Taiwan

“The Moon is the earth’s only satellite, and the fifth largest in the solar system. Its surface is full of meteorite pits, high mountains, and plains; quite desolate, a world of deadly stillness. When we’re looking into the starry sky, we’re actually peeking into its past…”

Hebei origin, air-force officer retiree, Mr. Chou, now diligently learning Taiwanese, met “Chang Jiang No. 1,” China’s top secret agent during Sino-Japanese war, on a Peking opera’ seminar. Chou’s flat moon life has then been sparkled. He started to talk around about the heroic accomplishments this “Chang Jiang No.1” had done. This person, “who contributes most to China,” gradually becomes Chou’s only mark on the Moon.

Is “homesickness” a gene? Inheritable? Transplantable? Can be parted or chosen? Contagious? Needs regular purging like computer viruses? … Through the story between Mr. Chou and “Chang Jiang No.1.” the film uses lively rhythm to represent the interesting homesickness issue. The director adopts a humorous way to re-present these new Taiwanese in Taiwan.

As for whether “Chang Jiang No.1” is a real person or not is up to the audience to decide.

Wai San Ding Island, an isolated sandbar off the west coast of Taiwan, has already drifted from the coast of Yunlin County to Chiayi County. The film documents the changes of Wai San Ding Island, and is narrated by the director in the first-person. The film consists of four parts and documents the daily life of the people whose lives are closely tied to the island. Their stories tell how Wai San Ding Island has changed through the decades. Footage which the director shot on the island 17 years ago is inserted to show the great contrast between the island of the past and its present appearance.

This film touches on the sensitive issues of national and ethnic identity in Taiwan. In 1965, Chen Yao-Chi directed the first objective Taiwanese documentary, Liu Pi-Chia. The main character, Liu Pi-Chia, was press-ganged into the Nationalist army in the 1940s in China, and came over to Taiwan with President Chiang Kai-Shek. After several decades, we unexpectedly met Liu in a village on the banks of the Mukua River. This new immigrant village consists of mainland veterans whose wives are from different ethnic groups, mostly Aborigines. Stones, the most important symbols of this film, link Liu Pi-Chia’s generation, who worked hard on the stony riverbed to reclaim land, and the new generation represented by Liu Pi-Chia’s son, whose hobby is collecting rose stones for artistic and economic purposes.

The Guan-Du Plain is the largest agricultural district within Taipei city, covering hundreds of hectares. A-Lang and his wife, who come from Ping-dong, own and farm on one-third of the plain. However, they profit nothing from the extent of their land and its proximity to the city. Rather, they fall the first prey to the disasters brought by commercial development. In addition to dealing with natural forces such as typhoons and earthquakes, A-Lang has faces capitalist acquisition, illegal dumping of waste, dust from incinerators, and the increasing conflict between agriculture and tourism… none of these is recorded on his lunar calendar. All he can do is stand and watch his land being gradually devoured by this city.

Struck by the difference between the political apathy of American youth and the exhilarating momentum of Taiwan’s social and political movements, the filmmaker navigates cultural, geographical and linguistic distances in search of wisdom and hope from her 100 year-old Taiwanese activist grandmother.

The filmmaker interviews her grandmother and people her knew her, just before her grandmother enters a full-care facility. The film explores the filmmaker’s discovery of her grandmother’s political sensibilities. As the film progresses, we hear history being told from various perspectives.