vote without even doing any research.” Imagine Taiwanese voters invited to a poker table. The bet looked simple — yes or no — yet most never showed. More than two-thirds of those
In the run-up to the referendum on re-opening Pingtung County’s Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant last month, the media inundated us with explainers. A favorite factoid of the international media, endlessly recycled, was that Taiwan has no energy reserves for a blockade, thus necessitating re-opening the nuclear plants. As presented by the Chinese-language CommonWealth Magazine, it runs: “According to the US Department of Commerce International Trade Administration, 97.73 percent of Taiwan’s energy is imported, and estimates are that Taiwan has only 11 days of reserves available in the event of a blockade.” This factoid is not an outright lie — that
Former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu’s (洪秀柱) attendance at the Chinese Communist Party’s (CPP) “Chinese People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War” parade in Beijing is infuriating, embarrassing and insulting to nearly everyone in Taiwan, and Taiwan’s friends and allies. She is also ripping off bandages and pouring salt into old wounds. In the process she managed to tie both the KMT and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) into uncomfortable knots. The KMT continues to honor their heroic fighters, who defended China against the invading Japanese Empire, which inflicted unimaginable horrors on the
Sitting on a bus bound for Heping Island (和平島), at the start of my first visit to Keelung in years, I was hell-bent on visiting a place of considerable historical interest, even though I knew that it wasn’t officially open to the public. In 2011, archaeologists working in the densely populated southern half of the island unearthed the foundations of the Convento de Todos los Santos (Convent of All Saints, 諸聖教堂), a Catholic house of worship established during Spain’s 1624-1642 occupation of northern Taiwan. I’d heard about its rediscovery a while ago, but it wasn’t until I read a scholarly
RSS