The Laundryman 青田街一號
The Laundryman is the directorial debut of Taiwanese writer Lee Chung (李中), who apparently cannot be mentioned without referring to his famous father, writer and screenwriter Hsiao Yeh (小野). It seems to be a mishmash of genres, as the trailer opens with a laundry shop that doubles as an assassination service, but things turn paranormal when a hitman with a troubled soul starts seeing ghosts and seeks help from a cutesy, pink-haired psychic medium who turns into the vehicle for these ghosts to interact with the hitman. Like many Taiwanese movies these days, the dialogue and action seem to take place in a constant manic state, which actually could be an endearing national trademark after you get used to it. It’s an irreverent black comedy with lots of violence that is sure to entertain, but also takes a look at human nature through the absurd.
Hitman: Agent 47
The genetically-engineered assassin protagonist of the popular first-person shooter video game Hitman: Codename 47 hits the big screens again in this reboot of the 2007 adaptation. This time, Agent 47 goes up against an organization that wants to find out the secret to his powers, and replicate them. Not surprisingly, he teams up with a young woman, also with secret origins, who may have the key to it all. There’s just one problem here. In the game, the player can choose to advance by way of an all-out bloodbath, but earns more points for tactical efficiency such as conserving bullets, not triggering alarms and killing targets without collateral damage. Yet, the trailer shows Agent 47 choosing the former path (such as ramming enemies with cars) which may indicate that the movie kind of misses the point of the game, or of an assassin movie at all.
Marvel Stories
If you’re feeling blue that there won’t be any Marvel action movies until Feb. 2016, take solace in the fact that Taiwan is the only country in the world that will be showing the French television documentaries Marvel Renaissance and Marvel Universe in one setting as Marvel Stories. The first film tells the story of how Marvel recovered from its 1996 bankruptcy to take over Hollywood and become an entertainment industry trendsetter. Descriptions of the film promises juicy tidbits and insider information that would surprise the casual fan, and the audience will hear from Hollywood producers, comic book writers and Avi Arad, former head of Marvel Entertainment and founder of Marvel Studios. Not sure what the second film is about, but hey, it’s 70 more minutes of Marvel screen time you’ll get to enjoy this year.
Pixels
If you grew up playing classic arcade games like Donkey Kong and Centipede, you’ll probably be ecstatic about the film’s premise of giant, pixelated characters from these games attacking the earth and its promotional posters featuring Pac-Man devouring its way through San Francisco. The US government doesn’t know what to do, so the illiterate president (Kevin James) turns to his best friend, a former video game child prodigy-turned-sad sack loser played by, if it isn’t obvious enough, Adam Sandler. Such a promising premise seems to have been turned into a formulaic Sandler bro-comedy with him playing the same person he’s played in most of his films. Worst thing is, it’s not even an original idea — the movie was inspired by a two-and-a-half minute YouTube short film by French filmmaker Patrick Jean, which critics say is better than its feature-lenght counterpart. I won’t lie, though, the special effects are pretty cool.
The Tribe
Set in a school for deaf children, The Tribe is an innovative reason to make a silent film — all dialogue is carried out in Ukrainian sign language, and there is no music. “You don’t need subtitles or voiceovers, because for love and hatred you don’t need translation,” the trailer declares. The effects are haunting, fitting for the grim portrayal of human brutality in a school ruled by a gang of students, “The Tribe,” which deals in organized crime and prostitution. When a member of the tribe breaks all the unwritten rules in the name of love, things turn nasty. The Guardian calls it “one of the most disturbing films of the year,” presumably in a way completely opposite from The Human Centipede 3, yet hitting on the same theme of how depraved people can be.
Exceptions to the rule are sometimes revealing. For a brief few years, there was an emerging ideological split between the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) that appeared to be pushing the DPP in a direction that would be considered more liberal, and the KMT more conservative. In the previous column, “The KMT-DPP’s bureaucrat-led developmental state” (Dec. 11, page 12), we examined how Taiwan’s democratic system developed, and how both the two main parties largely accepted a similar consensus on how Taiwan should be run domestically and did not split along the left-right lines more familiar in
This month the government ordered a one-year block of Xiaohongshu (小紅書) or Rednote, a Chinese social media platform with more than 3 million users in Taiwan. The government pointed to widespread fraud activity on the platform, along with cybersecurity failures. Officials said that they had reached out to the company and asked it to change. However, they received no response. The pro-China parties, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), immediately swung into action, denouncing the ban as an attack on free speech. This “free speech” claim was then echoed by the People’s Republic of China (PRC),
As I finally slid into the warm embrace of the hot, clifftop pool, it was a serene moment of reflection. The sound of the river reflected off the cave walls, the white of our camping lights reflected off the dark, shimmering surface of the water, and I reflected on how fortunate I was to be here. After all, the beautiful walk through narrow canyons that had brought us here had been inaccessible for five years — and will be again soon. The day had started at the Huisun Forest Area (惠蓀林場), at the end of Nantou County Route 80, north and east
Specialty sandwiches loaded with the contents of an entire charcuterie board, overflowing with sauces, creams and all manner of creative add-ons, is perhaps one of the biggest global food trends of this year. From London to New York, lines form down the block for mortadella, burrata, pistachio and more stuffed between slices of fresh sourdough, rye or focaccia. To try the trend in Taipei, Munchies Mafia is for sure the spot — could this be the best sandwich in town? Carlos from Spain and Sergio from Mexico opened this spot just seven months ago. The two met working in the
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