804 A Brighter Summer Day

Discuss releases by Criterion and the films on them. Threads may contain spoilers!
Post Reply
Message
Author
User avatar
cdnchris
Site Admin
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 2:45 pm
Location: Washington
Contact:

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#176 Post by cdnchris » Mon May 02, 2016 5:55 pm

zedz wrote: I was home sick from work yesterday, so I decided to listen to Tony Rayns commentary, and it's a tremendous piece of work. Nearly four hours (he only shuts up for one crucial scene) of carefully constructed, superbly researched discussion and information, including excerpts from private letters written by Yang during the making of the film. It's full of crucial contextual information (e.g. quite a bit about class, and the important insight that when Ma intervenes in the gang's abduction of Xiao S'ir this isn't just about his father being an important man, but is quite specifically about military rank) and revealing formal insights (e.g. the way in which Yang consciously removes Xiao S'ir from the frame towards the end of the film).
The track was an excellent one. He laments a bit that all he is doing is simply reiterating the story (though, as you show, he does quite a bit more than that, his sharing of the letters probably being the highlight). But even if that was all he did I would still find it invaluable as he clarifies situations and moments that I was still not grasping even after a second viewing. I was very fond of the track.
zedz wrote: The New Taiwan Cinema doc has lots of interesting information, but it's more than a bit of a shambles, having very little to say about the second decade it's ostensibly covering (so: almost no mention of A Brighter Summer Day, and Tsai Ming-liang comes off as little more than a footnote, even though he's an interview subject). It's probably most worthwhile for the glimpses it offers of great films you can't otherwise see (in muddy SD) as well as several unsuspected New Taiwanese Cinema films that look wholly unremarkable.
My knowledge on New Taiwanese cinema is non-existent so I still found the documentary worthwhile, though I was surprised this film and others barely register a blip as you pointed out. And though I was aware before how hard it is to find these films it was no less frustrating to get a list of all of these films mentioned in the doc and in Rayns' commentary, many I hadn't heard of, only to find no DVD available anywhere, or only to find non-English friendly versions available (though at least with most of the non-English ones I was able to find subs online that I could use to make my own DVD, but I think I would still have to fork over anywhere between $40 to $80 per title to get them to begin with).

User avatar
htom
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 1:57 pm

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#177 Post by htom » Wed May 04, 2016 12:33 pm

zedz wrote:Rayns has one significant quibble about the film, which I can sort of understand, but look at differently:
SpoilerShow
It's about Ming's 'unknowability' and her mysterious appeal to so many different male characters. Rayns seems to find this kind of imposed on the film rather than being totally organic, but I actually think it's both necessary and natural / logical.

It's necessary because Xiao S'ir is our focal character and the great tragedy of the film is that he never 'gets' Ming. I feel that her character needs to be opaque enough for that relationship dynamic to work. If we had much greater insight into her character, or she was more forthcoming, I suspect the film would fall down in other ways. Also, in her final scene, she actually does try to explain herself to a much greater extent, but it's too little, too late, and Xiao S'ir can't process it (just as he didn't really understand what Jade had told him a little earlier).

And the general fascination for Ming is natural / logical not because of some amazing feminine mystique, but because of her position as the girlfriend of absent gang leader Honey. Horrible as it might be, that relationship has conferred a local value on her, and it's the (only?) reason that Sly was after her. It's also the reason that Tiger is warned about her - in fact, is there any evidence that Tiger actually has a crush on her, or is it just a projection of the jealous gang members who see her as a valuable token? (And from the last we see of Ma, it seems likely that he 'adopts' Ming in a perverse attempt at forging a stronger bond with Xiao S'ir, which is the relationship he really values.) Everything is the tragic consequence of a society that sees women as accessories to men. Xiao S'ir is the only character who encounters Ming on neutral terms and forges a genuine relationship with her before becoming aware of her relational 'value'. (It's crucial to understand that, because of his eyesight problem, Xiao S'ir never has any idea who it is that flees from the schoolroom at the beginning of the film, even though everybody assumes it him who started any number of rumours about it.) This is why Honey trusts her with him, and it's why Ming is so devastated to discover that they don't actually have a genuine friendship but instead that it's just the same old competitive male bullshit.
SpoilerShow
Ming comes off as a fairly passive character regardless of whether the point of view is objective or subjective, given she really only has a couple of moments in the film where she dominates the conversation. One is, as you noted, her angry outburst at Xiao S'ir in Guling Street; to me this was a consequence of his assuming a protector/owner persona towards her, which she had seen altogether too many times by now. Another is when the doctor informs her that he is engaged, and her reaction is to tell him that he isn't really in love with his fiancée. Interpreting this scene is a bit difficult for me as it is not clear if this sudden possessiveness is due to his tending to her leg injury or supervising her mother's hospitalization or something else. In any case her admonishing tone seems to be an attempt at playing a femme fatale rather than actually being one. over all this, life under military dictatorship would seem to inevitably mean the inherent male domination leaves all the female characters in the film without much ability to change anything.

User avatar
colinr0380
Joined: Mon Nov 08, 2004 4:30 pm
Location: Chapel-en-le-Frith, Derbyshire, UK

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#178 Post by colinr0380 » Mon May 30, 2016 9:06 am

I sent some of this long weekend watching this film in its four hour version for the first time. I'm surprised by how much of the three hour version that I had previously been familiar with still managed to get packed into the film, but the four hour version is obviously the one to watch (for instance those, slightly crucial, expository beginning and ending intertitles never appeared in the three hour version!), with a lot more of the subplots given time to play out fully and aspects such as the opening credits shot of the characters riding their bikes towards the camera that anticipates a few of the other characters having conversations whilst walking later on. It sort of adds a bit to the sense of time passing and routines that both form and get disrupted by events out of the control of characters (you get the father-son chat walk that only occurs due to school problems, for example!). Routines, favourite spots and objects and so on are often the comforting things that arise despite, rather than because of disruption. Perhaps the film is suggesting that school or work life, and friendships or family life in general, are just as ephemeral? Or perhaps that the individual people are ephemeral, while the structures of life continue on relatively unchanged? For example the way that the gambling pool hall appears to be back up and running again at the end of the film after the massacre. There feels like a certain circularity there, in which the characters go through disruptions and then, if they're not personally affected by say a murder or expulsion, they usually end up simply going back to their other duties or tasks, such as finishing off that tape to send to Elvis!

I love the scope and detail in this film, both character-wise but also compositionally. There are lots of shots in which characters go off into the far background of the shot and disappear which feel like an interesting contrast to the shots where the camera follows the characters while they are walking (for example Si'r running after Ming after Honey returns; Ming and her mother passing the 217 pool room as they move into the area, with the shot then lingering on them in the distance; and of course the shot at the end of Cat walking off after dropping his tape off for Si'r), and the whole film is creating that sense of specificity and complexity in the way it has a change of focus or shows events disappearing into the background. Of following particular stories inside a wider world. Perhaps that also fits with the other key visual motif of the film, of objects being picked out of the darkness to focus upon.

I kind of like the way that Ming is relatively opaque as to her relationships with all of the different guys in the film. Its presented much more from the perspective of the guys being infatuated with her, so just how infatuated with Honey she was seems a little unclear as we're only getting Si'r's perspective on it. I wonder whether she's being presented as the Cressida figure (as in Troilus & Cressida) here, looking for that sense of security that is perhaps even more pragmatically important than just love. Honey appears to have let her down and left her high and dry in that sense (and even her mother cannot provide security any more due to her health issues), so Ming has been thrust into a world where doctors have to be appealed to if just to get the hospital fees waived, and Ma's better-off status provides a small amount of hope. I get the impression that after Si'r's expulsion that Ming is hopeful for being with him in the future when he's managed to get himself together academically again and then might be able to provide the security as well as the love interest, and for now has fallen in with Ma purely for practical reasons of keeping a roof over the head of her mother and herself. After all we never even see Ma and Ming together, so we're only getting any kind of a sense of a 'relationship' between them from Si'r's perspective, manipulated by Sly's comments. Ironically it perhaps would have been better for Si'r if he hadn't introduced them because it just helped to fuel his, seemingly literally self created, paranoia!

I also wonder how much the at first stable relationship of his parents fracturing under the stress of interrogation and career changes is yet another aspect factoring into Si'r's own behaviours here too, along with Si'r's own immediately confrontational approach to problems and relentlessly inquisitive personality. Perhaps maintaining a cool head and/or a close relationship is a luxury that only those in positions of security (like Ma, or Mr Wang) can afford? Something I particularly like in the film is the way that Si'r often seems unsure about what he is doing before he decides to go all in on a course of action, such as letting Ming walk off and walking a little the other way himself before running after her and telling her he'll protect her, or cycling around Uncle Fat before picking up the brick. There's an opportunity there to do something different, for another course of action, that begins to disappear later on in the film.

I like to think that Si'r's father's experience removes that guidance from him. At first the father is standing up for Si'r with the school and against Uncle Fat's jealous accusations. They aren't successful but Si'r's father is providing an example of robust defencesivness that isn't violent. Si'r sits quietly in the first scene, then shifts nervously around later on in the school and then in the scene with Uncle Fat just after he starts deferent and then is about to lash out when his father tells Uncle Fat off and walks off with Si'r. Later on the father is absent and Uncle Fat seems alone and defenceless and so Si'r more than deliberates whether to bash his head in. But Si'r thinks differently and tellingly drops the rock just before Uncle Fat has the heart attack and falls into the ditch, which fatefully turns Si'r from an aggressor into a saviour. And not just of Uncle Fat but of his own father due to the debt Uncle Fat feels he needs to repay later on.

But then the father returns a broken man and Si'r falls back into despair, takes matters into his own hands at school when his father cannot stand up for him even imperfectly any more, and lashes out at friends and foes alike (the older brother taking a beating for Si'r could seem to be the father's disappointment and aggression coming out overly violently that anticipates Si'r's own anger at Ma and Ming later on), and after all the times of looking on the bright side, fateful intercessions (even before the religious sister gets involved!) and lucky escapes, unfortunately one shattering act slips through the net and destroys multiple lives and relationships.
Last edited by colinr0380 on Mon Jun 13, 2016 11:42 am, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
liam fennell
Joined: Tue Jul 20, 2010 2:54 pm

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#179 Post by liam fennell » Mon Jun 13, 2016 11:12 am

This movie... for me it smells of reality like nothing else I've ever seen. Usually I'm hyper aware of the fact movies are artificial, the fact that there is a camera and a crew and staging and lights, but this movie is so convincing I find myself almost doubting that most obvious of facts. What little artifice that I detect reminds me of the unreliability of memories; the way memories are in fact memories of memories of memories and therefore prone to little distortions over time which lead to people remembering things differently years later.

Of course I'm guided to this line of thinking by the author's statement in the booklet accompanying the Criterion release, where he hopes (I paraphrase badly) that this movie will express the truth of his own generation's experiences in comparison to the whitewash of history and for the benefit of future generations. And then there is the echo of that hope embedded in the story itself as expressed by Honey when he speaks of reading War and Peace and how if he could write he'd write a novel for people like himself in the future.

I'm trying to express some kind of profound things I can't quite grasp and maybe the movie itself is, also. After two viewings I think I have all the plot points and characters nailed down but I still feel like the movie contains mysteries I will never fully grasp. Mysteries that happen between the events of the narrative, or something.

All this aside, the thing is as entertaining and charming and beautiful and sad as any other movie I've ever seen!

To sum up all the above: wow.

User avatar
Michael Kerpan
Spelling Bee Champeen
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 1:20 pm
Location: New England
Contact:

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#180 Post by Michael Kerpan » Tue Jun 14, 2016 11:44 pm

Sadly, this film didn't do much for me. I found the characters uninteresting (and not particularly "real" seeming) and didn't really like the editing. I liked at least chunks of YiYi and Terrorizers, so didn't expect this to (mostly) strike out. C'est la vie. Hopefully, the documentary on New Taiwanese cinema will be interesting.

User avatar
hearthesilence
Joined: Fri Mar 04, 2005 4:22 am
Location: NYC

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#181 Post by hearthesilence » Tue Jun 14, 2016 11:48 pm

Damn. Well, if it's on BD and you want to trade for it or sell it at a discount, hit me up.

User avatar
Michael Kerpan
Spelling Bee Champeen
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 1:20 pm
Location: New England
Contact:

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#182 Post by Michael Kerpan » Wed Jun 15, 2016 12:11 am

hearthesilence wrote:Damn. Well, if it's on BD and you want to trade for it or sell it at a discount, hit me up.
Well, not until after I check out the extras. ;-)

User avatar
hearthesilence
Joined: Fri Mar 04, 2005 4:22 am
Location: NYC

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#183 Post by hearthesilence » Wed Jun 15, 2016 12:14 am

Hahah, k

Emilio
Joined: Sat Dec 05, 2009 8:38 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#184 Post by Emilio » Fri Jun 17, 2016 4:39 am


User avatar
Newsnayr
Joined: Wed Apr 01, 2015 12:54 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#185 Post by Newsnayr » Sun Jul 24, 2016 1:31 am

Just watched this film (with my Taiwanese parents, who seemed very pleased with the authenticity of the portrayal of the time period), and while I must say that I slightly love Yi Yi more, for its more optimistic view, A Brighter Summer Day is, for lack of a better term, one of the ten or so best films I've ever seen, as experiential as it is plotted, as reserved as it is intimate, and as funny as it is heartbreaking. I feel like it may grow even more on me, as I come more and more to grips with the colossal nature of this work of art.

User avatar
Drucker
Your Future our Drucker
Joined: Wed May 18, 2011 9:37 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#186 Post by Drucker » Tue Dec 20, 2016 1:40 pm

I can't be the only person who noticed the mistake about 1:55 into the film, when the headlining band is playing a concert while
SpoilerShow
Honey is murdered
.

If you look closely at the shots of the drummer, there is no kick pedal to his bass drum! He's just tapping his feet.

Harry Caul
Joined: Sun Jan 22, 2017 1:59 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#187 Post by Harry Caul » Sat Feb 04, 2017 12:32 am

Being an avid cinephile, I had heard of A Brighter Summer Day years ago - but for various reasons held off on actually watching the film. The four-hour length, Asian setting/early 1960's time period, and the subtitles all gave me the impression that the movie - though obviously critically acclaimed - would be way too long & dense for me to appreciate.

But, I finally gave this a chance recently - and, I was extremely impressed. Despite the unusually long running time, not one moment of this superb film dragged or felt forced. It actually felt more like watching a documentary from late 1950's/early 1960's Taiwan than an actual film. Very epic in scope, with naturalistic acting - obviously in large part because the actors/actresses were mainly non-professionals.

I especially enjoyed the great attention to detail. I've seen a lot of historical films, but ABSD felt extremely authentic - more so than most other films of this type I've seen. I.e., the old-time record/tape players, the pictures of Elvis on the walls, the school uniforms, the tea in those unusual clear cups, etc. really made you feel as if you were transported back to that time & place. I also appreciated the scene where the father was being interrogated by the authorities, and you saw that big pool of water on the cement floor - obviously a result of the rain/flooding that had occurred the previous day/night; the electricity going off and on due to power outages, etc. It's little touches like this that made the film much more realistic/authentic.

It was interesting to see the extreme contrast between Xiao Si’r's strict, regimented home life with his family & the chaotic, sometimes violent street gang life that he got involved in at night.

And, the street gang violence was fairly vicious & permeated the whole film....starting off with that defenseless little kid who got hit in the head by a brick (in the beginning);
SpoilerShow
the gang leader Honey getting murdered by being pushed in front of a car; and the later gang members being systematically killed during a surprise attack by a rival gang.
However, this aforementioned violence didn't prepare me for
SpoilerShow
the heinous, cowardly murder that closed out the film; I was shocked when Xiao Si’r stabbed Ming in cold blood, apparently because he was jealous & felt that she had "shamed" herself. I did not see that coming, and it's actually the last thing I would have expected to happen in the film - especially since, towards the end, the movie was leading you in the direction of thinking there would be a fight/confrontation between Xiao Si’r & his former friend Ma - over Ming.
SpoilerShow
I know this murder is based on a true event that Edward Yang (the director) remembered from his youth. And, I'm wondering if the perpetaror in the real-life crime only got 15 years in prison, just like Xiao Si’r did in ABSD. If so, this is a surprisingly light sentence for a heinous crime like this.

User avatar
movielocke
Joined: Fri Jan 18, 2008 12:44 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#188 Post by movielocke » Sat Feb 04, 2017 2:16 am

Harry Caul wrote:
SpoilerShow
I know this murder is based on a true event that Edward Yang (the director) remembered from his youth. And, I'm wondering if the perpetaror in the real-life crime only got 15 years in prison, just like Xiao Si’r did in ABSD. If so, this is a surprisingly light sentence for a heinous crime like this.
well how often do thirty year olds behave like fifteen year olds? How often do people in their late thirties behave like people in their early twenties. Fifteen years is historically a severe sentence, it's only in the last forty years that politics required the transition to our current norms of routine insanely severe sentences that serve no purpose.

But that's beside the point, I knew from discussion of the cover or the criterion blurb that a girl in the film gets murdered, but after about forty minutes I figured I must have misunderstood some half read bits and pieces as there was obviously no murder imminent within the film, when the ending finally occurred and then the film is just over I was completely shocked and a little irritated. It took me about a week to realize that if you go in as I did basically completely ignorant of what the film is leading to you don't really appreciate the nuance of how you wound up there. In short, Im eager to watch it again but I'm planning on continuing to ruminate on it for a year or two before I do.

Harry Caul
Joined: Sun Jan 22, 2017 1:59 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#189 Post by Harry Caul » Sat Feb 04, 2017 12:13 pm

movielocke wrote:]well how often do thirty year olds behave like fifteen year olds? How often do people in their late thirties behave like people in their early twenties. Fifteen years is historically a severe sentence, it's only in the last forty years that politics required the transition to our current norms of routine insanely severe sentences that serve no purpose.

But that's beside the point, I knew from discussion of the cover or the criterion blurb that a girl in the film gets murdered, but after about forty minutes I figured I must have misunderstood some half read bits and pieces as there was obviously no murder imminent within the film, when the ending finally occurred and then the film is just over I was completely shocked and a little irritated. It took me about a week to realize that if you go in as I did basically completely ignorant of what the film is leading to you don't really appreciate the nuance of how you wound up there. In short, Im eager to watch it again but I'm planning on continuing to ruminate on it for a year or two before I do.
There are juveniles in recent years who have killed their whole families, murdered others in cold blood, etc. Just because they're juveniles doesn't mean they didn't know what they were doing. As far as I'm concerned, if you commit a heinous crime like murder - no matter what your age - you should be treated as an adult & given the maximum sentence. When the authorities give murderers lighter sentences (i.e. 10, 15 years instead of life in prison) - in many cases, once they're free, they go back out on the street & commit the same crimes again. It's bleeding heart liberals who are indirectly responsible for a lot of violent crime out there. If a criminal has done something like this, lock the S.O.B. up & throw away the key!!!

Note if the killing was in self-defense that's a completely different story; obviously someone should not be punished for defending themselves.

Re: The storyline in the film, I was intentionally ignorant of this plot because I was avoiding spoilers & info. that would give this away. I actually was happy I didn't know anything about what was going to happen, so I could be surprised - I don't like knowing the ending of a film ahead of time.

User avatar
Michael Kerpan
Spelling Bee Champeen
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 1:20 pm
Location: New England
Contact:

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#190 Post by Michael Kerpan » Sun Feb 05, 2017 7:27 pm

> It's bleeding heart liberals who are indirectly responsible for a lot of violent crime out there. (italics in original -- so we know that the statement is important and really truly true)

Okay. Looking forward to your next bit of wisdom.

Harry Caul
Joined: Sun Jan 22, 2017 1:59 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#191 Post by Harry Caul » Sun Feb 05, 2017 10:22 pm

Michael Kerpan wrote:Okay. Looking forward to your next bit of wisdom.
Since there's a good chance you may not have comprehended what I meant by my statement, my point was that if violent criminals aren't given harsh sentences, then they can easily get out of jail & re-offend. There have been numerous cases of this happening in real life, so I don't need to provide examples here. Don't take my word for this, look it up if you don't believe me.

I don't know if the sentence of 15 years for the heinous murder in ABSD was true-to-life, but I know the crime was based on a real-life event. My point is that 15 years is not harsh enough for something like this. I looked online for more info. on the actual crime this was based on, and couldn't find much. Apparently the crime in the film was based on an actual event the film director (Edward Yang) remembered from his youth.

User avatar
Shrew
The Untamed One
Joined: Tue Feb 27, 2007 2:22 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#192 Post by Shrew » Mon Feb 06, 2017 12:05 am

The harshness of the sentence is just like, your opinion, man. But seriously, 15 years for a minor (Xiao Si'r is 14 or 15) is not an outlandishly lax penalty. I also expect it would have been defended as a crime of passion, and more likely fall under Taiwan's equivalent of second-degree murder. And while this is conjecture on my part, I can't help but wonder if the girl's reputation ended up playing an unfortunate mitigating role in the trial.

Also, the Chinese title, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread, translates to roughly "The Guling Street Youth Murder", which is what the murder Yang based the film on was known as in the press. So the audience is supposed to expect a murder from the start. That said, I think the film's goal is to portray the time and environment in which such a terrible crime took place, rather than a psychological portrait of the killer. Hence, the end is shocking because Xiao Si'r never seems like a killer despite the violence and chaos around him.

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

804 A Brighter Summer Day

#193 Post by zedz » Mon Feb 06, 2017 12:17 am

I agree with your last point to an extent, but Yang meticulously traces the tiny degrees by which this unthinkable act is precipitated. Just about every action in the film nudges Xiao S'ir in the direction of the final tragedy.

User avatar
Michael Kerpan
Spelling Bee Champeen
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 1:20 pm
Location: New England
Contact:

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#194 Post by Michael Kerpan » Mon Feb 06, 2017 1:08 am

zedz wrote:I agree with your last point to an extent, but Yang meticulously traces the tiny degrees by which this unthinkable act is precipitated. Just about every action in the film nudges Xiao S'ir in the direction of the final tragedy.
I _felt_ the pushing -- but never really bought it.

User avatar
Shrew
The Untamed One
Joined: Tue Feb 27, 2007 2:22 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#195 Post by Shrew » Mon Feb 06, 2017 1:35 am

To clarify what I meant, I think the film sets up the murder and makes it clear what pushed Xiao Si'r to that point, but the murder never feels predetermined. There's the feeling that if any of a hundred tiny variables had been different, the murder might not have happened.

To extent it feels similar to If...., in that the ending violence makes sense based on what comes before, but also is not the only (or even most) logical ending.

Harry Caul
Joined: Sun Jan 22, 2017 1:59 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#196 Post by Harry Caul » Mon Feb 06, 2017 1:43 am

Shrew wrote:Also, the Chinese title, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread, translates to roughly "The Guling Street Youth Murder", which is what the murder Yang based the film on was known as in the press. So the audience is supposed to expect a murder from the start. That said, I think the film's goal is to portray the time and environment in which such a terrible crime took place, rather than a psychological portrait of the killer. Hence, the end is shocking because Xiao Si'r never seems like a killer despite the violence and chaos around him.
Exactly - the time/place of the film was the focus, and it was done so well that you were really engulfed in this era. And, that's part of the reason why I didn't see the stabbing/murder coming whatsoever. I knew that a crime was going to take place, but I didn't think it would be
SpoilerShow
Si'r stabbing/killing Ming
- without provocation. This is what the murder so horrifying. I actually thought the crime would be a gang member killing another. In any case, I'm glad I didn't know much of the movie's story ahead of time so I was genuinely surprised at the end.
Shrew wrote:The harshness of the sentence is just like, your opinion, man. But seriously, 15 years for a minor (Xiao Si'r is 14 or 15) is not an outlandishly lax penalty. I also expect it would have been defended as a crime of passion, and more likely fall under Taiwan's equivalent of second-degree murder. And while this is conjecture on my part, I can't help but wonder if the girl's reputation ended up playing an unfortunate mitigating role in the trial.
I find 15 years to be a long time, but it's not that harsh considering Si'r took an innocent life. Also, he was young enough when the crime occurred that when he got out he'll still have much of his life ahead of him. Conversely, if he were 70 years old & put in prison for 15 years - that would probably be a death sentence.

In any case, it doesn't seem like the authorities at the time really put a lot of value in human life.

Going along with this, I found it telling that we never saw the authorities investigate Honey's death and/or the deaths of those other gang members during the storm (by the rival gang). Presumably, they thought Honey's death was an accident (since he was pushed in front of a car at night). It seems obvious that they didn't care too much about gang members dying/killing each other.

And, great The Big Lebowski reference - LOL. That's my all-time favorite comedy.
Last edited by Harry Caul on Mon Feb 06, 2017 8:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#197 Post by zedz » Mon Feb 06, 2017 5:01 pm

Sentencing children is always problematic, as they have traditionally not had the same legal culpability as adults, just as they don't have the same legal obligations. The ten-year-old murderers of James Bulger - a much more horrible killing in just about every way - were both sentenced to eight years in 1993.

Harry Caul
Joined: Sun Jan 22, 2017 1:59 am

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#198 Post by Harry Caul » Tue Feb 07, 2017 1:49 am

zedz wrote:Sentencing children is always problematic, as they have traditionally not had the same legal culpability as adults, just as they don't have the same legal obligations. The ten-year-old murderers of James Bulger - a much more horrible killing in just about every way - were both sentenced to eight years in 1993.
I was not aware of the JB crime until you mentioned this; I looked this up, and I agree it was extremely horrific & sickening. These two little monsters should never have seen the light of day after they did this.

Another example is the heinous torture & murder of Sylvia Likens in 1960's Indiana - minors were involved in this as well, and several of them only got 2 years in a reformatory for the crime:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Sylvia_Likens" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

This story was adapted into an extremely disturbing film, An American Crime (2007).

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#199 Post by zedz » Tue Feb 07, 2017 4:07 pm

:-" Good news that Taipei Story is forthcoming, huh?

User avatar
Omensetter
Yes We Cannes
Joined: Sat Apr 23, 2011 8:17 pm
Location: Lawrence, KS, U.S.

Re: 804 A Brighter Summer Day

#200 Post by Omensetter » Wed Feb 08, 2017 10:19 pm

It's beyond exciting and I'm forever grateful for the Summer Day release! I haven't seen it, but they're essentially opening up portals for those tethered to R1---portals long pined for---and Taipei's reveal through a newsletter clue will not dampen my enthusiasm. (In contrast to last month's newsletter reveal where my reaction was more observation, a sufficient interest in seeing Rumble Fish, a desire that Criterion will sell plenty to libraries, etc.) I think we'll finally see Hou on Criterion this year, hopefully slotted in a second WCP release alongside Mysterious Object at Noon and perhaps some other lower profile releases from lower profile directors (Memories of Underdevelopment and Pomegranates seem like they can hold their own individual release, especially if they think Canoa can.)

I cannot comment on Taipei, but Summer Day remains the best film and experience for me for at least the last two years, the sort of first viewing you hold dear after long having seen essentially all the titles in what one may call the Canon.

Post Reply