It is generally agreed that the new direction began with the 1982 Central Motion Picture Corporation movie "In Our Time," which featured four episodes, each by a different director. Actually, new cinema in Taiwan has somewhat deeper roots, going back to early attempts by Wang Chu-chin in "The Legends of Six Dynasties" and "Those Days in the Heaven," and by Lin Ching-chieh in "Student Days." "In Our Time" was also different from these earlier films because it was the first to receive extensive critical and media attention. In fact, change was in the wind, and for several substantial reasons.
First, Hong Kong cinema was making great inroads into the local movie market. Everything from martial arts movies to comedies was saturating local theaters. In response to the popularity of the imported movies, local directors began copying some of the same approaches to film making, an orientation reinforced by visits to Taiwan by many of Hong Kong's more creative new cinema directors.
Second, Taiwan's audiences were sick unto death of the locally made Kung Fu or martial arts productions and the renditions in film of syrupy romantic themes, many of which were based on novels by Chiung Yiao, which appealed primarily to female teenyboppers. "Never go to a domestic movie!" became a faddish comment indicating higher tastes and intellectual status. In an attempt to regain audiences, local directors turned to their version of "social realism," which boiled down to "violence plus soft pornography." Audiences could choose between blood or syrup, neither particularly stimulating alternatives.
Third, the print media entered the action as well. Many editors and critics were concerned about the declining state of film production in Taiwan, and in the 1980s they began playing an important role in guiding opinion through their writing in newspapers and magazines about possible new directions in film production. Instead of filling up column space with gossip about the private lives and loves of movie stars, they turned to more serious topics.
For example, the Drama and Theater page of the Commercial Times, chaired by Chan Hung-chih and edited by Chen Yu-hang and Lee Yung-chuan, called on critics to promote new concepts in cinema. At the same time the United Daily News began running two columns, "Chiao Hsiung-ping at the Movies" and "Cinema Forum" by film critic Edwin Huang, that dug deeper than details about the sex lives of the stars.
Through the help of the newspapers' large circulations, both columns enjoyed a wide readership, and their assessments of local cinema began shaping public opinion enough to cause filmmakers, movie corporations, and even the government to take notice of the essentially low quality of film production in Taiwan. Positive results started to now slowly from all quarters as audiences and industry alike reevaluated the scene and began having considerably higher expectations from the craft.
The establishment of the Motion Picture Library in the late 1970s was a fourth development that helped prompt improvement in the local cinema scene. It built an extensive international collection of publications about film, and also began hosting international film festivals. The library offered qualitatively superior alternatives to much of what was appearing in local theaters, and gave Taiwan's audiences some of their first exposure to "artistic films" and "special focus films."
The literal explosion of popularity in video-taped movies further augmented the impact of the Library's imports. In a few short years, Taiwan's movie audiences became thoroughly internationalized, and the local industry faced serious financial difficulties because of the competition.
Fifth, an improving economic picture created radical changes in local lifestyles. Suddenly, like mushrooms after a summer shower, in basically agricultural Taiwan there emerged modern, urban centers. These gave rise to new forms of culture, specifically metropolitan culture, and concomitant shifts in tastes and forms of entertainment. The challenges of a rapidly changing environment, and learning how to cope with it, soon became a subject for movies as much as for daily decision-making. The old escapism of superficial romance and Kung Fu movies was no longer relevant.
Sixth, the ROC's Government information Office became involved with the "new cinema culture." After conducting a study of college students and film preferences, the GIO began sponsoring campus film festivals. In addition, the Golden Horse Awards were designed to encourage excellence in local movie production, with the government proposing three guiding principles for the industry: internationalism, professionalism, and artistry. The industry began to respond to the new atmosphere and the challenges it presented, and before long several local directors of "new cinema" were making names for themselves in international film festivals.
The greatest difference between the directors of new cinema and the old-generation directors is that the former thoroughly rejected the old commercial forms of escapism. They were no longer the weavers of superficial love stories, nor the creators of heroes through scenes full of Kung Fu stunt acting. With unprecedented sincerity, they sought materials for their films from daily life and literary tradition. Their goal was to construct an image of and for Chinese people here and now.
Because these directors and script writers were comparatively young, they frequently searched their own memories for film themes. "Growing-up" became the most important subject for their work. This happened for several reasons.
Reflections on personal maturation in a rapidly changing world was seen as an important subject for personal assessment by directors and scriptwriters alike. The majority of them were born around 1949, so that the searing wars, international and civil, of the 20th Century were for the most part only history, not personal experience.
Instead, their interests focused on the years of overwhelming, concentrated change in Taiwan's politics, society, and economy. Growing up in such an environment, they experienced first-hand the difficulties that arise when old forms are jettisoned for new, often with confusing and deleterious results. Transformations in ways of thinking were no less startling than the altered landscape of cities rising from rice paddies, or super-highways replacing gravel roads.
Not surprisingly, film was seen as a means to bring some sort of sense to the past by chronicling change from the perspective of the director's own life. Hence the rise of the autobiographical film. Taiwan's audiences were fortunate to have their first example from Hou Hsiao-hsien, "The Time to Live and the Time to Die," for it set high standards of technical excellence and intellectual sensitivity.
Hou's film was soon joined by other autobiographical works, including Wu Nien-jen's "Dust in the Wind," and Chu Tien-wen's partially autobiographical "A Summer at Grandpa's."
Moreover, because of the simultaneous and often interlocking growth of autobiographical and realistic films, Taiwan's directors suddenly found that their works were more in line with international tastes in cinema. There were human stories to be told, and to be set against the background of modernizing societies where social change had difficulty keeping pace with economic change. Taiwan itself offered a rich body of themes along this line, and local directors began tapping them.
Changing views about the Chinese mainland, for example, were sensitively recorded in "The Time to Live and the Time to Die." "Taipei Story" dealt with economic changes and the impact these have on urban dwellers, and "The Sandwich Man" chronicled the pains of imperialism and related issues. Other themes such as shifts in paternal authority, marital crises, the problems faced by veterans and aborigines, and environmental problems all became subjects of new cinema films that brought both personal perspectives and realistic social commentary together in often powerful films.
But a difficulty emerged. The films appealed at first to a large, mass audience because of their novelty. But eventually the audience size dwindled to the so-called intellectual audiences. The masses saw enough problems in their lives in the real world; movies were supposed to be an escape, not filmed sociology classes. Before long, the new cinema directors were having difficulty finding financing for their films.
Despite these problems, the new cinema orientation lives, and its approach has made impressive marks in local cinema history. It has given the movie industry a previously unknown breadth and depth, qualities that continue to influence its development.
One of the more important contributions of new cinema and its so far brief legacy has been in narrative and an essentially new film language. The pattern and structure of new cinema differs considerably from traditional cinema; therefore, it represents a new self-consciousness both for film makers and their audiences.
In the first place, new cinema is often full of self-conscious inner-searching by film makers, an orientation that distinguishes it from the old cinema. It is a style that makes the world conform to a very personal view of reality. This is achieved by abandoning traditional patterns of drama and putting emphasis on the aesthetics of solitude and tranquillity, which gives rise to multiple messages previously rare on the screen. Several techniques are used to produce these effects.
Ellipsis, for example, purposely omits some parts of the logical relations between cause and effect which are indispensable for dramatization, trying instead to appeal to the audience's association, organization, and sensitivity toward the nature of the media. The long-take, on the other hand, places no intentional emphasis on a certain dramatic or visual focus; it just lets time, in tune with the visual liberty of deep focus photography, show the meaning of reality.
Another technique allows space and depth to develop unprecedented complexity. This flows from the new generation filmmakers' more self-conscious acknowledgment and application of the elements and the nature of a picture. In other words, the fragile dramatic technique depending on dialogue and plot is replaced by a more dramatized and complicated pattern.
New cinema also offers a more implicit and reserved way of acting. It is good at mixing professional and amateur actors and adopting a way of acting that seems more natural rather than focusing on agitation and exaggeration. While it tries to keep close to reality—the outer appearances, behavior, and details of life—it also secretly integrates some close-ups of the expressions of people who are not performing. This is a technique used quite effectively by Chen Kun-hou and Hou Hsiao-hsien. These shots give the motion picture a novel and practical character, one that totally rids film of the rigid formula and artificialness of the studio style. The effect is heightened oftentimes by emphasizing dialectic tension and contrast in sound/visual coordination, and in the montage editing.
Second, there is no visible tendency of the new film language toward reaching unanimity. Quite to the contrary, its development is diversified and alive. For example, because Hou Hsiao-hsien pays special attention to reality and integrates characters, situations, and the environment so thoroughly, he thus steps into the category of "the realistic style."
Edward Yang, with his intellectual sensitivity and his very self-conscious Western-style aesthetics, brings cinema into higher levels of artistry through his own delicate and subtle contributions. Other examples are the avant-garde and surrealism of Chiu Kang-chien's "Playboys of the Tang Dynasty" (which reminds one of Fellini's grotesque aesthetics, surprising and bold camera positions, and camera movement), Roy Tsang's sound/visual experiment in "Woman of Wrath," and Chang Yi's trying to figure out new powers of expression in narration.
Third, the new film language appeals to the new generation's sensitivity toward cinema. Owing to its use of anti-traditional dramatizing techniques, it has changed the experience of enjoying a movie in Taiwan's audiences. Suddenly, instead of counting the number of bodies chopped to bits in a Kung Fu scene, or passively waiting to be entertained by a light romance, they must positively select, absorb, think, and reflect.
Fourth, a negative point: the simple and crude recording and dubbing equipment frequently used by new cinema directors have hindered the development of the vocal sensitivity of the film language. Dialogue and music remain the weakest of all parts of filming; the potentialities of sound have never been given enough attention, and the operation of music has many weak points. Recently, using dialect in the dialogue has increased the sense of reality in films, but generally speaking, the vocal performance is the weakest part.
After the initial new cinema established a solid foundation, many directors since 1983 have begun a "second wave" of new cinema, sometimes referred to by critical observers as the age of "exploitation and commercialism." These directors have various backgrounds. Some are old hands who have been active in this circle for years, such as Chiu Kang-chien and Lo Wei-ming, two outstanding persons in cinema criticism, script writing, and film publications. Both studied dramatic and theatrical arts in the U.S. and were key figures in establishing the important local film publications Theater and Influence.
Other directors have strong academic backgrounds, such as Lee Yu-ning, Li Chi-hua, and Fred Tan, and some come from other parts of the industry. For example, Yu Kan-ping and Yang Li-kuo were former assistant directors, Liao Ching-sung was formerly a film editor, Mai Ta-chieh made experimental films, and Yeh Chin-sheng was a producer and investor.
These late new-school directors are different from their earlier counterparts. They are much more sophisticated, apt to adjust to prevailing practices, and are more flexible when manipulating manpower and equipment. In concept and method, they are not so uncompromising with the administrative part of the industry or with the GIO's Department of Motion Picture Affairs. However, in general they have achieved less when compared with the early new-school directors who have given cinema more dignity and creativity.
Obviously, these newcomers no longer insist in pure realism, Lo Wei-ming and Chiu Kang-chien are making very stylized and personalized films. Chiu's "Playboys of the Tang Dynasty" made a breakthrough in pattern, theme, and conceptual ideology. It is full of surrealistic imagination and a touch of avant-garde. In the second part of "Ah Fu's Present," Lo, in an European introspective style, reproduces a nightmare-like Cultural Revolution experience. Both works have weaknesses, but their bold experimentation and the spirit of originality are in sharp contrast to their predecessors.
Oftentimes, "realism" becomes a slogan for exploitation. The later new cinema school often turns the previous sympathetic feelings for humble people, which generally prevails in the works of the earlier directors, toward films geared for commercial advertisement. Examples are "On Stage and Off Stage," "The Relation between Father and Son," and "Papa, Can You Hear Me Sing?" (see FCR, November 1983)
Sometimes these new directors even go back to the illusory dreamlands of irresponsible myths, once again drawing on earlier movie themes geared for audiences with no sophisticated expectations for their theater money. Critic Edwin Huang calls their productions "sentimental bombs," In "Papa, Can You Hear Me Sing?" a poor girl turns into a glamorous singer. In "On Stage and Off Stage," a sleazy strip show has turned into a joyful carnival. Or in "Taipei Mythology," a colorful heavenly cabin appears on an isolated mountain. All these are but proofs of the digression from the earlier period of new cinema and its humanist ideal: to deal with what really concerns humble, ordinary people.
What is worse about the latter development in new cinema is that they actually poke fun at those poor people who have had to bear up under great misfortune. They have become films that poke fun at tragedies. "Rose, Rose, I Love You," "Missing People," and "The Taste of Mercy," are examples of this questionable approach. The new orientation has also emphasized sex, such as seen in "The Portrait of All Beauties" and "Spring Beyond the Bamboo Fence."
The formerly sincere humanism is also swallowed up by commercialism. Film marketing now takes the "new commercial route." Examples are Fred Tan's "The Dark Night" and Lo Wei-ming's "Ah Fu's Present." Although these use more delicate multi-camera shooting, there is heavy reliance on sensational elements to bolster commercial appeal.
From the beginning, Taiwan's cinema has a close relationship with novels. In his time as the head of the Kuo Lien Film Company, Lee Han-hsiang made novels his major story source for films. One of his first investments was director Sung Chun-shou's masterpiece "Dawning," which was based on Chu Hsi-ning's novel of the same name. The trend of adapting Chiung Yao's novels to popular films also started at that time, and director Pai Ching-jui's famous work, "Good-bye, Ah Lang!" took its story structure from Chen Ying-chen's novel, The Tribe of the Generals.
Because of the smashing success of "The Sandwich Man" at the box office at the very beginning of the new cinema, Huang Chun-ming became a favorite choice among the list of novelists. Many film companies tried hard to rework his A Flower in the Raining Night and Sayonara, Good-bye for film. Generally speaking, regional novels have achieved the attention of society through film, and the works of Wang Chen-ho, Yang Ching-tsu, and Chi Teng-sheng have therefore also been favored by the motion picture industry.
Beyond regional novels, important novelists of the 1960s, such as Pai Hsien-yung, and Taiwan's faddish female writers, such as Li Ang, Liao Hui-ying, and Chu Tien-wen, are in fashion as well. The regional novel as a film source has also influenced casting for films, for now actresses who look more like local girls, such as Lu Hsiao-fen, Chang Chun-fang, and Su Ming-ming, tend to take the place of the more Western-appearing Terry Hu and Sylvia Chang, Of these, Lu Hsiao-fen has been the busiest actress, starring in many films, such as "A Cart of Dowry," "A Flower in the Raining Night," "Virgin Lad," "Love Is Grown with Flowers," and "Osmanthus Alley."
The trend of drawing on novels for movie scripts flows from several causes. First, there is a shortage of good original scripts, Most of the new-school directors and some scriptwriters are young, with insufficient experience, and they cannot meet the demands of all the producers. Novels therefore become a convenient source, plus their story lines have already proved their appeal.
Second, most of the new-school filmmakers are themselves attracted to regional novels. The reading of writers like Eileen Chang and Pai Hsien-yung was an almost indispensable experience to their growth. Such an experience "vibrates" harmoniously with the psychology of the new generation intellectuals. These filmmakers feel the same about Pai's charming language and well-ordered imagery, for example, and are generally attracted to the sympathetic feelings that characterize the regional novel.
Third, a large number of novelists engage in writing or revising film scripts. For example, the Chu sisters wrote "Growing Up," "A Summer at Grandpa's," and "The Boys from Fengkuei" for directors Hou Hsiao-hsien and Chen Kun-hou, Hsiao Hsa wrote for her husband Chang Yi, and Huang Chun-ming wrote a script based on his own novel. These people all helped put stories from novels on the screen.
Of course, not every script revised from a novel meets with success. Hsiao Yeh insists that the literary character of the new cinema comes from script writing and the quality of directing, and does not just originate from novels. He has a good point, because there are all too many rough and grotesque scripts based upon novels. Some so-called "realistic works" adapted from various regional novels have especially lost the vision which helps audiences understand Chinese society and history by clarifying the situation of humble people. Too many of these films have beat around the bush, dwelling on the superficial meanings of these often pitiful stories; they miss the essence of the whole environment.
Among these less than successful attempts are those works that fall into the category of "popular drama," such as "Virgin Lad," "A Cart of Dowry," "A Flower in the Raining Night," "The Last Night of Madame Chin," and "The Matrimony." Other works just exploit the poor characters' humble social status and miserable situations, and use promotional gimmicks plus pornography to make a splash in the market. Examples of this less than endearing form are the nude of a gigolo in "The Portrait of All Beauties," the close-up of love-making in "The Dark Night," the extramarital affair in "A Road with No Returning," and the teasing prostitutes in "Rose, Rose. I Love You."
Today it is difficult to determine exactly what direction new cinema will take. No doubt those "later new cinema" types who take advantage of the fame of novels and their writers and try to parlay them into box office receipts will continue to put movies on the screen, They will twist the genuine sympathetic portrayals of humble people into a form that ridicules rather than achieves sensitive insight, each time offering the public a fish eye as a pearl. By doing so, they confuse audiences and critics alike, and make the novels-turned-filmscripts less impressive.
It is hoped that more directors, like some of the best of the "older new cinema" school, will strike a healthier balance between what sells at the box office and what correctly should pass for high-quality cinema.