Dreams, a Journey Toward Wan Wan (帶著夢想去旅行)
There is nothing new about blogs turned into books turned into films. Taiwan Internet blogging sensation Wan Wan (彎彎) receives the cinematic treatment in this film by TV director Wang Chuan-tsong (王傳宗). Wan Wan, and the simple line-drawing character than dominates her blog, hit Taiwan’s office workers like a tornado back in 2004, providing a cutesy depiction of petty frustrations and dreams for a better life. When hits on her site broke 200 million in 2008, books and films soon followed. Dreams, a Journey Toward Wan Wan is a documentary that tells the tale of this strange phenomenon. Check out the Wan Wan Web site at cwwany.com.
Camino
Spanish film inspired by the life and death of Alexia Gonzales (a woman who is currently being considered for sainthood), Camino tells the story of a young Catholic woman’s struggles with debilitating illness and the effects it has on her deeply pious family, especially her mother, a devout member of the extreme Catholic group Opus Dei. The film picked up a slew of Spanish film awards last year, including the Goya Award in 2009 for Best Film, Best Director, Best Actress and Best Screenplay, but its deep concerns with some of the more bizarre aspects of the Catholic faith may make it play less well in Taiwan. At 143 minutes, Camino is likely to prove a grueling experience.
Shrek Forever After
The fourth and, we are promised, final installment of the Shrek franchise. Given the poor reviews of Shrek the Third (2007), it’s just as well that this outing has the added gimmick of 3D to bring in the punters. Unsurprisingly, Shrek Forever After has failed to recapture the off-kilter humor of the first two Shrek movies. The desperation of the filmmakers is reflected in the high-concept “what if?” story scenario with Shrek finding himself transplanted by the evil Rumpelstiltskin into a world in which he has to become reacquainted with all his old pals. Instead of being fun or exciting, it’s all been seen before.
Echoes of the Rainbow (歲月神偷)
Hong Kong movie directed and written by Alex Law (羅啟銳) based on his own childhood and the tragic death of his brother from leukemia. The period detail is said to be very accurate of Hong Kong from 50 years ago, and likely to stir up memories. Strong performances by veterans Simon Yam (任達華) and Sandra Ng (吳君如) as parents of two boys eking out a precarious living as shoemakers and dealing with family tragedy. The pitfalls of a director going straight for the heartstrings have been avoided in Law’s careful and sensitive recollection of a Hong Kong very different from the one usually portrayed in cinema.
Gabai Granny 2
A follow-up to 2006’s Gabai Granny (Saga no Gabai-Baachan), based on a successful novel by Yoshichi Shimada about a young boy growing up poor but happy under the care of his grandmother, a practical and resourceful woman who teaches him many life lessons. This sequel, subtitled “Grandma I Want to Play Baseball,” picks up the same set of characters and adds a baseball theme. The main character experiences plenty of laughter and tears in his struggle to make it onto a school baseball team, helped with practical advice and comforting words from grandma.
Taiwan’s English education system is being pulled apart by three opposing forces. Bilingual Nation 2030 pulls students toward English and global communication. Artificial Intelligence (AI) readiness pulls them toward digital judgment, verification and AI-mediated work. But Taiwan’s old exam culture pulls them back toward memorization, grammar drills, timed reading and correct answers. If the education system keeps using old exams to define success, it risks producing graduates who are neither genuinely bilingual nor genuinely AI-ready, but trained for tasks machines can already perform. The first force is Bilingual Nation 2030. Launched in 2018, the policy aimed to “help Taiwan’s workforce connect
It seems every few days one bumps into one of those “real man” comments in which Taiwan is urged to “face reality” or similar, and “make a deal,” with the speaker implying that soon it will be too late. “Deal” advocates always present themselves as having a superior grip on reality, and the manly ability to make the “hard choice.” Their testosterone-laden language often echoes that of Taiwan sellout advocates. Note that such commentary always specifies a process (“make a deal, work with, make progress”), never the end state of what occupation by a violent authoritarian colonialist state will entail. In
There are shadowy cabals plotting to sell out Taiwan to be annexed by China, by invasion if necessary. Fortunately, they are buffoons. In 2019, former Bamboo Union gangster and founder of the China Unification Promotion Party (CUPP), Chang An-le (張安樂, colorfully known as “White Wolf”), led a protest at the Legislative Yuan against comments made by then-premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) that in the event of an attack by China, he would never surrender, but would protect the nation by fighting to the end, even if he only had a broom. Chang had party members bring a wooden casket that they
June 1 to June 7 "If all Taiwanese were as afraid of dying as you, then what would happen?” Physician Shih Chiang-nan (施江南) reportedly said this to his wife Chen Chiao-tung (陳焦桐) after she urged him to stop intervening on behalf of Taiwanese soldiers stranded overseas after serving in the Japanese Army during World War II. Shih had clashed with high-ranking officials over the issue, engaged in several heated arguments with Taiwan governor-general Chen Yi (陳儀) and allegedly shouted at general Ko Yuan-fen (柯遠芬), chief of staff of the Taiwan Garrison Command, over
RSS