If China Post was a newspaper that people actually read, I may never write in this town again. Thankfully, this is not the case, but I'm not exactly celebrating.
There's this movie, it's called Cape No. 7. It's huge here, people are freaking out over it. I first saw and reviewed the film back in June. It was, as I saw it, a light-hearted comedy full of local humor and great characters that lost itself in an over-ambitious, unforgiveably sappy story. More hype than substance. Then this happened. And this squirmy little cutsie commercial film is now like a rusty screw burrowing its way into my gut.
It's not hard to see why it went to Number 1 in Taiwan. Up until now, Taiwanese filmmakers have largely consisted of arthouse auteurs, more bent on alienating or depressing their audiences than entertaining them.
Let's take Tsai Ming-liang for example.
I've never seen any of his films in its entirety, although I did catch a few minutes of The Wayward Cloud when I was working at TIFF... before I left because I was falling alsleep. I don't actually recall, but there's a chance I was actually the TIFF publicist for this one. 
All I remember is that one flip through the press kit made me dub this film "the watermelon porn musical." And indeed, (ssshhh) that's actually how I sold it to the press. Well... my press. To our left, we have a bunch of semi-nude women with buckets on their head trying to seduce a man with a giant penis head on his head. To the right, the doctor is checking her melons. Apologies for the tiny jpegs.
Set in a place like Taiwan, where the cute per capita ratio is ridiculously high; where what people look for in a pet is whether or not it will fit in their handbag and everyone gets daily email dosages of cute cat and cute panda photos, Tsai is... well god, he's like his giant penis head man set amidst a display of hello kitties. This IMDB article kind of sums up Tsai's relationship with Taiwan:
Berlinale Winner Says He May Not Release Film In His Homeland
A Taiwanese film that won the International Critics Prize at the Berlin Film Festival last Saturday may not be released in Taiwan if any of its sexually explicit scenes are ordered deleted by local censors, the film's director told reporters in Taipei. Returning to Taiwan after receiving the award for outstanding artistic contribution, director Tsai Ming-liang vowed not to distribute his film, The Wayward Cloud, in Taiwan "unless in its totality." The Taipei Times observed today (Wednesday) that movies are generally barred from showing genitals, sexual intercourse or nudity. But Tsai commented, "Audiences are smart enough to tell if it is pornography. This film can jerk tears. Can a porn film have [that] effect?" Ironically, the film deals with two porn actors.
The result is two-fold. It means that the handful of hardcore cinephiles in Taiwan have a higher tolerance for pretentious arthouse than most, and that everyone else will go screaming for the first cinematic exit door. Enter Cape No. 7. It's inoffensive, funny, immensely accessible and has Taiwan written all over it. Instant mass appeal. Taiwanese audiences have been starving for its simplicity for years. It's a bad film, but it's good for Taiwan.
So, for fear of stepping on another landmine, I'm not even going to bother embarassing myself. Every time I try to share my opinions about a movie, I get slammed. The Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival has started, I'm going to post my thoughts here, safely, where I know no one will read them.
Oh, and if you're wondering about the title of this entry? It's a line from the film.
There's this movie, it's called Cape No. 7. It's huge here, people are freaking out over it. I first saw and reviewed the film back in June. It was, as I saw it, a light-hearted comedy full of local humor and great characters that lost itself in an over-ambitious, unforgiveably sappy story. More hype than substance. Then this happened. And this squirmy little cutsie commercial film is now like a rusty screw burrowing its way into my gut.
It's not hard to see why it went to Number 1 in Taiwan. Up until now, Taiwanese filmmakers have largely consisted of arthouse auteurs, more bent on alienating or depressing their audiences than entertaining them.
Let's take Tsai Ming-liang for example.
I've never seen any of his films in its entirety, although I did catch a few minutes of The Wayward Cloud when I was working at TIFF... before I left because I was falling alsleep. I don't actually recall, but there's a chance I was actually the TIFF publicist for this one. 
All I remember is that one flip through the press kit made me dub this film "the watermelon porn musical." And indeed, (ssshhh) that's actually how I sold it to the press. Well... my press. To our left, we have a bunch of semi-nude women with buckets on their head trying to seduce a man with a giant penis head on his head. To the right, the doctor is checking her melons. Apologies for the tiny jpegs.Set in a place like Taiwan, where the cute per capita ratio is ridiculously high; where what people look for in a pet is whether or not it will fit in their handbag and everyone gets daily email dosages of cute cat and cute panda photos, Tsai is... well god, he's like his giant penis head man set amidst a display of hello kitties. This IMDB article kind of sums up Tsai's relationship with Taiwan:
Berlinale Winner Says He May Not Release Film In His Homeland
A Taiwanese film that won the International Critics Prize at the Berlin Film Festival last Saturday may not be released in Taiwan if any of its sexually explicit scenes are ordered deleted by local censors, the film's director told reporters in Taipei. Returning to Taiwan after receiving the award for outstanding artistic contribution, director Tsai Ming-liang vowed not to distribute his film, The Wayward Cloud, in Taiwan "unless in its totality." The Taipei Times observed today (Wednesday) that movies are generally barred from showing genitals, sexual intercourse or nudity. But Tsai commented, "Audiences are smart enough to tell if it is pornography. This film can jerk tears. Can a porn film have [that] effect?" Ironically, the film deals with two porn actors.
The result is two-fold. It means that the handful of hardcore cinephiles in Taiwan have a higher tolerance for pretentious arthouse than most, and that everyone else will go screaming for the first cinematic exit door. Enter Cape No. 7. It's inoffensive, funny, immensely accessible and has Taiwan written all over it. Instant mass appeal. Taiwanese audiences have been starving for its simplicity for years. It's a bad film, but it's good for Taiwan.
So, for fear of stepping on another landmine, I'm not even going to bother embarassing myself. Every time I try to share my opinions about a movie, I get slammed. The Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival has started, I'm going to post my thoughts here, safely, where I know no one will read them.
Oh, and if you're wondering about the title of this entry? It's a line from the film.
