This screening will be preceded by an opening reception beginning at 6 P.M. in the AFS Cinema lobby. There will be a discussion after the film with Dr. Peggy Chiao, one of Taiwan’s preeminent film scholars and producers, and UT Professor of History Dr. Madeline Hsu. The discussion will be moderated by Austin-based filmmaker Yen Tan, director of this year’s SXSW hit 1985.

Hou Hsiao-hsien closed out the ’80s with one of his most acclaimed works, toplined by future superstar Tony Leung Chiu-wai (CHUNGKING EXPRESS). Still undistributed in the U.S., A CITY OF SADNESS was a sensation in Taiwan for its frank depiction of the post-World War II era, when Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist government ended fifty years of Japanese rule and placed the island under a brutal martial-law regime. But for all its ambition, the film remains touchingly intimate, using the story of a single family to explore history through means both formally and narratively audacious. The first Taiwanese movie to win the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, A CITY OF SADNESS is an unparalleled landmark of Taiwanese and global cinema.