Much is left unsaid in Father to Son, but as relationships between fathers and sons go, especially in Asian culture where affection is not always openly expressed, how much can be explicit?
The storylines and relations seem complicated in this poignant, subtle drama as it follows a 60-year-old, still rather dashing Fan Pao-te (Michael Huang, 黃仲崑), who falls ill at the beginning of the film and tries to come to terms with mortality and closure, especially with his father, who abandoned the family when he was young to seek his fortune in Japan.
Fan and his son (Fu Meng-po, 傅孟柏) are the focus of the main plot, but the film also spotlights many other characters while flashing back throughout Fan’s childhood and young adulthood. The parallels among fathers and sons, especially the relationships — or lack thereof — are apparent and it’s clear that history repeats itself in this small southern town. But fate can also be changed.
Photo courtesy of atmovies.com
The cinematography is stunning, and director Hsiao Ya-chuan (蕭雅全) chooses his backdrops well. Although the story is set mostly on one street in a sleepy, nondescript town, it fully makes use of the notion of being stuck in time with an old hotel, a traditional laundry shop with a sign emblazoned with black and gold calligraphy and a Japanese era-style hospital with terrazzo floors and long, narrow hallways. Even the hostess club that Fan and his buddy frequent, the roadside stall where they drink or Fan’s hardware store are shot in a way that creates an air of the fantastic even though it’s clear that this is reality.
Is this 2018 or 1987? Although the flashbacks are made clear in black and white, sometimes it is hard to tell until someone whips out the latest model smartphone — and then things become blurred again as people are seen smoking in offices and restaurants when Fan visits Japan. Maybe it doesn’t matter, as some things simply don’t change no matter what the era.
Through Fan’s father, the story also stretches back to post-war Taiwan, depicting a society that still retains some of its old Japanese connections, and where people would prefer to head overseas to make it big than stay at home as a nobody.
Photo courtesy of atmovies.com
This is Hsiao’s third feature film since 2010’s Taipei Exchange (36個故事), continuing his poetic style of never directly tackling the subject but instead telling the story through delicate sentiments and subtle relationships. Although the film seems all over the place at the beginning, as the plot progresses, nothing is superfluous as there’s a whole backstory spanning many decades that slowly ties things together.
Although Fan chose a simple life as a hardware store owner and amateur inventor, he’s highly intelligent and deeply philosophical, making for a complex character that’s intriguing from the very beginning as he heads out to fix a friend’s electrical problem with his tools around his belt as if he were a cop heading to solve a crime.
His counterpart is his buddy A-kao (Long Shao-hua, 龍劭華), the carefree owner of a fruit store, who, although is not a major part of the film, does a brilliant job in providing chuckles and dragging Fan into his shenanigans. His elated expression when Fan, who had abstained from drinking since he fell ill, finally took a sip of beer, is priceless.
Fu also delivers a good performance as the son, and even though father and son do not seem to exchange many words, their affection and love for each other are clearly felt.
Hsiao is indeed deserving of best director at this year’s Taipei Film Awards, where the film also picked up best original score (Summer Lei, 雷光夏 and Chris Hou, 侯志堅) and best art direction. It’s a movie that’s meant to be felt and pondered upon, leaving the audience for much reflection long after the curtain draws.
Last week the Economist (“A short history of Taiwan and China, in maps,” July 10) and Al Jazeera both sent around short explainers of the Taiwan-China issue. The Al Jazeera explainer, which discussed the Cold War and the rivalry between the US and the People’s Republic of China (PRC), began in the postwar era with US intervention in the Chinese Civil War and the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) retreat to Taiwan. It was fairly standard, and it works because it appeals to the well-understood convention that Taiwan enters history in 1949 when the KMT retreats to it. Very different, and far
To step through the gates of the Lukang Folk Arts Museum (鹿港民俗文物館) is to step back 100 years and experience the opulent side of colonial Taiwan. The beautifully maintained mansion set amid a manicured yard is a prime example of the architecture in vogue among wealthy merchants of the day. To set foot inside the mansion itself is to step even further into the past, into the daily lives of Hokkien settlers under Qing rule in Taiwan. This museum should be on anyone’s must-see list in Lukang (鹿港), whether for its architectural spledor or its cultural value. The building was commissioned
July 15 to July 21 Depending on who you ask, Taiwan Youth (台灣青年) was a magazine that either spoke out against Japanese colonialism, espoused Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) ideology or promoted Taiwanese independence. That’s because three publications with contrasting ideologies, all bearing the same Chinese name, were established between 1920 and 1960. Curiously, none of them originated in Taiwan. The best known is probably The Tai Oan Chheng Lian, launched on July 16, 1920 by Taiwanese students in Tokyo as part of the growing non-violent resistance movement against Japanese colonial rule. A crucial part of the effort was to promote Taiwanese
Like many people juggling long hours at work, Chiharu Shimoda sought companionship via a dating app. For two months, he exchanged messages with five or six potential partners, but it wasn’t long before he was seeking out just one — a 24-year-old named Miku. Three months later, they got married. The catch: Miku is an AI bot. And Shimoda knew that from day one. The 52-year-old factory worker is one of over 5,000 users of Loverse, a year-old app that allows interaction only with generative artificial intelligence. Shimoda’s also among a much bigger cohort of people who’ve either given up or