Loneliness is the clock of midnight

Margaretta 2022-04-21 09:03:32

Tsai Ming-liang is an indispensable and important role when it comes to Taiwanese movies. Different from other "famous directors" in Taiwan, Yang Dechang, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Wu Nianzhen... They are dedicated to showing the social life at the same time, reflecting the mode of getting along with people and the state of communication, calmly or affectionately revealing the social picture, even in the Among them, to expose the trauma of the times, Cai Mingliang's films do not have this "sympathetic" feature. They are private, obscure, and indescribable. In short, Cai Mingliang focuses more on "people". Emotional mining. "Eight o'clock on your side" well implements Cai Mingliang's previous work style. It can even be said that the feelings presented in this film - loneliness and loneliness, can even be said to be fatal! It tells the story of Xiaokang, who sells watches on the flyover, and meets Xiangqi, who just needs a watch. Since then, Xiaokang has become a little lost. He starts watching French movies and sets the alarm clock forward by seven hours... At the same time, he goes to France Xiangqi and her widowed mother are also experiencing the dark clouds of loneliness shrouding their world. The story of this film is weak, of course, this is also a feature of Cai Mingliang's images. They are like old-fashioned bread that is not good-looking. Only when you chew it repeatedly can you taste the mellow flavor. For the sake of this strong fragrance, Cai Mingliang spends most of the pages to let the characters in it practice their inner loneliness, that is, to use specific and metaphysical plots to "interpret" the metaphysical mental state. For example, Xiaokang went to buy a French movie disc, secretly went to the mall to set up all the alarm clocks in the mall... These seemingly clueless and meaningless behaviors, in fact, are in subtle ways, to complete the emotional climax anytime, anywhere The shaping of the image's characteristics also contributed to the emotional impact: it was because of the "unconsciousness" that the abnormal behavior was made. And this "unconsciousness" is actually a derivation of a state of "lost" or "ungained". Similar to a transition between emotion and practice, it is also a testimony, if the audience can understand At this level, you will find the subtlety of the storyline. It is like searching for treasures according to the map. After a thousand hardships, after finding the gold and silver, you are very happy, but soon you will fall into the emptiness caused by the abundance. For delicate feelings, the best way to express them is long shots. Its long characteristics are highly compatible with the "exploitation" of delicate emotions. The director uses a lot of long shots in the film to show the state of the characters - usually by placing the protagonist in an extreme space (either loud or silent) with small movements and minimal dialogue, everything is in a kind of ready-to-go. The tense state of the hair, and the characteristics of long shots are also fully utilized here. It tries its best to prolong the emotional turmoil, leaving the audience at a loss, unable to judge the director's strength point, helpless, and can only feel the breath of the film with heart, Then, on the basis of full experience, we can turn passive into active. Although the emotions are fully rendered, it also leads to a certain threshold for entering the film, which will block the interruption of the audience's film journey. In terms of tones, the director chose the usual cool tones, which is different from the blue and blue of the previous work "Long Live Love". The film is mostly based on yellow, green and gray, and the exposure is small, with many shadows, and the visibility of the picture is low. In this view, this may be a disadvantage, but it happens to be "tailor-made" by the director. An indescribable loneliness, more of which haunts at night, the cool tone, the shadow is just to fit this loneliness. As for the low visibility, it is because this loneliness is confined to the hazy, it is unclear, it can only be understood rather than spoken, and all it needs is a state of anxiety - a screaming head, aphasia, and distortion of the image. At the end of the film, Xiang Qi is leaning on the seat in the park. The sky is a light blue mixed with gray, which is different from the dark blue of despair at the end of "Long Live Love". It symbolizes a kind of beginning, an image of birth. The purpose of the director's final tones is no longer to render melancholy, but to herald a return. In the sequel "The Overpass is Missing", it can be known that Xiangqi still returned to her homeland, and she also went to Xiaokang. It can be seen that the difference in the director's color tone processing is a comprehensive consideration of the film, and the content of each part corresponds to the corresponding artistic technique. The reason why Director Tsai Ming-liang can visualize a loneliness with minimal movement and language is the composition of the picture in addition to the above points. He is good at creating contrasting relationships between characters and environments. For example, there is a scene in the film. Xiaokang is watching a movie in the cinema with a watch. There are only two people in the whole theater. The rest are rows of bright red seats. They are hidden in the darkness. The light of the screen flickers from time to time. yellow face. The contrast between quantity and color forms a strong visual impact, and an uncomfortable loneliness quietly occupies the heart, waiting to be defeated in one fell swoop. In addition, the angle of the composition of the film is sometimes irregular, forming a sense of disorder and frenzy, which is also a special treatment of externalizing the complex psychology of the characters, which is pioneering. From the beginning to the end, the director did not convey any emotion to the audience through words, but let the audience become busy, bewildered and lonely in the visual maze constructed by him. Listen to the audible, audible sound of clocks moving as they fall asleep. Everything is silent, every step of walking is a loss, it is the sting of missing, and it is the proof that expectations are delirium.

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Extended Reading

What Time Is It There? quotes

  • [first lines]

    Father: Hsiao Kang? Hsiao Kang?

  • Shiang-chyi: Come on. Sell me this one.

    Hsiao-kang: It'd be bad luck to own my watch.

    Shiang-chyi: Why?

    Hsiao-kang: Someone in my family just died. I'm in mourning. I can't sell it to you.