A New Understanding of Time with Hou Hsiao Hsien — Series Begins September 8 at AFS Cinema
Reality in Long Shots: A Hou Hsiao-Hsien Retrospective begins Saturday, September 8, at AFS Cinema. Buy your tickets today. Presented in partnership with Austin Asian American Film Festival.
Hou Hsiao-Hsien grew up in the wake of WWII and Japanese occupation of Taiwan, witnessing a generation with bleak outlooks leading bleak lives. Reflecting on his early years of learning to deal with this overarching sense of despair, Hou says he would dive into literature and absorb as much film as he could by sneaking into movie theaters at a young age. These experiences directly informed many of his films and formed the basis of his filmmaking style.
John Berra of BFI outlines the effect of this type of viewing in his profile of the director, “Multiple viewings are often required to settle into Hou’s measured rhythm, but once the necessary internal adjustment has been made, patience gives rise to a rare form of sensory pleasure.” Our retrospective series gives us the ability to observe the development of Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s style as he reveals a new understanding of our relationship with our place in time.
THE BOYS FROM FENGKUEI (September 8)
Taiwan, 1983, 1h 42min, DCP
THE BOYS FROM FENGKUEI, Hou’s fourth feature, witnesses the coming of age of Ah-Ching and his debaucherous friends as they move from their hometown of Fengkeui to find work in the city of Kaohsiung. The boys discover unique new difficulties in life in the city and find themselves torn physically and emotionally between their past and present.
Hou reflects on the work in an interview with Criterion, “this film really broke the conventional ways of doing things and taught me that you have freedom to do whatever you desire, which allowed me to transcend all those dogmatic ways of making films that I was taught in film school.”
THE TIME TO LIVE AND THE TIME TO DIE (September 11)
Taiwan, 1985, 2h 18min, 35mm
Winner of the International Critics’ Prize Award at Berlin Film Festival, this autobiographical work follows a young boy named Ah-Ha and his family as they leave China and move to Taiwan. Ah-Ha acclimates quickly to this change by joining a local gang, but his family grows strained in their longing for the mainland. Hou observes a gradual, deep divide between the boy and his family as they drift apart in this monumental coming-of-age drama.
In his reflection on the work of Hou Hsiao-Hsien, Philip Lopate of the New York Times calls this film the directors’ first genuine masterpiece.
GOODBYE SOUTH, GOODBYE (September 15)
Taiwan/Japan, 1996, 1h 56min, 35mm
Gao is a bottom-tier thug in contemporary Taiwan who coordinates shoddy money-making schemes with his rag tag group of friends. In this slow-burn reconception of the gangster genre, Hou frequently finds his subjects as they lazily navigate in-between moments of their petty crime lifestyle in the sensuous streets of Taiwan. Gao’s absurd dreams of striking it rich are mirrored by a fantastic soundtrack coordinated by musician and co-star, Lim Giong.
MILLENNIUM MAMBO (September 18)
Taiwan, 2001, 1h 59min, 35mm
Vicky (Shu Qi, THE ASSASSIN) finds relief in the bright lights and designer drugs of the Taipei club scene, then returns to the cluttered apartment she shares with her abusive, good-for-nothing boyfriend Hao-hao (Tuan Chun-hao). A hard-edged but sensitive gangster (Jack Kao) holds out the possibility of a more lasting escape, but Vicky must first break free of the inertia confining her. With MILLENNIUM MAMBO, Hou Hsiao-hsien kicks off the 21st century as only he can, delivering a reflective, neon-drenched mood piece that captures the excitement and ennui of contemporary urban life.
FLOWERS OF SHANGHAI (September 22)
Taiwan, 1998, 2h 10min, 35mm
Consisting of only 37 total long shots, FLOWERS OF SHANGHAI is a story told within the candlelit rooms of a 19th century high-end brothel. Hou travels between three of these flower houses, weaving together concurrent experiences of love, ultimately creating what is considered one of the most beautiful films ever made.
A CITY OF SADNESS (September 29)
Taiwan, 1989, 2h 37min, 35mm
In his most overtly political film, Hou chronicles the story of four brothers during a time when thousands of Taiwanese settlers were being murdered or imprisoned by a tyrannical Kuomintang government. Blending the elements of social, familial and personal turmoil that color Hou’s earlier works, A CITY OF SADNESS represents the ability of the director to portray how society affects minute details in the life of the individual. This film was the first Taiwanese film to win the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and established Hou Hsiao-Hsien as an indelible voice in world cinema.
In an interview about the film, Hou gave a rare insight into his directing process, “The character of Tony Leung’s elder brother in A CITY OF SADNESS is a very dramatic actor so when we were filming, he tended to be overly dramatic for what the scene required. The way to combat this was to pretend to him that we were just doing a test and it wasn’t real, and whenever he felt he was doing a test he would tone it down, for whatever reason, but it was actually a real shot, he just didn’t know it and then the minute I said ‘ok this is a real take’ he would revert back to his very dramatic style. That was the only way to get him to give the more realistic kind of performance that I’m looking for.”
- This piece contributed by Shane Pfender
