A 228 minutes saga from the late Taiwanese director Edward Yang (Yi Yi 2000, 10/10; A CONFUCIAN'S CONFUSION 1994, 8/10), A BRIGHTER SUMMER DAY, whose literal translation of its original Chinese title is "The Murder Incident of the Boy on Guling Street", is based on a true event in the 1960s, a 14-year-old boy murdered his 13-year-old girlfriend, and became the first juvenile offender served in jail since millions of mainland Chinese retreated to Taiwan in 1949 after the civil war.
Xiao Si'r (Chen Chang in his film debut) is a high school boy, the fourth child (out of 5) in the family, his parents, played by Kuo-Chu Chang and Elaine Jin, are the first generation of immigrants from mainland China. Significantly introduced by the inter-titles at the beginning, for those who are oblivious of the political context, it is a generation of uncertainty and insecurity, they oscillate between kicking off their new life in an unfamiliar island (e.g. the Japanese house they live in) and wallowing in their past homeland, therefore, as their children, the future is more up in the air, the only viable way is to gang up and act out their adolescent hormone and hot-blooded rebellion by trite brawls, loafing around and merrymaking.
The film is an onerous undertaking for the Taiwan cinema (not only at that time), it encompasses more than one hundred amateur actors with multifarious locations, the epic of its narrative progression is patiently and elegantly drawn out by Yang's dispassionate camera angle (sometimes tilted) and long takes, the flux of emotions is gradual but ample, one memorable example is the killing spree in the pitch-black during the outage, overtly pays the homage of Bushido's code of vengeance, the cruelty of survival stands out markedly.
Before Xiao Si'r meets Ming (Lisa Yang, her one-and-only screen role to date), he is a top student in the class, irrelevant to any gangster behaviors, afterward he falls in love with her in the most implicit and Asian fashion, but she has a boyfriend Honey (Hongming Lin), who is the leader of the Little Park gang. When Xiao Si'r finally meets Honey, there is no hard feeling, Honey's idealistic lonely-hero ambition magnetizes him, and after Honey's death, he follows his suit to be the guardian angel of Ming and involuntarily is involved in the payback carnage.
Ming is the most complicated character in the film, firstly we watch her go back to a big house, presumably think she is from a well-heeled family, then we realize she lives with her single mother, who is the maid of the house, and soon is laid off because of her aggravated illness. Ming is much more mature and worldly than her age, and her innocuous looks can easily deceive audience and the infatuated Xiao Si'r. During the pivotal stabbing sequences, she determinedly hollers "the world will not change for you!", it sharply counters Xiao Si'r's indoctrinated belief "my destiny is in my own hands", two worlds collide, and casualty ensues. Here comes the act of passion and its grim consequences. It is a cri-de-cur from a disillusioned youth, to the adult promiscuity, to the ubiquitous bureaucracy, to the unjust world!
Yang presents an ultra-rich fodder among numerous supporting characters, each one brings about a certain empathy in the societal furnace, Xiao Si'r's family in particular, five children are all imbued with their distinct dispositions and the tenable relationships among siblings are by turns heart-melting and heartily-understanding. Their father undergoes a sea change when being excruciatingly investigated by the national security officials, Kuo-Chu Chang and Elaine Jin are professional thespians among the large cast, both are strikingly captivating without any incongruous histrionics with the rest first-time youngsters.
A BRIGHTER SUMMER DAY is one of the most important contemporary masterpiece of Taiwan cinema, and should be recommended to cinephiles from all over the world with Yang's other legacies, I can write a lengthy essay parsing every single role and contextualizing their incisive bonds under that particular societal backdrop, but first of all, it is in urgent need of BluRay restoration, the DVD version I watched is way too inferior.
Xiao Si'r (Chen Chang in his film debut) is a high school boy, the fourth child (out of 5) in the family, his parents, played by Kuo-Chu Chang and Elaine Jin, are the first generation of immigrants from mainland China. Significantly introduced by the inter-titles at the beginning, for those who are oblivious of the political context, it is a generation of uncertainty and insecurity, they oscillate between kicking off their new life in an unfamiliar island (e.g. the Japanese house they live in) and wallowing in their past homeland, therefore, as their children, the future is more up in the air, the only viable way is to gang up and act out their adolescent hormone and hot-blooded rebellion by trite brawls, loafing around and merrymaking.
The film is an onerous undertaking for the Taiwan cinema (not only at that time), it encompasses more than one hundred amateur actors with multifarious locations, the epic of its narrative progression is patiently and elegantly drawn out by Yang's dispassionate camera angle (sometimes tilted) and long takes, the flux of emotions is gradual but ample, one memorable example is the killing spree in the pitch-black during the outage, overtly pays the homage of Bushido's code of vengeance, the cruelty of survival stands out markedly.
Before Xiao Si'r meets Ming (Lisa Yang, her one-and-only screen role to date), he is a top student in the class, irrelevant to any gangster behaviors, afterward he falls in love with her in the most implicit and Asian fashion, but she has a boyfriend Honey (Hongming Lin), who is the leader of the Little Park gang. When Xiao Si'r finally meets Honey, there is no hard feeling, Honey's idealistic lonely-hero ambition magnetizes him, and after Honey's death, he follows his suit to be the guardian angel of Ming and involuntarily is involved in the payback carnage.
Ming is the most complicated character in the film, firstly we watch her go back to a big house, presumably think she is from a well-heeled family, then we realize she lives with her single mother, who is the maid of the house, and soon is laid off because of her aggravated illness. Ming is much more mature and worldly than her age, and her innocuous looks can easily deceive audience and the infatuated Xiao Si'r. During the pivotal stabbing sequences, she determinedly hollers "the world will not change for you!", it sharply counters Xiao Si'r's indoctrinated belief "my destiny is in my own hands", two worlds collide, and casualty ensues. Here comes the act of passion and its grim consequences. It is a cri-de-cur from a disillusioned youth, to the adult promiscuity, to the ubiquitous bureaucracy, to the unjust world!
Yang presents an ultra-rich fodder among numerous supporting characters, each one brings about a certain empathy in the societal furnace, Xiao Si'r's family in particular, five children are all imbued with their distinct dispositions and the tenable relationships among siblings are by turns heart-melting and heartily-understanding. Their father undergoes a sea change when being excruciatingly investigated by the national security officials, Kuo-Chu Chang and Elaine Jin are professional thespians among the large cast, both are strikingly captivating without any incongruous histrionics with the rest first-time youngsters.
A BRIGHTER SUMMER DAY is one of the most important contemporary masterpiece of Taiwan cinema, and should be recommended to cinephiles from all over the world with Yang's other legacies, I can write a lengthy essay parsing every single role and contextualizing their incisive bonds under that particular societal backdrop, but first of all, it is in urgent need of BluRay restoration, the DVD version I watched is way too inferior.