New immigrants and migrant workers from Southeast Asian countries long ago became part of Taiwanese society. Yet their stories and experiences are rarely covered in the mainstream media, let alone on the big screen. Detours to Paradise (歧路天堂), the feature debut by film critic, scholar and English teacher Rich Lee (李奇), is an admirable attempt at portraying the country’s undocumented foreign laborers as real people and addressing their plight in an arresting story that stars a strong multinational cast from Indonesia, Thailand and Taiwan.
The film centers on Setia (Lola Amaria), an undocumented migrant worker from Indonesia who drifts from Taoyuan to Taipei working odd jobs for a meager living. Her lover Supayong (Banlop Lomnoi) is a Thai construction worker. In each other’s arms, the two find mutual comfort and solace, conversing in simple Mandarin and dreaming that one day they will have a comfy bed to share.
At the massage parlor where she works as a cleaning lady, Setia grows close to Wonpen (Niki Wu, 吳立琪), a Thai worker who changes her identity to re-enter the country. Soon after Wonpen leaves, Setia switches jobs to work at a noodle shop where she meets retired movie star Fei Man-guang (Yang Kuei-mei, 楊貴媚). Paralyzed from the waist down, Fei is a suicidal heavy drinker who is addicted to painkillers.
Fei gradually accepts Setia as her caretaker. However, the story takes an unexpected turn when Setia discovers that her new employer was responsible for the car accident that killed her older sister, who worked as Fei’s maid. Meanwhile, the police catch Supayong and he faces imminent deportation.
In the end, Setia is left alone in an unforgiving country. Like countless others, she continues to plod along as an undocumented migrant despite the hardship.
With the participation of Hou Hsiao-hsien’s (侯孝賢) filmmaking comrades including cinematographer Lee Ping-bing (李屏賓), editor Liao Ching-sung (廖慶松) and art director Huang Wen-ying (黃文英), Detours to Paradise exudes a sense of realism that is reminiscent of Taiwanese New Wave cinema. Slow pacing, long takes shot from a distance and minimal dialogue recall the early work of Hou and Tsai Ming-liang (蔡明亮).
Lee shows a flair for storytelling through the film’s mise en scene. The scene in which Setia is seen standing alone in a scrapyard shortly after she arrives in Taipei tersely conveys the runaway laborer’s powerlessness amid the hostile environment. An inescapable sense of confinement is present even in the scene in which Setia and Lomnoi sleep soundly in a hotel room as the camera pans to reveal the iron lattice window.
The film takes a melodramatic turn when Yang’s character Fei enters the picture. The cinematography and art direction become abstract and Yang’s acting more stylistic, which contrast the film’s overall tone. This section’s incoherent style, though a flaw to some, effectively portrays the collision between two worlds. The slightly theatrical treatment of Fei’s life suggests that what is perceived as normal in Taiwan is, in fact, exotic and alien to Setia.
The strong multinational cast turns in naturalistic performances that enhance the film’s slices-of-life feel. Indonesian actress and film director Amaria comes off as a sympathetic lead with her absorbingly understated performance. Noted for his work in Tropical Malady by Cannes-winning director Apichatpong Weerasethakul, non-professional actor Lomnoi from Thailand possesses natural charisma and a strong presence that recalls Lee Kang-sheng (李康生) in Tsai’s works.
Taiwanese actress Wu, who, through her convincing performance as the Thai servant, demonstrates great potential as a serious actor.
Though disconnected at times, Detours to Paradise is a commendable piece of filmmaking and shows that the spirit of New Wave cinema is still alive and kicking.
May 11 to May 17 Traversing the southern slopes of the Yushan Range in 1931, Japanese naturalist Tadao Kano knew he was approaching the last swath of Taiwan still beyond colonial control. The “vast, unknown territory,” protected by the “fierce” Bunun headman Dahu Ali, was “filled with an utterly endless jungle that choked the mountains and valleys,” Kano wrote. He noted how the group had “refused to submit to the measures of our authorities and entrenched themselves deep in these mountains … living a free existence spent chasing deer in the morning and seeking serow in the evening,” even describing them as
As a different column was being written, the big news dropped that Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅?萁) announced that negotiations within his caucus, with legislative speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) of the KMT, party Chair Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文), Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chair Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) had produced a compromise special military budget proposal. On Thursday morning, prior to meeting with Cheng over a lunch of beef noodles, Lu reiterated her support for a budget of NT$800 or NT$900 billion — but refused to comment after the meeting. Right after Fu’s
Yesterday, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) nominated legislator Puma Shen (沈伯洋) as their Taipei mayoral candidate, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) put their stamp of approval on Wei Ping-cheng (魏平政) as their candidate for Changhua County commissioner and former legislator Tsai Pi-ru (蔡壁如) of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) has begun the process to also run in Changhua, though she has not yet been formally nominated. All three news items are bizarre. The DPP has struggled with settling on a Taipei nominee. The only candidate who declared interest was Enoch Wu (吳怡農), but the party seemed determined to nominate anyone
What government project has expropriated the most land in Taiwan? According to local media reports, it is the Taoyuan Aerotropolis, eating 2,500 hectares of land in its first phase, with more to come. Forty thousand people are expected to be displaced by the project. Naturally that enormous land grab is generating powerful pushback. Last week Chen Chien-ho (陳健和), a local resident of Jhuwei Borough (竹圍) in Taoyuan City’s Dayuan District (大園) filed a petition for constitutional review of the project after losing his case at the Taipei Administrative Court. The Administrative Court found in favor of nine other local landowners, but
RSS