 Good evening ladies and gentlemen My name is Benjamin Penny. I have the honor to be the deputy director of the Australian Center on China in the world Who is which is hosting this film screening and the conference Taiwan view from the south with which is associated and It's It's wonderful to see our auditorium so full and they say there is no audience for art forms This is truly And it's a wonderful thing. I think the way Tainan is one of the most extraordinary film directors Not just from Taiwan, but just one of the most extraordinary filmmakers working today We are showing his latest film. I believe it has had One possibly two screenings in this country before at the Melbourne International Film Festival this year I believe this is the only other screening that it's had So it's I had the privilege of seeing it in in Taipei a couple of months ago, and I know that you will find it A really rewarding experience So I'm going to hand over now to the Jaden who will be interviewing director Tai For 15 or so minutes. We will then show the film after the screening The there will be a approximately half an hour of questions and answers to director Tai just for those of you who don't know Jaden then there is a polymath Literary figure the author of 11 books Seven of which are novels Person who has been a journalist in China who has been engaged with Chinese literature film culture and politics for some years now and has had a career which has Involved Chinese cinema a cinema in Chinese from both sides of the straits and elsewhere as a critic as a Sub-titler as in all capacities. So I think it's wonderful and very Suitable that Linda should be the person who is interviewing director Saitama. I'll hand over now and All the best Thank you all very very much for coming. It's a great honor to have timing Leanne here with us today and what we're going to do is I'm going to be talking to him in Chinese and then I'm going to Translate I'm going to translate my questions and then I'll give you a brief translation of his answers We're going to what we're going to do is we're going to have a little conversation beforehand Just to set some things up for those of you who are So that you can think about when you're watching this film And for those of you who are not totally familiar with his films will just introduce a few of the themes So The first question I have is about sense of place and how that applies to this film您您拍電影的時候也說我地方就選的場地進地也可以算一個人我這個電影他的進地感我覺得很強而且我我我看了您接受的採訪說選選地選場地可能擁有很多很多時間能不能談一下今天晚上我們要看的交友的一些進地為什麼選對你我在回答你的問題可不可以先講兩句我說回答你的問題跟大家 say hello First say hello to everyone I hope that you're sort of mentally prepared for this. I'm sure that you are here. You probably know enough to be prepared Maybe you're going to sleep You might be prepared to have a little nap If you sleep And if you do fall asleep do not feel guilty You know theater is a pretty good place to have a nap Type of film where I fall asleep usually the action pictures But my films really are it's really easy to fall asleep in the If you're not sort of you know moving with it, then you suddenly go oh my god, I'm not I'm not there anymore This is a film about time But you can't have time without place So I see what she is I'll have 20 minutes. I'm going to find what she's doing. Hi, she's going to come in I've been making films for 20 years, and I've discovered that really what I'm talking about is time and place She's a good actor. It's good. She's a good one. She and the And the I've been and the with the actors as well. It is a thing about time If I didn't have to Lee Kang-sheng for 20 years, I'm not afraid I wouldn't have made this film if I had not been Working together with the actor Lee Kang-sheng for these 20 years, then I wouldn't have made this film I'm not very interested in the subject matter It's not particularly interesting social issue. I think my movie is not in the research society My films are not about society. I'm not really interested in social questions. It's not it's not about a particular topic It's it's a lot of people think this movie is People think of this film as a film about people who live on the margins people who live in the lower But I'm most interested in is in the face of my lead actor Lee Kang-sheng When He's he's only 45 years old and the first film that I made with him. He was he was 25 Now I'll answer your question This movie basically It seems to be filming in Taiwan or in Taipei Taiwan some cities, but you probably can't see the appearance of this city. It's basically no It's This this is a film in the place is a Taiwan city. It's not particularly specific. It's not necessarily Taipei Those are fake Where where it takes place it's all in these kind of in these places that are Like wastelands or urban wastelands and so on I love wastelands I want to live in Asia. I have a special feeling for my city The appearance is very argue. Why is it so ugly? Hey people around Asia are often Arguing about the nature of the cities there they live in and the face of the cities and you know, why is it so ugly? But she died off a bit in a feisty or so. He's not going to make But these wastelands these these ruined places are also very beautiful Yeah, those are very very fishy because he wouldn't be able to And there's so many of these sort of places around all of Asia because this is constant tearing down and building up and tearing down and building up And it just leaves a lot of these sort of wastelands around So it's really a film about that it's about these these these ruins these places If there's a family, but it's not you, you know, they exist within this I'm not gonna speak too much about that because you will see in a moment these incredibly beautiful ruins Wow, I'm not sure The there's a building in this that plays a central role in this film And it's an old apartment building from the 1970s which actually was destroyed in fire now at that time It was very fashionable to have wallpaper in your home So a lot of the this is kind of a burnt-out shell of a building But there's this sort of the remains of the wallpaper and then there's been Water has gotten into the building and has turned this wallpaper into something that is it Appears like a painting, but it's a painting that no painter could paint When I was looking for locations, I discovered this amazing mural that was made it was made out of charcoal And it was it was in this place where nobody went It wasn't something that some kids that just you know Drawn on a wall. It was it was a proper work of an artist I didn't know who drew it. Who painted it and that actually changed the conclusion of this film It really did change the way this whole film is structured because it when you're in front of that That mural it has this incredibly charismatic tendency. You just can't leave it. You can't tear yourself away And it was only much later I said charcoal, but I think what I mean is more like pastel like crayons or It's got color in it anyway. Anyway, at the end of the The process I finally found the artist and use this young artist. His name is Gao Junhong And he told me why he made this painting how it came about He's going to China because he went to Taiwan first and he took a lot of pictures in Taiwan It was like Taiwan's appearance, the appearance of the original This painting is a three-seater in a flat house in Taiwan, Tainan This picture is currently in the History Museum Oh, no, that's not what I'm trying to do. I found he even got a new version of the original This photo I made a new version of the original and I met Gao Junhong and used charcoal to draw this What happened was that he came upon a photograph which is actually in the Historical Museum in Taiwan And the photograph was taken by an Englishman who was in Taiwan in 1894 and he had taken a whole lot of photographs in Taiwan and this one was in Tainan and he had taken this photograph of this mountain range, it's very, very beautiful. So this artist made his mural on the basis of this old photograph that was by this English person who coincidentally, some French people, also made a woodblock print of. Gao Junhong, he is very interesting, after I met him, I showed him the lens that I took with his painting. He later told me that he was very shocked because he said that he never knew that he could see his painting at night. So later, after I met Gao Junhong, I showed him the film and he looked at his, he saw his mural in this film and he was really quite astonished. I mean, he was surprised because he said, I never realized you could even see this at night because there's a whole other sense of it. And this place, this mural and this place doesn't exist anymore, it's all been knocked down. So I think that's a really beautiful introduction to this film. We've been talking for, I think exactly 15 minutes and we're going, so what's going to happen is, we'll do the, we'll put on the film now and then afterwards I'll kick off with a question or two and then we'll open it up and we'll do this, we'll have about half an hour of Q&A. So I hope you enjoy the film and thank you so much. I hope that wasn't too rough on you all. So we're going to have a little Q&A, I thought I would kick it off by asking a question because your scripts are famously short and poetic and you don't write dialogue for the actors. So what I want to know is what did the script say for the cabbage scene? Did it say smother a cabbage, gouge its eyes out, eat it and weep? This is what I want to know is how you wrote that scene. 听懂听懂,听懂,听懂,听懂. 听懂四分之三。 剧本就是写小康吃高一餐。 所以李康生大概从十年前就拒绝看我的剧本。 但是我们还是会有时间聊一下, 简单的说大概延手, 平常聊一下, 就没有沟通, 就拍的时候, 今天要拍吃高丽菜, 他就来到现场, 他不知道要吃高丽菜, 然后他就看到有七八个高丽菜放在旁边, 我说你要把其中一个吃掉, 很简单的沟通, 他就演了, 然后一次, OK, 因为你看到那个镜头, 我不相信他还可以演得再好, 所以我就说收工, 而且也值得很多, 特别开心那天, 当然也很感动, 因为我非常相信我的演员可以做到这么好, 他真的就做到, 但是我不知道他会怎么做, I basically just said eat it, and Lee Kong Chung has refused to even read my scripts for the last ten years. So basically we just have this conversation and give him the general idea and then he goes with it. So with this one, there were all these different cabbages, so he had to pick one. Anyway, it was one take, he just carried on, and it was amazing. And so that was it, I didn't need to ask him to do anything else, and it was really moving actually. OK, now Lee Kong Chung, last year, I just finished a film about someone else, he was very good at reading the script. Last year? Last year, yes, and this film should be released this year. He was very good at reading the script, and the script is also about Japanese. He was reading the script every day, so I saw he was very angry, very jealous. So last year Lee Kong Chung was in somebody else's film, and he really worked hard at learning the script. He even had to learn to speak Japanese in the script, and he used so much effort, really put everything into it. And when I saw that, I was so angry. And jealous. We'll open it up to questions. Do we have a roving mic? Yes, we do. OK, so first question in the front. Well, first of all, thank you very much for making the film. It's completely fantastic, fabulous. Thank you. My question relates to the ideas and images of home and homelessness that one thinks about when watching that film. Also thinking about where you've made your films. I think one in Malaysia, mostly in Taiwan, but also in France. Is there a place or a country where you feel at home or you don't feel at home? Well, before I made this film, I really didn't have a sense of where I belonged. Well, before I made this film, I really didn't have a sense of where I belonged. I've lived in Taiwan for 30 years. Actually, in my heart, I think Taiwan is mine. I think it will remain forever. Because I am overseas Chinese, I came from Malaysia. I've been living in Taiwan for 30 years. So Taiwan is kind of, it's the place where I choose to stay, where I will stay. So I really like within my work to consider this question of home. Wherever I go, whether it's Malaysia or Taiwan, I'm always very drawn to the homeless, the people who live on the margins, the workers who come in from other places to work in the city. They're always, I'm always very drawn, I always look at them, I study them and very interested in them. And one of the things that I've noticed is the people in St Taipei who hold the signs for real estate, advertising this real estate, they very, very often are people who don't necessarily have home themselves. And it gives me a contradictory feeling, I have a contradictory feeling. And at once I both sympathize with them, I pity them or sympathize, at the same time I am envious. And sometimes if they lack some of the unhappiness that some of us have, you know, mortgages, finding places to live and so on, they just, you know, anywhere can be home. And so in the end, in this movie, the concept of home is recognized in a recollection, a memory, which is at the end, and it's this kind of, it's not a realistic thing. There's furniture, so there's an indication that this was a home, but it's obviously not a complete home. I want to stimulate people to think afresh about the concept of home. And recently, Lee Kang Chung and I moved to this place on a hill, a mountain, and suddenly I had this feeling like, I don't want to go anywhere else. That's it. We spent a lot of time roaming around, being outside, going, you know, floating, and really what we need is that mountain. And it's a familiar feeling because when I was little, I didn't live in the city, I lived outside, and so, you know, on the mountain, you wake up, there's birds, there's all this stuff, and you can run away. But within this home, I have found my lost world and the world that I love, and it has a lot to do with making this particular film. We have a question back there. I want to be honest with you that this is the first time I've finished watching your film. So can I have a certificate? Can I have a certificate because I think the first time I've finished watching your film? Or just joking. I got two questions, just simple questions. Because he hasn't seen them in the cinema, he's been watching the pirated versions. This is not my question. I want to ask a simple question. The first question is that I find out the way in which how you describe the detail is very different from what I've seen. What I mean is that you don't put detail into narration narratives, but you put in detail to itself. So I'm wondering what do you think about the details in film? The second question is that we have one question. The second question is that you don't put detail into narration narratives, but you put in detail to itself. So you provide a very special image of the political science of detail. To me, it's actually a total. It's like you're carrying a gun. So I want to ask you what do you think about the details in your film? The second question is that we have one question and other people have questions too. We shouldn't forget that images are expressed through films. We shouldn't forget that images are expressed through films. So what we often think of these films, we're often thinking of the story, we're often thinking of the narration. For me, it's really about the images. Films are about images. Of course, I want to seriously think about whether those stories are useful or not. So I haven't thought about it for a long time. I've been thinking about it for a long time. I see a lot of films and I often think, what is the use of narrative? What is the purpose of stories? I'll give you an example. We see a lot of war films. We see a lot of war films. You see them and you want to stop war. They're really powerful when you finish seeing them. You think we can't have war. War is terrible. But a hundred years later, we're still in war. So films can actually do that to change us. We should think about it. So what I want is the image, not the story. I feel like the image and not the story is really the essence of film. We return to that essence. So these images give us an emotional response to the images but we also ought to be stimulated to think as well. So I've been talking about it recently. I hope my work is like the moon on the sky. It's the same as the moon on the sky. There's no art that surpasses the moon. Recently I've had this thought and I wish my films could become like the moon that just sits there in the sky. Because there is no film that's more beautiful than the moon. And it doesn't tell you anything. There's no story that the moon tells you. But every single time you see it, it gives you a different inspiration or a different spark. And of course that represents nature's whole flower. And of course that represents nature's whole flower. So I hope that I can use a unique way to observe and use it. So it's very hard for me to create films like this in Xi'an. So I'm going to develop an artistic concept. So I don't like the idea of, I hope my films never sold onto airplanes for viewing on airplanes. I don't want them to be watched on the internet. I even have trouble with the idea of theaters. So recently I've come up with this new thing, which is to work with art galleries. The commission resized Ma Jiang Hong and what was the reason of it? There seemed to be so many possibilities, but what did he want to say when he resized Ma Jiang Hong? And I'll just make a note in case people don't know, the poem Ma Jiang Hong is what this lady was talking about. And it's a Song Dynasty poem by a guy called Yue Fei, who's a famous patriot. Why did you say Ma Jiang Hong? Because Lee Kang Shun can sing Ma Jiang Hong. Really? Because Lee Kang Shun can sing. I've just done that thing, because Lee Kang Shun can sing it. That's why. So Lee Kang Shun can sing it. And he can sing it. He can go to the toilet and find a place to sit and watch. So Lee Kang Shun can stand for eight hours. He can stand for anything, but it's hard to stand. So when I observe them, I spend some time observing them. I see a lot of people sing and sing by themselves. Or they can do it by themselves. And then I'll bring Lee Kang Shun over to ask him, what did you just say? Lee Kang Shun said, I'm in the youth. Youth, you know? And then I'll just... Okay. So I look at these guys who stand by the road holding these signs. And the thing is about this work is that they're not allowed to do anything else. So they can't listen to music. They can't even put something down on the ground. They can't rest their sign. They stand there for eight hours. If they have to go and relieve themselves, they have to take the sign with them. It's absolutely grueling. And so as a result, I've discovered that they often live out there talking to themselves or singing. And so I've gone out to them sometimes and gone, what are you singing? What are you saying? And some of them are reciting the sutras. Of course, I think of Lee Kang Shun as a singer. He's a singer in a normal life. Because that young boy in that age will always be a singer in school. So, of course, I want to think about what Lee Kang Shun is going to do. Sing Ma Jiang Hong. Ma Jiang Hong, of course, won't just randomly choose. It's also very serious to think about. It's important for this film. I think a lot of people feel that way. I think every era has a lot of people's feelings. What is my contribution to the newspaper? Maybe it's to report to the station. Maybe it's to fight for the position. So I think this film is a bit like Lao Zi's idea. In other words, asking why we live. Actually, it's a bit like Lao Zi's heaven and earth. You forget to go out. Everyone doesn't know why we live. One life. Okay. First of all, Lee Kang Shun, I knew that he could recite this poem, that he could sing this poem. So obviously that was a consideration. Because the generation to which he belongs, everybody learned that poem in school. So everybody can recite that poem. But it wasn't just a random choice. Because at the same time, what is in this poem is very expressive of a kind of sentiment that I was thinking about. The recitation of this poem. This movie also, the way I made this film also has a connection to the thoughts of Lao Zi, the Taoist philosopher. And Tendi Buran, who's it possible to translate? Anybody going to try Tendi Buran? Tendi Buran, you can say, This world is not possible. Heaven is not possible. Heaven is not possible. The nature itself is no mercy. Yeah, there's no mercy in the world. People just, they exist and there's no mercy towards them. I think we've got time for one more. And yeah, back there, last. You talked about images. And obviously I see the importance of the images. But I was very struck by the importance of sound in this film. And I want to ask you, and you're giving us an aesthetic experience that's visual but also auditory, right? And I want to ask you how much you considered sound when you were lining up those languid, long shots that you use. How much was that a part of your calculation in deciding on the shots? In addition to sound, this sound is very important. And in the long shots, especially in the long shots, how much did you consider the length of the sound? Is this what you considered? My sound, basically every sound, is a kind of environmental concept. Environmental, environmental, environmental. You know, environmental. A environmental return. So basically my idea is that, with all my films, is that I return the sound to you. And it's a kind of a disturbance. It's kind of an annoyance as well. And some people might think that the particular sounds aren't that important, so you know, we're not sure. But I think they're very important. And so each time I work with the post-production crew, I have to communicate with them really clearly because the way that they work, normally in this industry, is to get rid of what is unnecessary. And I actually like most what is unnecessary. And it seems to happen all the time. I go into the post-production studio and they've already gotten rid of all this stuff. And I'm like, no, no, no, bring it back. And it feels like it reminds me of exactly where this space was. And the scene where the kids come out from behind that tree, it seems like they're in the middle of some deep forest or jungle. But in fact, it's in the middle of the city. It's just one of these kind of waste areas. And what's really important in the sound in that one is that in the distance, very, very softly, if you listen, you can hear the sounds of a primary school. You can hear kids. And so they seem to be completely separated from the city and everything is going on there. But it's really, really close. I really do like the things that are not only useless, but also possibly meaningless. So sometimes I choose those sort of things. So the two people standing there with the signs for that long, it really doesn't necessarily, it's not necessarily something that has use or particular meaning, the extent of that. Because most of life goes past without use or meaning. Sometimes, you know, the audience or the people who have seen this movie they'll be like, why is it so long? They'll have an argument about this with me and I'll say, why? Because it's my movie.