New Year’s Eve
Similar in concept and execution to Valentine’s Day, which was released here in February. And that’s not surprising since it is by the same director, Garry Marshall, who also brought us such urban romantic fantasies as Pretty Woman, Runaway Bride and The Princess Diaries. If you liked any of these films, then you are well on your way to liking New Year’s Eve. Otherwise, you will probably be disappointed by the massive cast providing the kind of solid but disengaged acting that shows the true talent-destroying power of Hollywood. There are Michelle Pfeiffer, Zac Efron, Robert De Niro, Halle Berry, Jessica Biel, and a whole host of others who are all capable of better work. For Sarah Jessica Parker, this is just more Sex in the City, and of course there is the usual celebration of the diversity, vitality and magic that some people seem to associate with New York.
Essential Killing
A challenging new film by Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski that looks political at first glance, but the director has stated that his primary intention was to make a study of the “struggle of man against many.” Starring Vincent Gallo as an Afghan prisoner on the run from the US military in an unnamed Eastern European country after escaping from a prison vehicle. The film has virtually no dialogue (except for vicious interrogation scenes at the beginning), and not a single word is spoken by Gallo, whose character suffers appalling hardships trying to stay alive in a frozen wilderness. The morality of the US presence in Afghanistan, the use of torture and extraordinary rendition are all part of the narrative, but not really central to the thrust of the film, which transcends any particular conflict. The film picked up a best actor award for Gallo at Venice, where the director also received the jury award.
Dream House
“A modest effort” is about as complimentary as the critics were able to get about Dream House, a film that on paper looks hugely promising. Directed by Jim Sheridan, who came to prominence with My Left Foot and continued to impress with films like In the Name of the Father and The Boxer. While he has a superb cast to work with, including Daniel Craig, Rachel Weisz and Naomi Watts, Sheridan seems out of his depth in the generic horror genre. Nice family moves into an idyllic new house that hides terrible secrets; bad things begin to happen. It’s all been done before, and much better.
My Back Page
Dense, nuanced, atmospheric and long, Nobuhiro Yamashita’s My Back Page paints a picture of Japan’s student protest movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s, which had some similarities with activities in the US at the time. Through a story of Sawada (Satoshi Tsumabuki), a young journalist finding his way around the protests, and Umeyama (Kenichi Matsuyama), an activist who feels the pull of more radical action, Yamashita takes his time in building to an energetic and powerful climax. Outstanding performances by the two male leads, while Yamashita, who is best known for his shoe-string budget indie comedies, is not afraid to dwell on the details of the political ambivalence of the period.
Almanya — Welcome to Germany
A comedy about Turkish immigrants in Germany by sisters Yasemin and Nesrin Samdereli parades and gently mocks various cultural stereotypes in its twin story about two cousins trying to work out their cultural identity. Although generally sympathetic to its characters on both German and Turkish sides of the cultural divide, the film is happy to look on the bright side of things, keeping the darker aspects of ethnic misunderstandings well in the background. Amusing and lighthearted.
Blood Prison
Based on a manga series by Masashi Kishimoto, Blood Prison is the fifth installment of the cinema adaptation of the Naruto: Shippuden series about a young ninja who aims to gain recognition as a master of his craft. In this installment, Naruto is framed for a series of murders and is placed in the notorious Blood Prison where he must prove his innocence or lose his life.
Peak: The Rescuers
A competent mountain rescue movie based on a manga by Shinichi Ishizuka. As the title suggests, it portrays the bravery of a mountain rescue team who put their lives at risk to save a group of climbers stranded on a mountainside with temperatures falling and bad weather brewing. There is plenty of heavy melodrama, with a good-looking cast trying its best to pretend that lives really are at stake. They don’t quite manage to do that, but that doesn’t stop the director from doing his best to wring some tears from the audience.
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
By far the most jarring of the new appointments for the incoming administration is that of Tseng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦) to head the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF). That is a huge demotion for one of the most powerful figures in the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Tseng has one of the most impressive resumes in the party. He was very active during the Wild Lily Movement and his generation is now the one taking power. He has served in many of the requisite government, party and elected positions to build out a solid political profile. Elected as mayor of Taoyuan as part of the
Moritz Mieg, 22, lay face down in the rubble, the ground shaking violently beneath him. Boulders crashed down around him, some stones hitting his back. “I just hoped that it would be one big hit and over, because I did not want to be hit nearly to death and then have to slowly die,” the student from Germany tells Taipei Times. MORNING WALK Early on April 3, Mieg set out on a scenic hike through Taroko Gorge in Hualien County (花蓮). It was a fine day for it. Little did he know that the complex intersection of tectonic plates Taiwan sits
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