Mulan (花木蘭)
The legend of Hua Mulan returns to home soil after a spell with Disney’s animation team and is a much more sober affair. The young lady dons men’s clothes and signs up for the military in place of her sick father, rising through the ranks and encountering all manner of conflict — personal and physical. Worth a peek if you’re a fan of historical battle epics, even if this one is scaled down somewhat, but anyone looking for a feminist subtext can forget it. Stars Vickie Zhao (趙薇), a solid actress but way too good-looking to convince as a cross-dressing military genius, and directed by leading Hong Kong cinematographer Jingle Ma (馬楚成).
Hachiko: A Dog’s Story
After a string of Japanese cute animal movies, here’s an American production with possibly wider international appeal, though it is based on a Japanese legend and movie (it premiered in Japan, but its US release next week is disappointingly low-key). Richard Gere — delightful piece of casting — is a professor who adopts a stray dog. The legend is no secret: The professor dies, but the dog returns to the local railway station every day for a decade to wait for his master to come home. The surprise is that this version enjoyed strong audience feedback. Great supporting cast (Joan Allen as Gere’s wife, Jason Alexander, veteran Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa) and directed by Lasse Hallstrom (appropriately enough), director of the well-loved My Life as a Dog (appropriately enough) from 1985, who has happily retained Japanese elements in the story. Warning: The word is that this movie will leave audiences in tears.
The Box
A stranger comes to the door of the home of Cameron Diaz and hubbie James Marsden, gives them a box with a button and informs them that pushing the button will make them instantly wealthy — but lead to the death of a stranger. From here things get complex, compromised and philosophical, as the protagonists’ moral compass spins ever more unsteadily. Sounds a bit like Peter Greenaway meets Hellraiser without most of the gore, though director Richard Kelly (Donnie Darko) might flinch at the comparison. Based on a story by Richard Matheson that was previously filmed as a Twilight Zone installment.
Pardon My French
The latest French comedy to hit Taiwanese screens stars Chiara Mastroianni (daughter of Marcello, also seen recently in Park Benches) as a sufferer of writer’s block so profound that she begins using a different first name. To make matters worse, she inspires an infatuation in a younger woman who just won’t stop being of use. Plot is not as important as tone and performances in this one, which should entertain Francophiles who enjoy offbeat material. Original title: Un Chat un Chat.
Ghost Train
Can’t remember the last time an Indonesian film enjoyed a commercial release in Taiwan, so this ghostly ride is special for at least one reason. Horror fans might be interested in the grafting of other Asian filmmakers’ horror motifs onto an Indonesian setting, though even more mainstream audiences might end up playing count-the-cliche. A girl disappears after boarding a late train; her sister and some dopey friends decide that they are best equipped to track her down despite paranormal activity in the paying area of the station. The Midnight Meat Train did all this better, and a lot bloodier.
The Ultimate Fight
We missed two Baixue theater offerings last week — one an apparent prequel to the German TV production Day of Disaster; the other an obscure animated film about dinosaurs (“Fantastic for all the family,” said the ad, even if the same can’t be said about the theater itself) — but if you’re desperate for some sub-DVD-standard fare in a stuffy, nearly deserted theater, then no look further than The Ultimate Fight (1998, also known as The Process), starring kickboxing icon Ernie Reyes Jr and Ernie Reyes Sr as a character called “Senior.” Reyes Jr is a foreigner who plunges into gangland violence on arrival in the US. It’s the kind of action movie that has a character called “Hitler,” but don’t knock Mr Reyes: His latest gig was stunt work on Avatar.
The breakwater stretches out to sea from the sprawling Kaohsiung port in southern Taiwan. Normally, it’s crowded with massive tankers ferrying liquefied natural gas from Qatar to be stored in the bulbous white tanks that dot the shoreline. These are not normal times, though, and not a single shipment from Qatar has docked at the Yongan terminal since early March after the Strait of Hormuz was shuttered. The suspension has provided a realistic preview of a potential Chinese blockade, a move that would throttle an economy anchored by the world’s most advanced and power-hungry semiconductor industry. It is a stark reminder of
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
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
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