黑暗之光:張作驥風格研究

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(1)國立臺灣師範大學英語學系碩士論文 Master Thesis Graduate Institute of English National Taiwan Normal University. 黑暗之光: 張作驥風格研究 Light in Darkness: Stylistics of Chang Tso-chi. 指導教授：吳佳琪博士 Advisor：Dr. Chia-Chi Wu 研究生：謝雯伃 Advisee： Wen-yu Hsieh 中華民國九十七年七月 July, 2008.

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(4) 中文摘要. 本論文企圖藉由將導演張作驥的電影置於美學、歷史及文化等三脈絡中分析，從對其創作歷程及作品風格的分析中，探討張作驥如何在台灣新電影的影響下繼承並發展個人風格。分析重點著重在張作驥的風格及敘事結構的安排，說明他在台灣當代電影史及整個影史上的定位。第一章對當前台灣電影的處境進行解釋及評價，同時整理作者論論述的發展歷史，以便在後面的章節進行檢視。第二章則以綜論和溯史的方式來回顧張作驥的電影背景養成，同時討論新電影運動的歷史及影響，檢視在新電影及大師侯孝賢的影響力之下，張作驥的風格是如何形成、發展、以臻成熟。第三章從風格和主題兩方面來探討張作驥明顯的個人印記，同時與社會文化及歷史經驗相應和。雙結尾的安排與「著魔寫實主義」的安排則說明了張作驥是如何使用風格技巧來建立關於現代化與後殖民歷史及文化論述。藉由對張作驥電影風格的分析，架構出的不只是導演本身風格的演進成熟史，同時窺看電影風格如何與歷史社會做緊密的結合，期望能藉由本文的討論，架構出張作驥電影風格形成的軌跡，並檢視台灣及世界電影史發展的脈絡。.

(5) Abstract This analysis seeks to analyze the director Chang Tso-chi’s works so as to discuss how and why Chang represents both a successor and pioneer in contemporary Taiwan film culture. I examine Chang’s style and narrative structure in order to probe his significance in contemporary Taiwan, and even in the whole cinematic historical context. Chapter I gives a thorough evaluation on Taiwan directors and Chang, and introduces the auteurism’s history in order to review and redefine it. Chapter II examines Chang Tso-chi’s background and films, and takes note that the influence of the Taiwan New Cinema movement is great in his films, especially the world-famous master Hou Hsiao-hsien’s. Chapter III focuses on more detailed analyses of Chang’s thematic and stylistic signatures. Of particular interest is that the specific forking-path structure and the “haunted realism” reflect the modernist and post-colonial point of view by offering criticism in a sympathetic eye. Redefined auteuristic view allows us to analyze Chang’s films within a stylistic as well as historical domain and provides us a better base with which to understand these two concepts. Since the beginning of the TNC movement, the directors of which earned international recognition. Using Chang as an example, the thesis strives to examine the contemporary trajectory of Taiwan cinema, which has become a part of the international film industry..

(6) Acknowledgement I would like to give my sincere gratitude first and foremost to Prof. Chia-chi Wu, my advisor, for her guidance and encouragement during the past years. Without her inspiring and consistent instruction, it’s hard for me to accomplish this thesis. I really appreciate that she spent so much time and energy correcting my logic, grammar, and interpretation. Her encouragement and suggestion during these years are the greatest supports for me. I would like to thank for the sophisticated and insightful comments of my committee members, Prof. Hsiu-chuan Lee and Prof. I-Fen Wu as well. Besides, I am indebted to all the support and concerns of my friends and my fellow classmates. Were it not for the solace brought by them, I could never hang on during the struggle with my thesis. Special thanks and love are given to my family members. They showed great confidence in me and offered unconditional support on the road I’ve taken. Without you all, this thesis will never be brought in the present form. I owe all of you for the love and understanding. And my gratitude is beyond words. Amitabha..

(7) Table of Contents. Chapter One. Introduction………………………………………………...1. Chapetr Two. Chang Tso-chi and Taiwan New Cinema………………..19. Chapter Three. Salient Features of Chang’s films………………………..53. Chapter Four. Conclusion……………………………………………...…91. Works Cited ...………...…………………………………………………………...98.

(8) Hsieh1. Chapter 1 Introduction. In this thesis, I will examine the director Chang Tso-chi’s works within specific cinematic, political and cultural frameworks. With thorough discussions on this director and his films, I attempt to determine how and why Chang represents both a successor and pioneer in contemporary Taiwan film culture. I will examine his style and narrative structure, probing their significance in contemporary Taiwan. I will also relate Chang’s films primarily with his predecessors in the Taiwan New Cinema with whom he shares similar stylistics. While studying Chang’s films in a larger cultural framework, I will discuss whether a director can simultaneously interact with film history, film criticism and the cultural politics of contemporary Taiwan. Or his or her works should be judged solely aesthetically? Since the beginning of the Taiwan New Cinema movement, the directors of which earned international recognition, the idea of “authorship” has sustained. My discussion of Chang and his works can be viewed as a review and redefinition of the concept “auteurism.” My research will center on two theoretical questions. First, can the terms “modernist” or “realist” define both Chang Tso-chi and his predecessors in Taiwan New Cinema, or is another category necessary for the understanding of Chang? And second, if separate categories are required, how and why are they distinct? Further, I would like to study how Chang’s film style can be placed in the lineage of Taiwan New Cinema. I want to investigate whether Chang can be seen as the successor of.

(9) Hsieh2. Taiwan New Cinema by surveying the movement from its inception to the present. I will investigate how and why Chang departs from the TNC heritage, and what he has learned in being part of this heritage. By returning to the birth of Taiwan New Cinema, I will analyze whether the TNC movement is the only influence of Chang’s. Taiwan New Cinema has been viewed as the product of cine-modernism, but is this term sufficient to describe Chang’s works? In my research I would like to see if Chang’s films can be categorized as a new phase of this cine-modernism. Additionally, do other cinematic aesthetics influence Chang? And finally what other innovations can be seen in Chang’s films? Do these developments reflect Chang’s era? The thesis moves from general stylistic discovery to close-up analyses of the formation of certain techniques or formal elements. Chang’s style exemplifies the development of post TNC. As a result, studying Chang’s films is important if we want to have an overview of Taiwan’s film history. In my research, I want to rethink Chang’s film style in the context of Taiwanese film history. I will attempt to explicate how TNC directors influenced him and how he broke with the legacy he inherited. As a study of the development of Chang Tso-chi’s style, my research hopes to refresh discussions and research about Taiwan films. With this research, I hope to draw attention to contemporary Taiwanese film directors who are “the glory of Taiwan” in film art.. Critical Evaluation of Taiwan Directors and Chang Tso-chi In the early 1980s, in order to resist what was felt to be crass Hollywood and.

(10) Hsieh3. Hong Kong cinema, the Taiwan New Cinema movement (TNC) emerged, presenting innovative, unconventional films. The movement from 1982 to 1989 attracted attention worldwide, and was considered an aesthetic success. But its alternative themes and challenges to the status quo struggled for a larger market acceptance, and gradually its appeal faded.1 Since then, Taiwan film workers have tried to reclaim this past glory. Therefore the Taiwan film industry after the TNC was ruled by a new generation, which includes such notable directors as Lin Zheng-sheng, Tsai Ming-liang and Chang Tso-chi, who we can call as the post TNC. There are high expectations for improved box-office performance, which is partially true (Tsai particularly, has found great success worldwide). However, economic and marketing problems still remain in the Taiwan film industry, and these directors are facing great challenges.2 Although TNC tried to attract local attention during its heyday, it mostly failed in this effort, and instead the movement found greater foreign interest. Foreign audiences seem to have appreciated the movement’s vitality and alternative themes more than conservative Taiwan filmgoers. In general, TNC movies were based on realism and. 1. I marked Taiwan New Cinema’s beginning time here according to Feii Lu’s Taiwan Cinema: Politics, Economics, and Aesthetics. In this book, Lu argues that Taiwan New Cinema began with 1982’s In Our Time. The exact time of its decline was not for sure because since 1985 that Taiwan New Cinema directors took different directions. Lu marks that in 1989, Hou Hsiao-hsien’s City of Sadness, led Taiwan films to reach a new era with the performances of single outstanding directors.. 2. Ang Lee and Tsai Ming-liang’s principal financial support has come from foreign companies, which bodes ill for the overall health of Taiwan filmmaking. Tsai’s I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone [Heiian chuan] received support from France and Austria. These Taiwan directors must seek financial support from foreign film companies because funding from the Taiwan government and companies is insufficient (as in Lee’s case), or because these sources shy away from controversial topics (as in Tsai’s case). Here I am primarily referring to Tsai Ming-liang. I exclude the world-famous Ang Lee here because he takes the studio production and can also be considered as a Chinese-American film director..

(11) Hsieh4. humanitarianism. Hou Hsiao-hsien and Edward Yang were at the vanguard of these themes. Numerous studies have shown that their works captured detached modernity (in Yang’s case) and remote Chineseness (especially in Hou’s case). As TNC began to fade in the 1990s, a new generation of directors emerged. Tsai Ming-liang especially has followed the footsteps of directors like Hou and Yang, with his work initially popular in international film festivals and art house cinema, which in turn led to some blockbuster hits.3 Emilie Yueh-yu Yeh and William Darrel Davis in their Taiwan Film Directors have commented on Tsai’s local sensibilities, and written that this director “occupies or colonizes typically Taiwanese material” and “reconstructs the local in a sophisticated, international art form” (248).4 And not only Tsai, but also other directors in his generation adapted a similar path to gain international claim. Seen in these lights, we can see how a contemporary “age for directors” in Taiwanese cinema reaches back to the roots of TNC for inspiration. In the preface on the anthology of contemporary Taiwan cinema, Ping-hui Liao. 3. Still, Ang Lee is excluded from the discussion here for the reason above. Further, Yeh and Davis point out that Lee may be “Confucianizing” Hollywood, not just as alignment of American genres around family hierarchies, but in the injection of sincerity and diligent craftsmanship. To exemplify their proposition, they analyze Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. First, a consideration on its production background, its embodiment of martial arts, as well as its narrative structure and literary source by Wang Dulu was made. This is an example to show how Lee weighs the alternate attractions of submission and rebellion while coming to terms with his ancestral patrimony.. 4. Being a transplant from provincial Malaysia, Tsai has become an intriguing Taiwan auteur. He is deeply embedded in Taiwan’s vernacular culture. Tsai’s distinct authorship could be discussed from the queer affection toward local-working class life. What Tsai presents is called “camp aesthetics.” Camp is rarely used in analyzing Asian film directors, but the two authors find it a powerful strategy to account for many extraordinary things in Tsai’s films. Household utensils, low-brow décor, working-class environments, clothes antiques, and pseudo-political paraphernalia are all parts of the Tsai camp. Besides the campy elements, Yeh and Davis also trace some vernacular histories that continue to haunt Tsai’s creation. Also sultry popular music and cinemas of a bygone era serve as potent sources of arousal for Tsai. In this respect, Tsai also works within the line of a pan-Chinese cultural patrimony..

(12) Hsieh5. notes the dilemmas that the Taiwan film industry currently faces: Inspired though also eclipsed by A City of Sadness, [1988 by Hou Hsiao-hsien] and very much working in its shadow, contemporary Taiwan film directors develop their art in response to an array of new challenges. These include increasingly scarce government financial support, rare chance for Golden Lions and Bears to boost international reputations, an aggravating consumerist economy and its impact on the box office, grinding competition from trans-regional cable TV channels and unauthorized internet film downloads, not to mention unprecedented socio-cultural excitements and tensions generated by electoral politics, and not least, the island state’s irreversible marginalization with the rise of China in the world economy. (XIII) In spite of these challenges, Liao writes that film production in Taiwan is not confined. Even working with limited budgets and in difficult situations, contemporary film workers still produce many quality films, many of which focus on localized topics (though they are often supported with foreign investment). Chang Tso-chi is one of them. Indeed, as Yeh and Davis argue in their introduction, contemporary Taiwanese directors’ attempts are “based on dialogue with earlier founding filmmakers attempting to forge a personal style, attempts that were hampered by the old cinema of authority” (6). In other words, Chang, and his generation of Taiwan directors are very much burdened by history. The movies indirectly revealed the thoughts of these directors in the 90s, which.

(13) Hsieh6. we shall examine, including the critical discussion of the symbiotic relationship of the tension between the historical context in the 90s and the directors’ creativity. In a large scale, directors like Tsai Ming-liang, Chen Kuo-fu and Lin Zhen-sheng have established themselves as world known directors. Although certain directors, like Tsai, have been objects of study for a long time, little is known about how Taiwan directors from the 1990s till now have interacted with the tradition and the redlined Taiwan film industry. There is a tendency for critics to focus on a director’s style after the TNC movement. Directors since the 1990s have tended to reproduce a facile mode of film production by appealing to international festivals and the art houses with highly stylistic films and cinematic language learned from previous generations. So what happened in the aftermath of Taiwan New Cinema, and what the direction of this “another cinema” claimed in the Taiwan New Cinema Manifesto is, have become a problem. Contemporary Taiwan cinema is treated by critics as a microcosm for contemporary Taiwan culture. In this context, both the international and domestic criticisms are mostly focused on the textual analyses and certain directors’ visual aesthetics only. Only a certain names like Hou Hsiao-hsien and Edward Yang, and sometimes Tsai Ming-liang are the apple of the critic’s eyes. Few studies have tried to investigate how some less-known Taiwan directors within the historical context, or analyze the origin of their stylistic development. For example, Hou’s works have been closely analyzed and examined. What seems to be lacking, however, is how the post-TNC generation in the 1990s reacts to.

(14) Hsieh7. the TNC tradition. My thesis is written with the aim to bridge the gap between Hou’s generation (the Taiwan New Cinema directors) and the next one in the 1990s by looking at Chang Tso-chi, who is recognized as the successor of Hou Hsiao-hsien. The goal of this thesis is to identify the inheritance of the so-called modernist realist tradition beginning with Taiwan New Cinema.. Auteurism Reviewed and Redefined Evaluation of a director is undoubtedly one of the most difficult tasks a critic faces. The beginning of the 1970s saw a number of attempts to validate the director’s importance in film making. Later on, because of the achievement of Taiwan New Cinema, the study of directors has apparently flourished, beginning from the concentration on individual directors’ thematic and stylistic preferences to an era’s aesthetics on the whole. Historically in Taiwan film history, the TNC movement was the first time the critics concentration moved on stories to distinctive features. This has given us new opportunities and challenges. Examining a director in both historical context and stylistic arena can allow us to understand their films in ways we were incapable of before. Understanding contemporary Taiwan films this way is in a sense simply a more refined and measured interpretation. Such interpretations include those creations elicited by specific imagery, including similes, metaphors and allusions; implications about the delivery of dialogue; and the much deeper implication about how the social context impacts an author’ work. Frequently, these interpretations evolve from searching for the right place for an author in film history or finding a.

(15) Hsieh8. satisfactory description of why an author develops certain techniques. Getting to know the arguments above helps us better understand films’ different facets. Some critics, such as André Bazin and Alexendre Astruc, have argued how films reflect a director’s personal vision, and they attribute the development to the influences of directorial practices and film criticism in the 1950s. Robert Stam circumstantially shows that several pioneers preached the attentiveness to the directors’ aesthetic achievement. These include Bazin’s basic deliberation of auteurism arguing that films should mirror the directors’ individual perception, and Astruc’s “camera pen” (caméra-stylo) which combines the ideas of a director’s filmmaking and a writer’s writing (Stam 83-84). Bazin and Astruc’s preference of the film directors have rooted the author theory, but it was not until Truffaut’s claim on "la politique des auteurs" in 1966 that auteurism was largely used by the directors and critics of the “nouvelle vague” (the French New Wave). Truffaut’s surprising hit essay was “Une certaine tendance du cinéma français" (A Certain Trend in French Cinema), a passionate and critical declaration which suggests that we savor films and attend to the distinctive style or consistent themes of their directors (Truffaut 7-20). Truffaut argues that there are no good or bad movies, only good or bad directors. He proposes that a director’s distinctive style determines one’s entire works and their “audacities are those of men of the cinema and no longer of scenarists, directors and literateurs”5 (17). Yet, not. 5. Here Truffaut means that a director does not create convincing mise-en-scène and interpreting the written script only, but has a more important job to make a film with his style..

(16) Hsieh9. only the almost appealing and liberal tone that Truffaut takes in declaring the “cinéma de papa” dead and gone, the enthusiastic reactions of the nouvelle vague directors and critics remind us that a new age of film criticism began in the 1960s. Truffaut and his contemporary colleagues at Cahiers du Cinéma employed the “author theory” both in filmmaking and criticism. They were against French cinema after the Second World War because of its big production and stereotyped theme and style. They admired the 1940s US film noir style, which was brought in France after the ban was lifted after the Nazi occupation. These French directors and critics discovered the vitality and creativity of individual directors in Hollywood productions and found the potentiality of their own films. The shift from studio production to authorship domination in French filmmaking also marks a change in film criticism in the English language. With the introductory essay of Andrew Sarris, the phrase “auteur theory” was officially shown in film criticism. In his "Notes on the Auteur Theory in 1962," Sarris indicates that a director, in order to be categorized as an “autuer,” must conform to three premises. Primarily, Sarris points out that “if a director has no technical competence, no elementary flair for the cinema, he is automatically cast out from the pantheon of the directors. A great director has to be at least a good director.” What is more, “the second premise of the auteur theory is the distinguishable personality of the director as a criterion of value. Over a group of films, a director must exhibit certain recurrent characteristics of style, which serve as his signature. The way a film looks and moves should have some relationship to the way a director thinks and feels.” And the final one is about “interior.

(17) Hsieh10. meaning,” which is “the ultimate glory of the cinema as an art.” Sarris defines the “interior meaning” as something “extrapolated from the tension between a director’s personality and his material” (Sarris 516). In Sarris’ The American Cinema: Directors and Directions, 1929–1968, critics and authors from the 1970s have been inspired to appreciate different distinctive directorial styles. However, the works of Sarris and other French critics like Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Chabrol, and Éric Rohmer did arouse criticism right after they declared their position. The “auteur theory” was criticized first due to its only focus on the authorial role of the director. It excludes the collaborative efforts of all other crew members, from the script writer to the cinematographer. According to Stam, “the real scandal of the auteur theory lay not so much in glorifying the directors as the equivalent in prestige to the literary author, but rather in exactly who was granted the prestige” (87). Anyway, film-making is a teamwork process. The “auteur theory” is also criticized by critics in semiotics and structuralism, like Roland Barthes, who focus more on the films’ imagery and other aesthetic elements.6 For semioticians and structuralists, a director’s style and internal intention has little to do with the final visual text. Susan Hayward argues that the tendency of some proponents of auteurism who seizes the concept of structuralism somehow discloses the limitation of autuerism. For example, to borrow Hayward’s phrase, when the French semiotician Christian Metz endeavored to “uncover the rules that governed film language and to establish a. 6. Barthes’s acclaim: “the author is dead,” could be the best exemplification of structuralists’ reaction toward the auteur theory in film..

(18) Hsieh11. framework for a semiotics of the cinema,” he tended to omit the “notion of pleasure and audience reception,” and focused only on “a crushing of the aesthetic experience through the weight of the theoretical framework” (17). Other approaches like psychoanalysis and post-colonialism concentrate more on how the films reflect the protagonists’ mental and political situation. The author-orientated methodology then reflects only part of the meaning of the films. The films are thus viewed in a cultural context, and that implies the “auteur theory” needs modification and reexamination in our times. “Auteur theory” has been the central topic of contemporary Taiwan cinematic criticism. It has long been the leading principle to examine the TNC directors but it has been as well a misused methodology most misused in the studies of Taiwan cinema. In Taiwan, we share similar perplexity over how to define “autuer theory” itself and its practice by Taiwan critics. Cinema in Japanese colonization and early postwar Taiwan had been the propaganda for government’s use, advocating political authority and preaching loyalty to the country. The government imposed censorship on film productions to make sure the governmental authoritative figures were not violated. In this period of martial law, film critics were limited to discuss more on the morality of the films rather than on their creativity. While it is true that individual directors were discussed, such a focus on morality and political correctness only deflect the critics’ attention away from the films’ aesthetics. Taiwan New Cinema marked the blooming of a new era of authors. The TNC directors made it a priority to integrate a more natural and direct style into their.

(19) Hsieh12. contemporary Taiwan cinema. Influenced by the Taiwan nativism, their innovative style recorded both the personal and historical transitions of Taiwan in the 80s. When the TNC films entered the international film festival arena, they were appreciated for their “primitive” eastern fascination. Moreover, due to the praises and prizes gained at international film festivals and on other occasions, some of the TNC directors, such as Hou Hsiao-hsien and Edward Yang, have become internationally recognized names. These auteurs of international cinema and their style take precedence over other issues and become the main concerns of film critics. Some critics discuss the cinematic style of those directors, and some others reaffirm the directors’ “interior meanings.” And recently, as the martial-law ban in Taiwan was lifted, some critics begin to give more attention on how a film interacts with the historical and cultural context. Directors’ creativities and interior meanings are not as important as political context itself anymore. It indicates that Taiwan is now facing the same of dichotomy in film criticism as what western critics do. Though “auteurism” has flourished in Taiwan film criticism since Hou and Yang gained international acclaim, it trapped subsequent Taiwan directors in the 90s by the lure of success. This outcome seems to have been a dead-end for Taiwan cinema. Chia-chi Wu points out the problem Taiwan film industry has faced after Taiwan New Cinema: [t]he international acclaim enjoyed by New Cinema’s filmmakers inspired followers to achieve a similar mixture of international fame and financial self-sufficiency. A few filmmakers, who had been apprenticed to New.

(20) Hsieh13. Cinema filmmakers in the 1980s, continued to operate in the formalist fold, realist tradition, independent mode of production, and most importantly, the global art-house system of capital recuperation pioneered by Hou and Yang. Some of them turned out to be no less creditable than their predecessors for their ability to redefine Taiwanese (post-)modernity or Taipei urbanity (such as Tsai Ming-liang), or to capture a renewed Taiwanese hybridity centering upon disenfranchised communities of youngsters (Chang Tso-chi’s Darkness and Light and The Best of Times). Other works, however, seem at best a bland, even brazen replication of New Cinema’s style and themes. Yet the made-in Taiwan ‘artsy films’ keep being granted international art-house distribution and major or lesser festival prizes.” (88-89) What is immediately apparent in this extract is that a number of Taiwan directors adopt “art cinema” themes and styles, specifically preferring those that win international film awards. These directors care little about local market. What is distressing, however, is that many directors who achieved international success in fact gave little back to the local Taiwan industry. This blind reproduction of the successful experiences brought Taiwan film business to its nadir. However, Reading the exploitation of “author theory” in Taiwan film industry after the blooming of Taiwan New Cinema in the context of the Chia-chi Wu and Yeh’s observations on an “easy way to success,” I argue that today “auterism” in Taiwan” is not only a “trap” that allures directors who seek quick success and instant profits, but also a system that establishes the images and aesthetics of Taiwanessness.

(21) Hsieh14. accepted as a consensus recognized by native and international critics and audience. In this paper, I want to take Chang Tso-chi, one of the directors of contemporary Taiwan, as an example to map Taiwan cinema’s current development. I do not choose Chang for random. Chang represents his generation that gains direct influence from Taiwan New Cinema and tries very hard to integrate this tradition into his own work. These directors’ reaction toward the “author models” set before them demonstrates a reconsideration of “auterism”. They are conscious of the importance and advantage in developing their own style and they strive for it. They identify themselves as “artists,” authors of the film. The very purpose to make a film is to create an art piece. In other words, the word “auteurism” should be reassessed in the case of Taiwan directors who started their careers in the 90s, but based their trainings in the mid 80s. The possible faces of these directors exemplify themselves in how they merge their creativity with the TNC directors’ trapping style. For example, neither the easy adoption of the TNC realistic style nor the exclusively conversion into fantastic and romantic elements can sufficiently explain the distinction of Chang Tso-chi’s films. The peculiarity of Chang’s films lies in his sustained endeavor to present the local life and history of Taiwan in the late 20th century—the life of the oppressed class, who can not demand for their own rights. My interpretation of Chang Tso-chi’s works seeks to demonstrate that Chang’s gangster bildungsromans may not solely be seen as a cultural form that replicates modes of the Taiwan New Cinema, one which has already obtained international-claimed position. As mentioned before, in many ways, Taiwan New Cinema and the films in the.

(22) Hsieh15. 90s made by directors such as Tsai Ming-liang, Chen Kuo-fu and Lin Zhen-sheng are delicately woven together in Chang and his films. They offer a framework that “both continues and differentiates itself from the Taiwan New Cinema” (Lu, 2005, 138). In his surprising, brilliant, and compassionate three films, Ah Chung [Azhong], Darkness and Light [Heian zhi guang] and The Best of Times [Meili shiguang], which mark Chang’s debut as a director, the audience sees not only a deep concern with contemporary Taiwan society but also unique visual features sparkling. In many ways, however, in Chang’s films, some visual motifs may ring a bell of the previous Taiwan New Cinema. Chang Tso-chi’s works inevitably invite comparisons with the works of TNC directors, especially Hou. But with close examination, Chang has a very different vision of reality and fiction. The style of Chang’s three films seems simple, yet it “seamlessly combines the seemingly in compatible modes of documentary-style realism and fantasy” (Chris Berry, 2007, 33). The outcome is the “another cinema” (Lu, 2005 147) which reveals less interests in “grungy social realism than in psychological realism” (Lu, 2005, 146). As Chang’s films draw to the ending, the audience begins to identify with the protagonists, not because they share the similar living environment but because they are trapped in a similar psychological dilemma. The true attractive power of Chang’s films, in my point of view, lies in these sympathetic responses—the emotional appeal caused by his distinctive cinematic narrations. Seen in this light, the “realistic element” in Chang’s films noticed by the critics is a mere façade. Under the guidance of his predecessors on the road to be an.

(23) Hsieh16. “auteur”, Chang Tso-chi has a complex signature that requires rigorous analysis.. Taiwan Films in World Film History Within the last two decades, TNC and post TNC films have been an auspicious target for both the audience and critics. Their attention was drawn firstly by the Taiwan New Wave directors in the mid of 1980s. As the reflection and reexamination of the contemporary era, their works were often viewed as a cine-modernism whose style and intention are related to the European film modernism. What they wished to create is “another cinema” which is different from the mainstream melodramas and kung-fu films. The TNC movement opened a space for further development, also created a few film auteurs such as Hou Hsiao-hsien and Edward Yang. And Tsai Ming-liang is the most prominent Taiwan auteur winning international prizes and reputation as well after this movement in the case. Thus, my research attempts to give a possible answer to the questions above by exemplifying the director Chang Tso-chi’s films. He is viewed as a direct successor of the TNC movement, and develops the TNC style to a new extent. Analyzing his film style would help to judge the possibility of “another cinema” after the TNC movement. In the second chapter I move into the understanding of Chang Tso-chi’s background and films. This section begins with general historical information about Chang Tso-chi, and then touches upon certain vital transitions of his career. I will examine his apprentice period and documentary film experiences to provide a view of some of the sources of his unique styles. Chang’s directorial preferences should be.

(24) Hsieh17. seen not only as talent-driven, but as a culmination of his past experiences in film and other media. Also in this chapter I aim to establish a historical framework of Chang’s reactions to his TNC predecessors, whose revolutionary changes in style and theme marked a summit of Taiwan cinema. Beginning with an examination of the specific historical and cultural background of Taiwan New Cinema in the 1980s, I will explore the aesthetic strategies and thematic paradigm shifts of TNC movement that inspire Chang’s cinematic innovations. I will provide an overall explanation of how aesthetic strategies and thematic paradigm shifts have operated in the TNC works and examine the methods deployed by Chang, stemming from his experiences working with the TNC masters, particularly Hou Hsiao-hsien. By emphasizing the crucial correspondences between Hou and Chang, I will present a lineage of modernist realists in Taiwan film history. While tracing how Hou and Chang exemplify realist traditions in Taiwan cinema, I will also examine the differences marking Chang, in order to illuminate his own construction as an auteur. Subsequent chapter 3 focuses on more detailed analyses of Chang’s signatures, which make him a pioneering director in contemporary Taiwan. In the first part chapter three, I focus on Chang’s distinctive approaches toward film making. Though he has released only four films, Chang has tended to establish signatures. I regard these as not only his inheritance from directors of previous generations but also a result of his own creativity. By exploring the consistent thematic and stylistic constructions in his three films, Ah Chung, Darkness and Light and The Best of Times, I will highlight perceptible personal styles based on the TNC movement (primarily on.

(25) Hsieh18. the master Hou Hsiao-hsien), and on the authenticity that emphasizes the distinctive editing, staging and mise-en-scène of Chang. I will discuss Chris Berry’s account of Chang, which created the term “haunted realism” in relation to Chang’s style and its applicability to life in contemporary Taiwan.7 This stylistic figure, placed in a context of post-colonial, post-modern and post-cold war Taiwan marks Chang’s true difference and significance as a contemporary Taiwanese director. My purpose throughout is not only to discuss Chang in the narrative of auteurism, which is in any case under reexamination and redefinition under the process, but also to view Chang as one lineament in the contemporary trajectory of Taiwan cinema, which has become a part of the international film industry. The definition and estimation of Taiwanese directors within international film is an ongoing project, and it is hoped that this analysis of Chang Tso-chi and his unique and important contributions, will make a useful contribution.. 7. I translated “haunted realism” to Chinese as 「著魔寫實主義」 according to the direct translated version of Chris Berry’s essay in Dianyin-hsienshan. See 「著魔的寫真主義--對於張作驥電影的觀察與寫實主義的再思考」/ Berry Chris（裴開瑞）著、王君琦譯 / 『電影欣賞』第 120 期 / 2004 / 頁 91-95..

(26) Hsieh19. Chapter 2 Chang Tso-chi and Taiwan New Cinema. The recent reception of director Chang Tso-chi’s Soul of a Demon [Hu die](2008) as a violent gangster film has distracted critics from a more in-depth and revealing investigation of this important contemporary director.8 This response has diverted audiences’ attention from the distinctive features of Chang’s work, and its deeply humanistic qualities. In some cases Chang’s work has been misapprehended as solely art cinema, lacking wider market appeal and more substantive critical attention. But this view is in sum inadequate, and to better understand the important significance of Chang’s achievements, a more comprehensive and detailed evaluation of his work is needed.. Chang Tso-chi’s Oeuvre Chang Tso-chi is a key player in contemporary Taiwan cinema. Chang’s work is a combination of movement, and. 3). 2). 1). themes and techniques inherited from the Taiwan New Cinema. the similar stylistic significances Chang shares with his contemporaries,. his own independent examination of arresting alternative themes and new. production values.9 Chang’s rural upbringing has given his films a distinctly. 8. For example, CMC, Chang’s Hong Kong cooperative company, marketed the film as a “gangster film.” See “The Gangster Film Soul of a Demon: Director Chang Tso-chi Fly with the CMC.” Hitoradio.com. 22, March, 2007.〈http://www.hitoradio.com/news/6_1_1.php?news_id=48063.. 9. Two other prominent directors of Chang‘s generation include Lin Cheng-sheng and Chen Kuo-fu..

(27) Hsieh20. grassroots and even bucolic flavor, and his narrative strategies have served a simple and romantic function, even when he has portrayed lower class oppression and lack of winning opportunity. His films feature a strategy known as “haunted realism,” which I will explore later in my analysis. Chang’s career can be divided into three phases-- a learning period, followed by a period in which he developed his unique style, and his mature period. Dividing Chang’s career into three parts this way will provide a clear framework in which to understand the development of his aesthetics and famed magical realist stylistics. Born in Jiayi in 1961 to a second-generation family that immigrated from China, Chang showed little interest in a film career in his youth. His attention was piqued, however during his military service when he attended film classes during his off days. In an interview with Michael Berry, Chang said, “I was in charge of a theater in the army, and it was very popular….The movies shown were not screened in any systematic way; sometimes reels would even be mixed and matched! Normally we are accustomed to seeing movies in a straightforward, linear fashion, but I realized that you could show ten minutes of one film, then jump to the middle of some other film, then move on to something else. After being exposed to so many movies during that era, I started playing with the idea of pursuing a career in film”(401). This initial experience in editing is surely what inspired of Chang’s later creative, non-linear editing in his work. After being discharged from the army, Chang entered the Film Department of Chinese Culture University in Taipei, and began his formal film education. Chang.

(28) Hsieh21. completed his studies at Chinese Culture University in 1987, and thereafter he worked under several famed directors. Though he got the opportunity to pursue further study abroad, he decided to take Hou Hsiao-hsien’s suggestion that young film directors should develop their style only after serving apprenticeships in the film industry. Chang began as a director’s assistant for Yu Kanping’s People Between Two Chinas [Haixialiangan] (1988) and Yim Ho and Tsui Hark’s King of Chess [Qiwang] (1992). These were followed by a stint as assistant director on Hou Hsiao hsien’s City of Sadness [Beiqingchengshi] (1989), Yu Kanping’s Two Painters [Liangge youqijiang] (1990) and Huang Yushan’s Peony Birds [Mudanniao] (1990). Chang began to immerse himself in the art of other TNC directors (Hsieh 2002, 81) at this period, including Hou Hsiao-hsien. Working with Hou differed from Chang’s experiences working with others, and at this time he learned how to work with non-professional actors, and began indulged in Hou’s directorial and stylistic preferences, including Hou’s distinctive long takes. In 1989, Chang served as an assistant director on Hou’s The City of Sadness, a family saga which examines the 228 massacre in 1947’s Taiwan. Chang placed himself in Hou’s shoes in order to understand the many challenges directors face (Hsieh 2002, 81), and he said that he was strongly influenced by Hou’s work ethic, and that this experience was a turning point in his career and greatly impacted his later style. To this day, critics say Chang’s work bears strong aesthetic similarities to Hou’s. At the beginning of his career, some thought that Chang was Hou Hsiao-hsien’s successor as a proponent of realism in film and a spokesman for underprivileged.

(29) Hsieh22. classes in Taiwan. Without question Chang’s pursuit of a realistic style can be seen as an outcome of his experience working with Hou and other TNC directors, and his career development firmly follows in their footsteps. Chang’s experiences with Hou and other Taiwan New Cinema filmmakers influenced his film techniques and production values, many of his personal thematic concerns, and his empathetic, compassionate portrayals of local poor communities and postindustrial family structure, with their associated criticism of Taiwanese society. Such filial, emotional, penetrating values have proven extremely popular with international audiences. Chang’s experience working with Tsui Hark was very different from his apprentice experience in Taiwan. This opened Chang’s eyes to the efficiency of Hong Kong studio production, which had been developed since the late 1960s. Working with Tsui inspired Chang, though we can seldom see Tsui’s influence in the way Chang synthesizes studio production values into his own innovative, independent productions.10 Nevertheless, working with Tsui also allowed him to receive training from directors outside the TNC group After his six-year apprenticeship, Chang directed his first TV series in 1991, initiating his independent career. From 1991-1996 Chang directed TV plays and documentaries about the lives of teenagers in Taiwan, including What the Grass Says to the Wind [Fenghancao de duihua] and Teenager? Teenager! [Qingshaonian. 10. At the premiere of his most recent film, Soul of a Demon, Chang noted that the three people who influenced him most were Yu Kan-ping, Hou Hsiao-hsien and Tsui Hark. He said that he learned how to interact with others from Yu, that Hou’s aesthetics influenced him most, and that Tsui’s resourceful Hong Kong studio production had deeply inspired him..

(30) Hsieh23. qingshaonian]. At this time, Chang acquired plenty of documentary techniques that he often employed, and in an interview with Hsieh Ren-chang in 2002, he indicated how this experience influenced his cinematic stylistics: It is easy for the director to discover the “target” of shooting while making documentary films. But the difficulty lies in how to capture the picture you want. Making a documentary film is like conducting a battle. You have to leave your camera on all the time in order not to miss any important situation.… I am used to work with non-professional actors due to my documentary experience (Hsieh 43 [my translation]).11 In this second phase, Chang also began to make his own films. His first effort was 1993’s Gunshots in the Night [Anye qiangsheng]. With this debut feature, Chang declared himself a full-fledged “auteur” controlling the entire filmmaking process. Interestingly, after Chang finished Gunshot in the Night, he quarreled with the film’s Hong Kong sponsor and producer Jacob Cheung on the editing of the print, and Chang demanded that the film be released as he had directed it. In the end, against Chang’s wishes, a commercial version of the film was released, and Chang refused to be identified as the director of the film (Michael Berry 403-406). We see here an example of the fiercely independent auteur at work, and in this respect Chang has made several important statements about how he asserts auteurist autonomy. Chang believed that “Taiwanese films win international prizes for it takes the 11. The original text in Chinese is: “ 因為拍紀錄片時，會很了解誰是主體，但困難在於能不能讓你拍到；拍紀錄片可說隨時處於備戰狀態，電源隨時開著，一看到狀況就拍進去。…後來我就起用非職業演員，這是從紀錄片的經驗衍生的。”.

(31) Hsieh24. director-oriented pro, yet today’s mainstream in film industry worldwide is the producer-oriented pro. The director-oriented pro can create films irrelevant to the market and the director’s name represents the whole film’s style. This is the origin of “auterism,” where the audience begins to identify a film with its director’s style (Li Hsieh and Wu, 2003, 86 [my translation]).12 Chang’s first critically acclaimed film was Ah Chung [Zhongzi] in 1996, which depicts a disfranchised working class teenager who practices the local Ba Jia Jiang folk ritual.13 This film is marked by lower working class sentiments, teenage rebellion, and vulgar language, all shot in a plain documentary style. This film began to draw many critics’ attention to Chang’s fresh film language. Chang’s next film, Darkness and Light [Heian zhiguang] in 1999, set in the Taiwan port city of Keelung, is more sophisticated, and in this film Chang further developed his grassroots style. This film won the Gold award in the Tokyo Grand Prix, and the Asian Film award at the Tokyo International Film Festival. It was also a big winner at the 1999’s Golden Horse Awards in Taiwan, winning Grand Jury, Best Original Screenplay, Best Editing and the Audience Favorite awards. Though his style was not yet fully developed, Darkness and Light contained many of the essential magical realistic elements that would mark Chang’s mature style.. 12. The text in Chinese is : “台灣電影會得獎, 是因為採取導演制的關係: 現今全世界電影都是製片人的制度, 可以隨時換導演。導演制可以拍出與市場無關的, 導演的名字就是整個電影, 造就了作者論。” 13. “Ba Jia Jiang” is a Taiwanese folk ritual for warding off bad luck. It is a practice of praying for a healthy and tranquil life from the divinity. At folk religious gatherings, practitioners first invite the gods to get into their bodies and then launch a parade declaring the gods’ messages..

(32) Hsieh25. If the first two phases of Chang’s career germinated his stylistics, the third phase, starting with his 2002 film, The Best of Times [Meili shiguang], demonstrates the full flower of his trademark style and magical realism in the themes like wretched gangsters, unhappy teenagers and irresponsible parents whose lives were eased somewhat by magical realism.14 Commenting on his own magical realism, Chang said that “what the film presents is definitely not reality, but the performance itself is real.” Therefore, “the boundary between surrealism and illusion doesn’t exist” (Li, Hsieh, and Wu, 2003, 88).15 It is possible that critics in Taiwan have been confused by incongruous or fantastic scenes (such as the appearance of the unicorn in The Best of Times), and Chang’s blurring of the line between reality and dreams. The Best of Times, with its spontaneous and fluent cinematic style, separates Chang’s work from that of his TNC predecessors. The film was shown at the 59th Cannes International Film Festival’s Unit International Panorama section. It also won Best Feature Film, Best Taiwan Film and Best Original Screenplay awards at the 39th Golden Horse Awards in 2003. All of Chang’s films can be viewed as types of “bildungsroman,” which are. 14. Here I define the often use of Chang’s mixture of reality and fantasy as a kind of magical realism. It is borrowed from the term created by Alejo Carpentier, describing the “practice of Latin American writers who mix everyday realities with imaginative extravaganzas drawn from the rich interplay of European and native culture.” According to The Harper Handbook to Literature, it “recalls the mixture of realistic techniques and surreal images in the work of certain European and American painters of the 1920s and 1930s, who were sometimes called magical realists”. See “Magical Realism,” The Harper Handbook To Literature. 280.. 15. The original quote in Chinese is: “看電影是假的，但表演是真的，將超現實與幻覺區分的那條線是不存在的。”.

(33) Hsieh26. about the coming of age of teenage protagonists.16 This genre was popular in Taiwan New Cinema in the 1980s, though opinions vary on the application of “bildungsroman” narrative to TNC films. Li Chen-ya says that the most likely explanation of the popularity of this genre in TNC and Chang’s films is “the contradiction between the grand history and petit personal memory” (120), and “the avoidance of historical trauma and the authorities.” He further comments that “the bildungsroman reflects the historical events through the fragments of life” (120-122). I will discuss Chang’s use of bildungsroman in the next chapter.. Taiwan Film History and the TNC movement In most analyses of Chang Tso-chi, Taiwan New Cinema and director Hou Hsiao-hsien are seen as important influences on Chang’s development. Examples include Feii Lu’s “Another Cinema: Darkness and Light” and Chris Berry’s “Haunted Realism: Postcoloniality and the Cinema of Chang Tso-chi.” These works are useful studies of Chang’s film style, and valuable contributions to Taiwan film studies. I will examine these two analyses in the later parts of this chapter, after examining Chang’s career and the inter-generational relationships between Chang and his predecessors, specifically Chang’s relationship to Hou.. Taiwan New Cinema. 16. According The Harper Handbook to Literature, the definition of “bildungsroman” is: “a novel of education from youth to experience” (74). This analysis of a novel’s plot has been applied to film study as well as other narrative genres..

(34) Hsieh27. Modern Taiwan film history can be traced back to the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) retreat from China and its relocation to Taiwan in 1949. Taiwan film history could be divided into three eras: the pre-TNC period (1949-1978), the emergence of Taiwan New Cinema (1978-1982) and the high period of Taiwan New Cinema (1982-1987).17 After 1987, Taiwan New Cinema officially came to an end. The arrival of the KMT as an authoritarian government in Taiwan in 1949 inaugurated an era of complete government censorship and control over state and individual film productions. Few Taiwanese films were made during the first years of KMT control in Taiwan, and most of the films shown during this period were imported from Hong Kong. Original films made in Taiwan were little more than propaganda in support of the new government’s policy.18 The next stage in Taiwanese film lasted for about ten years, from 1950 to 1959. The initial popularity and then the decline of local Taiwanese films (Taiyu pian) were crucial in this period. Most Taiwanese language films of this period were simply productions of Taiwanese opera stage performances, which were targeted at lower class audiences. After 1960, the Taiwan film industry grew because of relative political stability and economic growth. In 1963, the KMT controlled Central Motion Picture Company (CMPC) and began to create films based on what was known as “healthy realism,” a term used by many critics to describe bright aspects of country life under KMT rule. According to Emilie Yueh-yu Yeh’s discussion in “The Road Home: Stylistic 17. 18. The following discussion of the periods of Taiwanese film history follows Lu Feii’s analysis.. Lu Feii in his Taiwan Film: Politics, Economics and Aesthetics explains this situation in the second chapter: “The era of Reformation.”.

(35) Hsieh28. renovations of Chinese mandarin classics,” “healthy realism,” which avoids portrayals of darker aspects of society, is a combination of classical Italian Neo-realism and vernacular popular fiction. She argues that “[h]ealthy realism is a didactic construction of romantic melodrama and civic virtue, a sort of purified wenyi. It mixes the interior/private mise-en-scène specific to family melodrama with the civil, public space to accommodate governmental policy, enabling a smooth integration with state ideological apparatus” (206).19 This movement was initiated with director Lee Xing’s Our Neighbor [Jieto xiangwei] (1963), a film preaching traditional Confucian teachings among its audiences. The film was successful and initiated an era of Taiwan locally-made films.20 The “healthy realism” movement prefigured the core values of later popular Taiwan cinema which avoided harsh realities in Taiwanese society.21 During the next ten years into the 1970s, Taiwan cinema reached the peak of its popularity. Melodramatic love stories and martial art films (wuxia) were the two most. 19. Feii Lu argues that Taiwanese “healthy realism” was more closely aligned with Soviet “social realism” than Italian neo-realism after World War II. He compares the differences between these three realisms: “Neo-realism aimed to disclose society’s defects instead of blindly providing optimistic solutions. Socialist Realism, however, sought a bright future for human beings based on the communism and socialism. Healthy Realism portrays how Chinese traditional ethics and good human nature can solve all social problems.” For more details, see Taiwan Cinema: Politics, Economics, and Aesthetics, p104, note 149.. 20. Films in this category also include The Oyster Girl [Kenu] (1964), and Beautiful Duckling [Yangya renjia] (1965).. 21. Major directors of the 1960s and the 1970s such as Li Xing and Bai Jingrui operated within a state-sponsored film style called healthy realism. But their activities during this period are not to be seen as entirely official, just as Taiwan cinema was not all propaganda. A thriving commercial cinema was well established by the late 1950s, with low budget taiyu pain—Taiwanese-language pictures—produced by small companies and directors with various regional backgrounds. The two authors propose the idea of “parallel cinema” to account for the conditions of Taiwan film production in the 1950s and the 1960s. The parallel tracks highlight the authorities’ neocolonial policy toward local Taiwanese culture but, at the same time, leaves a market gap that allows alternatives to flourish. For more information, see Yeh and Davis, “Parallel Cinemas: Postwar History and Major Directors” in Taiwan Film Directors..

(36) Hsieh29. popular genres. The vogue of these two genres can be partly attributed to the fact that the KMT government could easily censor every detail that violated governmental authority, and prohibit films that disclosed any ugly realities in Taiwan. Thus, films with melodramatic and martial art (wuxia) genres were highly accessible to film makers, who could create utopian and escapist films that are unconnected to reality. These popular genres were made in a dreamy style that emphasized romantic dialog and melodrama, as well as martial arts stunts. They reached a height of popularity, but then reached an aesthetic dead-end, and this golden age began to decline. The decline of the Taiwan film industry in the late 1970s provides a starting-point for the discussion of the rise of Taiwan New Cinema. Yeh and Davis give a brief account on the background from which Taiwan New Cinema arose: After enjoying continuous expansion from the mid-1960s to the late 1970s, Taiwan cinema faced a series of impediments. Taiwan lost its most valuable overseas Southeast Asian market, following the success of Communist revolutions in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, and sanctions were imposed on Chinese culture in Indonesia and Malaysia. The industry was hit by another problem in the 1980s: the decline of domestic mandarin-speaking film audiences, who turned to exciting, tour de force Jackie Chan kung fu films and excruciating comedies from New Cinema City of Hong Kong. Furthermore, proliferation of VCRs let audiences stay home or patronize video parlors for better selection and flexible viewing. Video rental stores also received licenses from Hong Kong’s two major TV networks—TVB.

(37) Hsieh30. and ATV—to distribute television dramas, some with better entertainment quality than local films. (55) Also relevant is June Yip’s remark: At the end of the 1970s, the most dangerous threats to the health of the Taiwanese film industry came from two sources. One serious challenge came from the rapidly growing availability of imported or smuggled videotapes of foreign films from America, Japan, and Europe. These pirated tapes were convenient and inexpensive to rent, extremely current, and, because many were illegally imported, usually uncensored. The other source of increased competition was Hong Kong, whose better equipped and financially flush powerhouse studios were producing thematically more diverse and stylistically more sophisticated films. (53-54) These arguments show that the Taiwan film industry was under great pressure during this period because of increased competition from Hong Kong and Hollywood. Additionally, the Taiwanese viewing public began to tire of sugary melodrama that was common in Taiwanese film by this time. Hence, the Taiwanese golden age of film went into decline. This decline and the pressure exerted by Hong Kong and Hollywood films inspired the following generation to create films thematically rebellious and aesthetically nouveau. By the 1980s the Taiwan film industry had reached a definitive stage of innovation, and beginning in 1982, with the ‘New Comer’ policy of the CMPC, a new group of filmmakers emerging to work in the Taiwan New Cinema movement. This.

(38) Hsieh31. angry generation rose when the decline of Taiwan cinema, the moment that the popularity of Hong Kong and Hollywood cinema was at a zenith. Disgusted with the conservative politics and orthodox, melodramatic themes of Taiwanese films of the 1970s ( a result of KMT manipulation and repression) on the one hand, and the glib, unrealistic martial arts films on the other, this new generation sought a new way to express their pent-up rage, progressive politics and urgent creativity. They used more realist approaches to present their motifs, which centered on nostalgia for the rural past and the corrosive effects of the urbanized present.22 Frequently they worked against the older generation. Aesthetically for the TNC the idea of “art for art’s sake,” rather than simple popular amusement motivated the movement. The TNC movement began with In Our Times, a film of four episodes made by four different directors: Jim Tao, Edward Yang, Ko Yi-Cheng, and Chang Yi. It is followed by the groundbreaking The Sandwich Man [Erzi de da wan’ou] (1983), adapted from the novel of the same name by nativist novelist Huang Chun-ming. The Sandwichman is an ideal example of the new TNC style and has become a classic of the movement. The film was an anthology directed by Hou Hsiao-hsien, Wan Ren and Zeng Zhuangxiang. The film’s three directors not only subverted traditional cinematic 22. In this respect, thematically and stylistically, the TNC movement was similar to the Taiwanese Nativist Literature movement of the 1970s, which focused on the usage of local languages and local native life. Writers in the nativist group, like Huang Chun-ming, Wang Chen-ho and Chen Ying-chen claimed that literature needed to present a realistic picture of Taiwanese society. Well-known TNC films that echoed the values of the flourishing Nativist movement include A Flower in the Rainy Night, and That Day on The Beach, films that examined the “elements of indigenous Taiwanese life, especially visible in language, literary adaptations, and rural subjects” (Yeh and Davis 56). After the KMT’s arrival in 1949, literature in Taiwan complied with two dominant ideologies—anti-communism and nostalgia—and works describing local country life were neglected. The Literaure Quarterly [Wenxue jikan], established by Wei Tiancong introduced the idea of realism to nativist writers and inspired the nativist movement in the 1970s. For more about the Nativist Debate, see Wei Tian-cong, The Collection of the Debate on the Nativist Literature [Xiangtu Wenxue Taolungji]..

(39) Hsieh32. technique, but also brought into play complex historical references, and instilled in the film a keen self-consciousness of Taiwan cinematic history. The Sandwichman remains a powerful, rich classic to this day. The Sandwichman is suffused with the historical events that colored and shaped Taiwan society from the 1950s on, and shares many characteristics with Taiwanese Nativist Literature. The film describes post-war Taiwan’s cultural and political struggles (including references to American economic support for Taiwan), and hopes for a better future. At the same time, the film reinterprets the themes of Healthy Realism, and one of the defining features of this successful film is its awareness of the cinematic tradition and the legacy of past eras. Hou Hsiao-hsien, for example, in his episode “Son’s Big Doll” in The Sandwichman, portrayed the protagonist’s career as a sandwichman in the 50s. The “peeling the apple event,” an act of government censorship with The Sandwichman, illustrates the conflict between the controlling authorities and the young TNC auteurs’ eagerness to freely speak their minds.23 Feii Lu describes how the CMPC responded to an anonymous complaint that The Sandwichman’ depicted an “un-civilized” culture in Taiwan. Initially, the CMPC edited out some shots in the film when this event was disclosed by the media. However, it aroused so much criticism that the CMPC was forced to release the unedited film (for more detail, see Feii Lu’s Taiwan Cinema: Politics, Economics, Aesthetics, p. 310). 23. “Peeling the apple” refers to how the government sought to peel away important parts of the film’s episode: “The Taste of the apple.” For a description of the event and its impact, see Chiao, Taiwan Xing dianying [Taiwan New Cinema] (Taipei: Shibao, 1988), 81-124..

(40) Hsieh33. The bravura film style of the TNC directors was based on stylistic reformation, or more generally, a focus on the importance of pure visual aesthetics. These developments not only altered the modes of film production in Taiwan, shifting the focus to the collaboration among independent film producers and directors, but also encouraged young directors to develop their own innovative stylistics, which was later categorized as “auteurism.” On 6 November 1986, about 50 TNC film workers and Taiwan cultural elites published the “Taiwan New Cinema Manifesto,” with the aim clarifying TNC’s aims and questioning governmental film policy and contemporary film critics in Taiwan. The Taiwan New Cinema manifesto proclaimed that the movement wished to be nothing less than epoch-making. Governmental support and cultural self-awareness were needed, the manifesto stated, to ensure a bright future for Taiwan cinema. The manifesto showed the belief that “the future of Taiwan cinema has many possibilities,” and that filmmakers were fighting for the existence of the “another cinema” in the film industry (Zhan 117).24 Though the movement itself declined soon after this manifesto, the TNC film makers established a model for later generations with its novelty. As Lu Feii said, We could say that In Our Time [Guangyin de gushi] both introduced the auteurs of the Taiwan New Cinema and prefigured the style of Taiwan New Cinema; Growing Up [Xiaobi de gushi] built the foundation of the TNC; 24. For the whole text of Taiwan Film Manifesto, see Zhan, Hong-zhi,“民國七十六年台灣電影宣言,” 《台灣新電影》, edited by Peggy Jiao. Taipei: 時報, 1988. 111-118..

(41) Hsieh34. The Sandwich Man [Erzi de da wan’ou], however, ensured the existence of the term “Taiwan New Cinema.” (Lu 1998, 273, my translation)25 Defining Features of the TNC One reason Taiwan New Cinema remains such an important era in Taiwan film history is because of its groundbreaking transition from governmental domination in the film industry to a period marked by “directorial reign.” Taiwan New Cinema gave life to Taiwanese cinema, which was in decline in the late 1970s. In this context, TNC also forged new directions for later Taiwan directors. As mentioned earlier, TNC directors made no attempt to depict what they felt were superficial commercial elements, and many of their films marked innovation, creativity and radical politics. Such filmmaking was a revolution in Taiwan, and interpretations of TNC movies necessarily highlighted these new factors and their impact. In the following, I will examine three responses to the TNC films. These aspects include historical consciousness, groundbreaking TNC aesthetics and the TNC’s cultural significance.. Historical Consciousness The TNC movement implicated the end of the period of repression in filmmaking that had existed during KMT control in Taiwan. Though closely aligned with the CMPC, TNC directors attempted to fight for freedom in producing their films. 25. Note that Lu did acknowledge the role of the government CMPC in the development of the TNC when she wrote that “is because these three films were all produced by the CMPC that we have to admit the influence the CMPC had on the films of this period.” The original text in Chinese is : 可以說, 《光陰的故事》介紹了新電影的作者, 預示了新電影的風貌, 《小畢的故事》打開了新電影起步的道路, 而《兒子的大玩偶》則確定了新電影一詞的存在。由於這幾部影片都是由中影所製作生產的,因此, 我們也不能不承認中影在此一時期對電影生產方向的影響。.

(42) Hsieh35. These directors deliberately made “a distinct step away from the pedagogical orientation of healthy realism, the commercialism of studio genres and the eclectic provincialism of taiyu pian [Taiwanese-language film]” (Yeh and Davis 56). Many TNC films criticized Taiwanese society and examined historical trauma during the authoritarian regime. Additionally, TNC films emphasize movement on local rural life and languages. Yeh and Davis point out that “cultural liberation can be understood as an urge for self-expression from a hitherto silenced group of people” (62), which points toward the grassroots themes of the TNC (which some critics have dismissed as merely rustic or provincial). Local Taiwan imagery is mostly represented in TNC films on a temporal scale of the 1950s and 1960s, and the spaces it outlines: the rural countryside, peasants and sometimes spectacular yet distant cityscapes. Viewing Taiwan in the 1950s and 1960s reveals a “temporal and spatial continuity that helps the teleological construction of the Taiwanese identity”—a theme picked up by TNC directors. The historical and political background portrayed in TNC films, replete with historical, economic and social context, “emphasizes the tragedies of these [Taiwanese] protagonists” (Yeh 1999, 49, [my translation]).26. Aesthetics. 26. The original text is “ 但建立身分的過程需要沿著時空的連續性, 朝著某目的定點進行。如此一來, 身分的構成就具備了起點, 中站, 和目的地。...但是觀眾之所以覺得這些底層人物值得同情的原因, 是影片同時提供故事發生的歷史/經濟/ 社會脈絡, 來點名小人物的困境。簡言之, 這些人物的悲劇不在他們的個體性, 而是社會經濟制度條件上。”.

(43) Hsieh36. The Taiwan New Cinema movement is particularly famous for its stylistic features and also cinematic preferences. Thematically speaking, the TNC films presented compassionate themes and grassroots locales and characters. Many of them portray farmers and working class people, focusing attention on the happiness and sufferings of these lower classes and agricultural groups in Taiwan. Perhaps the best-known example is Hou Hsiao-hsien’s “Son’s Big Doll,” episode in The Sandwichman. The economic dilemma of the couple in the film represents the living conditions of many people in rural working classes during the time the film was made. As in his other TNC films, like A Time to Live, A Time to Die and Boys From Fengkuei, Hou promotes a compassionate concern for downtrodden people and grassroots themes within his autobiographical depictions. This concentration on working and lower classes was not new in Taiwan film history, however. In the 1960s, the CMPC promoted a series of films endorsing governmental policy in rural villages in Taiwan, employing the “healthy realism” style discussed above.27 A difference with TNC films was that they moved from “healthy realism” and focused on the realists’ attention on realistic conditions, proper, in Taiwanese working classes.28 Yu Kanping’s Papa, Can You Hear Me Sing? [Da cuo che] (1983), for example, based its setting on a veteran community and depicts the issue of the ambiguous moral value. 27. Here I refer to a series of films made during the 1960s and 1970s, and to even into the early 1980s under the supervision of CMPC general manager Gong Hong. These films were based on KMT socio-economic policy, which in part focused on the development of Taiwan’s rural countryside. Gong adopted elements of Italian neo-realism but added positive messages that ignored harsh social realities.. 28. Thematically, Taiwan New Cinema’s inclination to the Italian Neo-realism is more than the previous generation’s healthy realism..

(44) Hsieh37. influenced by the industrialization from the 70s. Meanwhile, Wang Tong’s A Flower in The Raining Night [Kanhai de rizhi] describes a sex-worker’s life and the generosity of the country people. Concerning on Taiwan’s own history and its people, TNC films reflect both the historical and personal trauma, as the spokesman for those described in their films. These themes were given yet more realistic treatment, and subsequently evolved into definitive reflections of Taiwan society in TNC films. To bring the humanistic qualities to life, many TNC films were shot on location and used amateur actors. The development of TNC films in the early 1980s turned from the theatrical mise-en-scène of the previous martial art films and melodramas. From the early 1960s, the production of kung-fu films and wenyi pian in Taiwan relied heavily on theatrical settings creating remote martial worlds or a society of entrepreneurs competing in love and business. The foundation of the studio system in Taiwan supported this. Studios with ample resources provided space and materials to construct these romantic interior settings and grand exterior milieus. In contrast, TNC films, shot on location most of the times, surprised and challenged audiences visually and thematically. Foremost among these may have been how TNC directors courageously employed amateur actors in their films, which became a standard for them. Although this approach in one sense was in part simply a function of budget considerations, it also demonstrates how the TNC was joined by eager, idealistic young actors, early in their careers, and the use of these original characteristics generated positive feedback among critics and audiences. The puppetmaster Li Tian-lu’s role as a grandfather in.