Red Riding Hood
A distinctly modern and adult take on the well-known children’s story that ups the sexual chemistry and throws in a werewolf and other supernatural elements. From Twilight saga director Catherine Hardwicke, Red Riding Hood stars Amanda Seyfried (who played Sophie in Mamma Mia!) as the red-capped beauty in question, and despite the medieval setting, teen romance is written all over this movie, a mood that is further underlined by the percussive rock score. Red Riding Hood is caught between the love of brooding outsider Peter (Shiloh Fernandez) and wealthy and good-looking Henry (Max Irons). As Solomon the werewolf hunter, Gary Oldman looks like he has walked off the stage of a provincial Shakespeare revival. He leads an inquisition within the village that reveals too many secrets.
World Invasion: Battle of Los Angeles
As much pleasure as the obliteration of Los Angeles may give to some, it is probably not sufficient to get excited about World Invasion: Battle of Los Angeles, a big-budget, big-effects alien invasion movie. An asteroid shower turns into an alien invasion by intergalactic types who seem intent on wiping out the human race. Both human and alien hardware is well rendered, and the desperate struggle of a marine platoon to save itself manages moments of genuine excitement, but in general this is just another generic apocalyptic tale.
Blue Valentine
Blue Valentine met with a polarized reception at Sundance last year and scored highly with the hard-core cinephile set at Cannes. It was dismissed at the Oscars, probably for reasons similar to the cold shoulder given to Winter’s Bone. The film is a sexually and emotionally frank film about a working-class American marriage, and uses its two stars, Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams, to go places that mainstream films seldom visit. Although the topic is rooted in American culture, the intense, Method-based character construction and its ventures into hyper-real color saturated cinematography give it the feel of the European art house. Love it or hate it, Blue Valentine does not leave much middle ground.
Mysteries of Lisbon (Misterios de Lisboa)
This movie is not to be undertaken lightly. It is a Dickensian narrative that follows a jealous countess, a wealthy businessman and an orphaned boy across Portugal, France, Italy and Brazil and encompasses themes of prostitution, murder, romance, war and spiritual malaise. It does this over a running time of 272 minutes, but according to Variety magazine, which describes it as “a period drama of contemporary import — and of the highest order,” both the narrative and the imagery are captivating. Based on a book by 19th-century novelist Camilo Castelo Branco, Mysteries of Lisbon is directed by Raoul Ruiz and manages to be engaging and accessible even when everyone in the film is embroiled in secrets and lies.
Undertow (Contracorriente)
Undertow is a ghost story combined with a tale of gay romance in rural Peru that has proven a huge success on the festival circuit through its ability to transcend narrow genre tags. While taking on psychological and metaphysical themes related to love, loss and true identity, the story is rooted in the daily lives of its characters, who reside in a small Peruvian village. The ghost of fisherman Miguel’s deceased lover lingers on in the corporal world, and while Miguel had managed to keep the affair secret when it was happening, now his lover is dead and the story begins to seep out.
And Soon the Darkness
Two pretty girls on the road in the backwoods of Argentina get into all kinds of trouble with nasty locals who have only one thing on their mind. The camera work is competent, the backdrops nice, the two stars, Amber Heard and Odette Yustman, are fine to look at, but And Soon the Darkness doesn’t have any real drama. The film’s whole torture porn angle is way too tame to appeal to audiences looking for a Saw or Hostel experience.
May 6 to May 12 Those who follow the Chinese-language news may have noticed the usage of the term zhuge (豬哥, literally ‘pig brother,’ a male pig raised for breeding purposes) in reports concerning the ongoing #Metoo scandal in the entertainment industry. The term’s modern connotations can range from womanizer or lecher to sexual predator, but it once referred to an important rural trade. Until the 1970s, it was a common sight to see a breeder herding a single “zhuge” down a rustic path with a bamboo whip, often traveling large distances over rugged terrain to service local families. Not only
Ahead of incoming president William Lai’s (賴清德) inauguration on May 20 there appear to be signs that he is signaling to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and that the Chinese side is also signaling to the Taiwan side. This raises a lot of questions, including what is the CCP up to, who are they signaling to, what are they signaling, how with the various actors in Taiwan respond and where this could ultimately go. In the last column, published on May 2, we examined the curious case of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) heavyweight Tseng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦) — currently vice premier
The last time Mrs Hsieh came to Cihu Park in Taoyuan was almost 50 years ago, on a school trip to the grave of Taiwan’s recently deceased dictator. Busloads of children were brought in to pay their respects to Chiang Kai-shek (蔣中正), known as Generalissimo, who had died at 87, after decades ruling Taiwan under brutal martial law. “There were a lot of buses, and there was a long queue,” Hsieh recalled. “It was a school rule. We had to bow, and then we went home.” Chiang’s body is still there, under guard in a mausoleum at the end of a path
Last week the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) released a set of very strange numbers on Taiwan’s wealth distribution. Duly quoted in the Taipei Times, the report said that “The Gini coefficient for Taiwanese households… was 0.606 at the end of 2021, lower than Australia’s 0.611, the UK’s 0.620, Japan’s 0.678, France’s 0.676 and Germany’s 0.727, the agency said in a report.” The Gini coefficient is a measure of relative inequality, usually of wealth or income, though it can be used to evaluate other forms of inequality. However, for most nations it is a number from .25 to .50