This is a story of how a middle-class family in 1960s Taiwan fell apart from a dull and uneventful life in a very short period of time. Dad is a straightforward man who came to Taiwan from Guangzhou to Shanghai, mom comes from a girls’ school and loves to nag, they have a common best friend who is doing well in Taiwan, the eldest sister is from Shanghai and happens to be going to study in the United States, the second brother has the same honest personality as the fourth child and plays pinball exceptionally well, the second sister is religious, the youngest sister is still growing physically and in a way has been very well behaved.
The family was crammed inside a Japanese-style house on Guling Street, and they had regular contact with local grocery store owners and friends who came from the mainland together. The children in school were divided into several different factions because of their different family backgrounds. The four children did not do well in the night section and met a group of school groups led by HONEY, plus a group of school groups led by Shandong in the family village, who fought over the control of a bar called Little Park. There is a movie set where the kids play, and a firing range not far away, and life really isn’t very big in this area, going back and forth in circles. Goodness shines in the darkness, but this faint light is too faint.
Xiao Si was involved step by step in the gang struggle is actually not a big thing, although Xiao Si’er bad temper, but if all then according to the established track to go, he would have been to slowly leave this environment, and kitten and pony they take a different path, but his life ushered in two turning points, one is Xiao Ming, the other is the father. Compared to Xiaoming, Dad was called to the isolation review for no reason is the most important point of the whole thing eventually happened. The director used nearly twenty minutes to show the process of Dad’s torture. The censorship comes very abruptly, and it is not quite possible to find a clear source, but also an abrupt ending. The film is a routine inspection, but for a university professor, who is very proud of himself, it is a major torture in his life. Day and night non-stop censorship, time and time again to turn the bottom, no cause and effect, even if you say a wrong word, will be the tension of the end of all things, in he came out after looking at his wife inside that glance to really fully revealed.
After that he was paranoid, furious, and groveled for help. This made that hero in his son’s heart slowly collapse. Since ancient times beauty like a good general, not allowed to see the white head on earth.
The hero can not collapse, in the hero movie they can always get up again after countless failures, but the fact is not so, Zhang Zhen’s hero collapsed and never stood up again.
The mother cried her heart out, the father’s chicken feather duster hit the second brother’s body one by one, the whole family was shocked, which is a high intellectual family’s normal ah.
The most tearful thing is not in how tragic the encounter, but in the encounter to these tragedies when the family’s blood is thicker than water affection. Especially the feelings between the five sisters, the film a few strokes, the first is the second brother took the mother’s watch, the eldest sister directly out of the money scolded them to go to the table to redeem, this thing did not tell the mother. Then was the old three in moving the book to see the note written by Xiao Si, but also just shocked, did not tell Mom, Xiao Si to find the second brother to borrow money to soak Xiao Cui, the mother’s watch when the second brother went to the bouncy house to go gambling redemption back, this thing would not have been known by Mom, until the little sister because and big sister quarrel and was stabbed. One more sentence little sister has always been extremely envious of big sister, from her see big sister wearing clothes when the envy of the eyes can be a glimpse of two. The second brother dead guard did not say denunciation of the fourth, was beaten all over the ground big sister jumped up to block the duster for him, little sister also ran up to hug his father, the second sister outside called the fourth, said you better not go up. The older sister is spirited and clever, the second sister is religious, the second brother is honest and bullied, the fourth sister is stubborn, the younger sister does not know what to do, there are small quarrels, there are also arguments, in front of the mother is not in the eye of the hook, but the film allows us to see the connection between people is blood and blood, we always say that Taiwanese films focus on the family, because in many Taiwanese films the portrayal of the family, is particularly flesh and blood.
Like the kind of affection and such shown in Ang Lee’s “Men and Women in Food” and “Pusher” are like this. The usual quarrel is true, when the big thing comes to help is also true, this is life.
She is not actually trying to pull people into the church, and in some ways she also feels that they are both very much alike. One could say that the older sister is the embodiment of edification, so her final mouth of running is screaming and crying, while the younger one becomes murderous.
It is actually incorrect to say that the second sister is seen as an outward manifestation of the younger one, that the younger one is itself the embodiment of original sin. Xiao Si is a truly indoctrinated child, and the goodness and justice in his heart drives him to do things. His unruly nature is used to resist the muddiness of the outside world, the teachers who defamed him, the classmates who framed him, the students who copied his homework, he does not want to and does not want to mix with them. Twice, once with a brick to prepare to throw the drunken boss, and the second with a knife to see the dying Shandong, he did not finally get down, the first time to save lives, the second time to turn away. In the face of a bigger than one dropout, he saw justice in his father and used his own justice to swing the bat, in the view of those watching the movie he was poor and deserved pity, hoping that the outside world would treat him well, and even hoping that he would lower his head a little to be kind to himself, but from beginning to end, to the end of the death can be seen, Xiao Si’er did not have a little compromise, he was even proud of himself, he was different from them, was Look down on, he just use “justice” to save Xiaoming, with his law to kill Xiaoming body “evil”.
Xiao Si’er saw the power of justice in his father’s body, he could use to protect his children, but also in his father’s body to see the evil consequences of this justice, he involved his father finally became unbearable.
All the evil in this world came at him, and at this sensitive age, it became an unbearable weight of life.
