Three Times
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Movie Reviews of Three Times
Movie Review: Three Times - Another Gem From Hou Hsiao-hsien
Summary: 4 Stars
Three Times is not a conventional movie, and I can understand how the slow pacing might alienate some viewers. Art is always subject to interpretation. For those who enjoy films that provoke ideas, introspection and philosophical debate, this is one such film.
Shu Qi and Chang Cheng are the lovers in acclaimed filmmaker Hou Hsiao-hsien's latest work. The film is almost like a non-sci-fi version of The Fountain set instead in three different eras in Taiwan. The actors play three sets of lovers in different historical settings, including 1966, 1911, and 2005. While "The Fountain" had eerie implications of reincarnation and a science fiction element, this film is instead a commentary on the universality of love.
In each of the historical periods, we see a very different kind of courtship where physical interaction is very limited. Yet in the modern era, it is possibly true intimacy that eludes them despite their easy access to physical satisfaction. While I will spare you the plot synopsis, watch carefully and draw your own conclusions.
The acting in this film is very subtle and stylized. The storyline is also developed slowly in each of the scenes. This allows us to really reflect on the historical context of each vignette, but it also makes this an impractical movie for the impatient and those looking for the simple pleasure of a movie instead of homework.
The real emphasis here is on the framing of the actors in idealized scenes. In that sense, the director uses all of his skills to strip away as much of the characters so that what we see most is their romantic interaction. These scenes approach photographs and the effect was intentional.
Conclusion
While I do believe this film is beautiful and well made, this is definitely a niche movie that is not for all audiences. I highly recommend this movie to students of Chinese culture and history as well as lovers of independent film.
If you are looking for a movie to be enjoyed at face value, look elsewhere as this may move too slowly for you. If you are willing to dig a little deeper, there is a lot of thought provoking material here. Give it a try.
Enjoy!
Movie Review: Three Times: A Century of Responses to Love
Summary: 4 Stars
THREE TIMES (Zui hao de shi guang) is so frank a film that the viewer may get lost looking for the hidden meanings in this century traversal of lovers' interactions in China. Not one for simple linear filmmaking, director Hsiao-hsien Hou instead opts for mood and suggestion and leaves the paucity of dialog to make room for emotional involvement and response. Three periods - 1966 A Time for Love, 1911 A Time for Freedom, and 2005 A Time for Youth - are depicted with the same main characters, Qi Shu and Chen Chang, who prove to be exceptionally sensitive to the concept from the director: with each new tale these fine actors mold new characters and questions and yet allow us to see a line of similarity in the couples as the director has suggested.
The film wisely opens with the most successful of the three 'Times' - 1966 A Time for Love - - tracing the emergence of timid passion between a lad headed for the military and a young girl who works in a pool hall. They communicate by letters after their first brief introductory encounter and circumstances interfere with the progress of their relationship in 1966 Taiwan. The middle section 1911 A Time for Freedom is gorgeous visually and conceptually the director has elected to use the cinematic form of the period (silent movie) to tell his story about the freeing of a young girl from the grip of a brothel madam and surveys the political tensions between Japan and China as the quietly lighted story of love and yearning unfolds. The film ends with 2005 A Time for Youth and here our lovers are caught up in the pollution of smog, cellphones, emails, nightclubs, and infidelities for same sex affairs that speak loudly about the tenor of the times.
Hsiao-hsien Hou's films are an acquired taste and many will find the choppy editing, the fragmentary scenes that are not always well focused for the story line, and the over-long length (130 minutes) too much to endure. But the ideas are fresh and the characters and vignettes are memorable, and most of the major critics in the media have lavished praise on this film. It is an interesting work but for this viewer there are enough flaws to keep it grounded. Grady Harp, August 07
Movie Review: Sexual Liberation is Not Emotional Liberation
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a haunting movie, which uses very little spoken dialog, and instead leaves the viewer to empathize with the emotions of the lovers. The movie has a special and unique feeling by virtue of this method of story-telling alone. By forcing the viewer to constantly ask "what is he/she feeling now?" the viewer is involved into each relationship almost as if the viewer was a silent third participant in each relationship.
I would like to have seen each relationship's back-story more fully developed. Instead, we get short glimpses into the history of each relationship, and we just have to infer how each relationship progressed. This may have been a deliberate decision of the story-teller, to trick the viewer into feeling more of the longing for the beloved - or the emptiness of the moments between love - than thinking about a narrative set of facts.
The first two stories have no visible sex, which enhances the story's focus on love as a condition of longing. In fact, a possible short coming of the stories is that they do not seem to reach for any conclusion. The beginning and ending point of each relationship seems to be the longing that each lover has for the other, each time fulfilled only imperfectly. The viewer is left dangling in each case, with many unanswered questions, trapped in the promise, occasional despair, and angst of love.
The final story is set in an era of sexual liberation, but the irony is that the participants seem more miserable in love than any of their naive historical predecessors. Free to have sex with anyone, Shu Qi seems to have no real purpose in love. She appears to be reduced to a set of impulses - none of which are well-explained, and none of which appear to satisfy her basic emotional needs in a sustainable or satisfactory way.
For a Western audience, this film begs to have another track on the DVD where the director or producer gives his take on each scene. I suspect that there are some Taiwanese cultural aspects to each film that would never be obvious to a Western audience without a guide.
Movie Review: Meditations on communication and love
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a beautiful film to watch despite the emphasis on stark reality. But it's a movie that's only going to interest a small percentage of the moviegoing population.
Even tho conflicts are vital ones like love and death, the stories are barely there. They strive for everyday naturalism -- without any of the dramatic peaks and valleys we've grown accustomed to in fiction. Most viewers will wonder when the story's gonna start.
The first of the three love stories (with same two lead actors in each, the female being the sexy, full-lipped Shu Qi) has VERY sparse dialog. But it's about characters unable to express themselves. The last story has a little more dialog but, like the first, it's all indirect. The drama comes from the behavior of the characters and from the things they don't say aloud. If the viewer is tuned into those sorts of things, considerable tension builds up which carries him along.
The second story is the most talkative -- but it's almost all silent! Title cards are used like in the silent film days. A gutsy trick, but I didn't find it entirely successful. Plus, it's also the most difficult to understand for those unfamiliar with Taiwan's culture or history. However, it's visually stunning since it is set in 1911 in a traditional Chinese home.
Another warning: the chronologies of the first and last episode are confusing at times thanks to the filmmaker's choice to avoid conventional means of identifying flashbacks. It's kinda funny that he chose to clearly label the chronology in the second episode which hardly needed it.
Here's a movie for those people seeking something new. Something daring. Something edging closer to reality. This could be the future of cinema.
Movie Review: Smartly Layered
Summary: 4 Stars
Visual and much more than just three love stories in different times. Characters have realism with which you can connect. The soundtrack is on the mark too...
Steamy and subtle...