Imagining the Unimaginable
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16 發光的城市 A R O U N D T O W N FRIDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2009 • TAIPEI TIMES FILM REVIEW OTHER RELEASES COMPILED BY MartiN WILLiams Saw VI Jigsaw is back — and he’s still dead. Never mind; there are plenty of flashbacks to keep the ghostly Tobin Bell cast as the moralist from hell for another year. This time he or his acolytes are after a deserving chap who deals in health insurance, and assorted other victims. Reliable reviewers thought this one stacked up pretty well given that the series is running out of scope and room for plot twists. Even so, it was ambushed at the US box office by a long-delayed, Blair Witch- style horror movie called Paranormal Activity. That film is due for release on Dec. 11. The Devil’s Tomb Cuba Gooding Jr, Ron Perlman and Ray Winstone head the cast of this underground action movie in which Cuba and badass military mercenary colleagues set out to rescue a group of archeologists from a most sinister location — and begin suffering hallucinations, Event Horizon- style, when they run into something not of this Earth. Not for the discerning film buff, perhaps, but it does star Henry Rollins as a priest and Bill Moseley (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, The Devil’s Rejects) as an oddball professor. This directorial debut of actor Jason Connery (son of Sean) went straight to DVD in the US. Old Fish (千鈞一髮) An unusual Chinese police drama, to say the least. A Harbin cop is forced — and able — to defuse a time bomb thanks to his engineering background, only to find that more and more explosives are being planted in the area, and his superiors want him to keep doing the dirty work. Is Dennis PHOTO COURTESY OF APPLAUSE ENTERTAINMENT Hopper on the loose? Ma Guowei (馬國偉) plays “Old Fish,” the put-upon policeman, in an award-winning turn. Directed by Gao Qunshu (高群書), who co-directed The Message (風聲), which is currently on release. Imagining the unimaginable Plastic City (蕩寇) A Chinese crook (Anthony Wong, 黃秋生) and his cooler-than-cool ‘City of Life and Death’ attempts to come to grips with the Nanjing Massacre adopted Japanese son struggle to keep their enterprise afloat in Sao BY HO YI Paulo, Brazil, when rivals and the StAff REPORTER authorities turn on them, including a Taiwanese entrepreneur. eventy-two years after shifts to a Chinese resistance to save others. Rabe’s Chinese no deeper significance. Strangely Critics said the fascinating idea behind the film and its the Nanjing Massacre, fighter (played by Liu Ye, 劉燁) assistant Tang (Fan Wei, 范偉) enough, it is only when the director visual distinctiveness were undercut by avoidable technical the atrocity remains an and his men. Suddenly there is plays the role of collaborator is done with the raping and killing problems (dubbing, for starters) and a stereotypically art house unresolved trauma. China an exchange of machine gun fire as he tries to save his family by that his cinematic poetry begins to divergence from coherent narrative — not to mention stylistic Sestimates a death toll of some and exploding grenades. We can striking a deal with the Japanese. surface, enthralling the audience lapses that verge on the silly. CITY OF LIFE AND DEATH 300,000, while Japan has yet to hardly tell the Japanese soldiers Meanwhile, the camera with its rich complexity of offer a formal written apology. In from the Chinese fighters as 南京！南京！ takes us on a journey through composition and imagery. 復仇 Chinese director Lu Chuan’s the camera frantically switches the conflicted Kadokawa’s own With production designer Vengeance ( ) (陸川) third feature perspective back and forth personal hell, as he is destroyed Hao Yi’s (郝藝) sets of destroyed Johnnie To (杜琪峰) is a Hong Kong City of Life DIRECTED BY: 南京！南京！ director who has kept pumping and Death ( ), this between the two sides who are Lu CHUAN (陸川) bit by bit by the inhumanity that buildings and streets, Nanjing sensitive subject is given a shown as equals in terms of mettle surrounds him. resembles an impressionistic limbo out solid action flicks over the dramatic contour that fortunately and morality. STARRING: To visualize an atrocity rarely that reflects the psychological years. He probably doesn’t have dwells neither on excessive grief We then move deeper into the LIU YE (劉燁) AS Lu JIANXIONG, visited by cinema, director Lu frenzy and spiritual void of its as much international exposure as nor nationalistic indignation. city with young Japanese soldier GAO YuANYUAN (高圓圓) blends gripping realism with a inhabitants. The Japanese soldiers he should, but this film may help Shot in black and white, the Kadokawa (Hideo Nakaizumi). He AS MISS JIANG, HIDEO NAKAIZumI lyrical style that gives his imagery look no better than their ghostly to change that. The lead actor is artistically accomplished film and his fellow soldiers stumble AS KADokAWA, FAN WEI (范偉) its haunting power. The elegant victims, tramping through the legendary French singer Johnny Hallyday, who arrives in Macau takes a gut-wrenching look at upon a church where Chinese AS MR TANG black-and-white cinematography desolate landscape like phantoms. after his daughter is nearly killed in a triad hit (the rest of her the brutalities that took place men, women and children have by Cao Yu (曹郁) exudes a sense of The most unforgettable family is wiped out). Hallyday, now a chef, must draw on his during a six-week period starting taken shelter. Kadokawa trembles, RUNNING TIME: sober detachment and spares the cinematic moment takes unsavory past to accomplish his vengeful mission — but that in December 1937. Not afraid of rushes out and screams for 135 MINUTES audience from experiencing the place toward the end of the past is disappearing as an old injury accelerates his amnesia. portraying the blurring of moral backup. His cries linger amid the full effect of the violence and gore, film. A Japanese victory ritual Co-stars include the formidable Anthony Wong (黃秋生) as a boundaries on either side of the devastated landscape. Language: which may have appeared intoler- is performed with rhythmic criminal (again) and Simon Yam (任達華) as a triad boss. conflict, director Lu chooses to The city is soon filled with IN MANDARIN, JAPANESE, ably monstrous if filmed in color. drumming and dancing by show the irrationality of war corpses of executed Chinese ENGLISH AND SHANGHAINESE WITH However, as a dramatic soldiers. The men perform through a succession of events soldiers and civilians. Those who CHINESE AND ENGLISH SUBTITLES reflection on a national trauma, ceremonial gestures, slowly Chef’s Special centering on a small number of manage to survive find shelter the film is designed to imagine the marching down the empty, ruined Chef’s Special throws together a characters, both Chinese and in a refuge area operated by a Taiwan release: unimaginable. The bulk of the film streets. The sight is eerie and bunch of funny characters centered Japanese, examining humanity in score of Westerners including ToDAY shows civilians and soldiers being unworldly, much like the atrocity around a restaurant in Spain whose its faults and virtues. the “good Nazi” John Rabe (John herded into groups and massacred, itself. An unthinkable horror chef is struggling to cope with life’s It is the winter of 1937. We Paisley). Female teacher Jiang women gang raped and children has been rendered in cinematic challenges, though vengeance plays follow a Japanese soldier and (Gao Yuanyuan, 高圓圓) helps to killed. The violence is portrayed in form right before our eyes, yet it no role this time. It’s a comedy, so enter the devastated Chinese oversee the camp and is a heroic an almost matter-of-fact manner. remains unfathomable even seven things can only get more chaotic; capital of Nanjing. The camera archetype willing to risk her life It sickens and repels, but posits decades later. in this case, the chef finds himself in a relationship with his new neighbor despite the fact that one of his female employees wants the man for herself — and that’s only one plot line. Vibrant and amusing, this is a crowd-pleaser that stands out in a busy week FILM REVIEW of releases. by the reactions of those around The Song of Sparrows This is It was made using behind-the- MICHAEL JACKSON’S him, his presence at the rehearsals Iranian filmmakers regularly scenes footage of Michael Jackson’s last is a rarity. deliver outstanding product, and rehearsals as he prepared for a marathon THIS IS It There’s also no getting over his while this award-winning drama run of farewell concerts in London. appearance — the ski-jump nose, from last year may not be in the PHOTO COURTESY OF SONY PICTURES exaggerated chin and trembling top tier, it should please fans of DIRECTED BY: white fingers — blown up large on Middle East cinema. A worker at KENNY ORTEGA the screen. During the elaborate an ostrich farm loses his job and travels to Tehran, where he struggles to maintain his sense of beginning or end. It’s padded with STARRING: production for Thriller, which aims mind-numbing scenes of dancers MICHAEL JACKSON to modernize the original video self as the urban environment closes in around him, leading learning their moves. And the star, with live dancers, there’s a grim to a tragedy — or so it seems. Salon.com called this visually whose name appears in the title, RUNNING TIME: chill that comes from watching handsome film “leisurely and lovely.” Directed by Majid Majidi, seems completely unaware that 112 MINUTES the pale man in his Ed Hardy who has built a solid reputation over the years.