Behind me you see the empty bookshelves that my obsession with film has caused. Film teaches me most of the important concepts of life, such as cynicism, beauty, ugliness, subversion of societal norms, and what it is to be a tortured member of humanity. My passion for the medium is an important part of who I am as I stumble through existence in a desperate and frantic search for objective truths.
In Only Image Remains we are shown a small portion of the rich cinematic history of a nation whose leaders have made every effort to destroy the works of its artists and intellectuals.
Those of us that have seen Hou’s Three Times probably have a pretty good idea of our preference for each segment. Some fall for the 60’s pop infused romanticism of the first segment, some for the post-modern nihilism of the third segment, virtually no one falling in the second segment camp. It wasn’t until my recent rewatch of the film that I ….
Continuing our journey through the films of Hou, we come to uncharted waters with his 1993 film, The Puppetmaster (1993). This is a film that recounts the events in Taiwan leading up to the beginning of World War II and Japanese occupation. It tells this story through the eyes of Taiwan’s preeminent puppeteer …
Hsiao-hsien Hou is a director that requires a journey through his entire body of work before you will be able to find the pulse of his films. There is a set of conflicting philosophies running through his work, and his films tend to illustrate these philosophies in a wide variety of ways. There is an undercurrent of tradition and an endless …
Flight of the Red Balloon… How do I even begin a review for a film that is delicate enough to capture the whimsical naiveté of childhood but mature enough to have its heart broken because that light eventually gives way to the soul dampening shadows of adulthood? I sit here and try to sort out a way to encapsulate a small portion of this film in a passable …
The rhythmic drones of a train as it heads down unknown tracks to unknown destination and Hou’s Goodbye South, Goodbye has effectively set the tone for what is to come. The movement of a train has been a staple of cinema since its inception. It has power that is rooted in centuries of pre-established conventions and those tropes have drilled an idea …
Oppressive wind torments the lonely inhabitants of a desolate landscape. It sweeps across the lifeless, chalky soil with brutal relentlessness, tearing down the landscape one layer at a time. If there is a deity minding the shop it seems to have either lost interest in the plight of humanity or is actively working at its destruction, but in either case the …
The seeds of greatness require proper nurturing before they can flourish to their fullest potential. A specimen will do everything it can to thrive with the available resources it is given, but if certain parameters are not met the specimen will most likely wither away and die, creating growth opportunities for less remarkable specimens …
Golden sunlight spills onto the multihued grey surfaces of New York, lending secret treasures to the eyes of its “productive” inhabitants while they scurry from one day to the next without ever really being mentally present. Each apathetic participant in life’s games of chance operates without consideration given to their …
Jarring fragments from a new realm of creative possibilities flood the screen with mid 1990s CRT technological aesthetics. Motion and light existing solely in a fabricated vacuum circumnavigates the world at lightning speeds as material objects have been given a new method of intercommunication that requires waning levels of …