Violence, sex and horror take star billing at Generation Horror, the newest installment of the regular POP Cinema mini-festivals. For a cult classic, film buffs could do worse than Carnival of Souls, a low-budget 1962 horror movie that focuses on a young woman caught between the realms of the living and the dead. Crime, danger and sex are voluptuously intertwined in Deadly Sweet (1967), an early work by Italian director Tinto Brass, who is most noted for his erotic films.
Other highlights include El Topo (1970) and The Holy Mountain (1973), Chilean-French film master Alejandro Jodorowsky’s two most celebrated films, which blend surrealism and mysticism. The festival opens today at SPOT — Taipei Film House (台北光點), 18, Zhongshan N Rd Sec 2, Taipei City (台北市中山北路二段18號), and runs until Jan. 28. It will run from Jan. 23 to Feb. 1 at the Kaohsiung Municipal Film Archive (高雄市電影圖書館). For Taipei screenings, tickets are NT$200 (NT$170 for SPOT members) each, and books of 10 tickets are available for NT$1,800 (NT$1,500 for SPOT members). Tickets can be bought at SPOT, through NTCH ticketing outlets or online at www.artsticket.com.tw. Screenings in Kaohsiung are free. Full program details are available at www.twfilm.org/horror.
Photo courtesy of Spot – Taipei Film House
Sept.16 to Sept. 22 The “anti-communist train” with then-president Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) face plastered on the engine puffed along the “sugar railway” (糖業鐵路) in May 1955, drawing enthusiastic crowds at 103 stops covering nearly 1,200km. An estimated 1.58 million spectators were treated to propaganda films, plays and received free sugar products. By this time, the state-run Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台糖, Taisugar) had managed to connect the previously separate east-west lines established by Japanese-era sugar factories, allowing the anti-communist train to travel easily from Taichung to Pingtung’s Donggang Township (東港). Last Sunday’s feature (Taiwan in Time: The sugar express) covered the inauguration of the
The corruption cases surrounding former Taipei Mayor and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) head Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) are just one item in the endless cycle of noise and fuss obscuring Taiwan’s deep and urgent structural and social problems. Even the case itself, as James Baron observed in an excellent piece at the Diplomat last week, is only one manifestation of the greater problem of deep-rooted corruption in land development. Last week the government announced a program to permit 25,000 foreign university students, primarily from the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, to work in Taiwan after graduation for 2-4 years. That number is a
In a stark demonstration of how award-winning breakthroughs can come from the most unlikely directions, researchers have won an Ig Nobel prize for discovering that mammals can breathe through their anuses. After a series of tests on mice, rats and pigs, Japanese scientists found the animals absorb oxygen delivered through the rectum, work that underpins a clinical trial to see whether the procedure can treat respiratory failure. The team is among 10 recognized in this year’s Ig Nobel awards (see below for more), the irreverent accolades given for achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.” They are not
This Qing Dynasty trail takes hikers from renowned hot springs in the East Rift Valley, up to the top of the Coastal Mountain Range, and down to the Pacific Short vacations to eastern Taiwan often require choosing between the Rift Valley with its pineapple fields, rice paddies and broader range of amenities, or the less populated coastal route for its ocean scenery. For those who can’t decide, why not try both? The Antong Traversing Trail (安通越嶺道) provides just such an opportunity. Built 149 years ago, the trail linked up these two formerly isolated parts of the island by crossing over the Coastal Mountain Range. After decades of serving as a convenient path for local Amis, Han settlers, missionaries and smugglers, the trail fell into disuse once modern roadways were built