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Political participation in 2004: an interview with Hou Hsiao Hsien

Chen Kuan-Hsing; Ti Wei; Ken-fang Lee

Online Publication Date: 01 June 2008

To cite this Article

Kuan-Hsing, Chen, Wei, Ti and Lee, Ken-fang(2008)'Political participation in 2004: an interview with Hou Hsiao-Hsien',Inter-Asia Cultural Studies,9:2,324 335

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Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, Volume 9, Number 2, 2008

ISSN 14649373 Print/ISSN 14698447 Online/08/02032412 2008 Taylor & FrancisDOI: 10.1080/14649370801965760

Political participation in 2004: an interview with Hou Hsiao-Hsien

CHEN Kuan-Hsing and Ti WEI (Translated by Ken-fang LEE)

TaylorandFrancisRIAC_A_296742.sgm10.1080/14649370801965760Inter-AsiaCulturalStudies1464-9373(print)/1469-8447(online)OriginalArticle2008Taylor&[email protected]

Looking back on political participation

Chen: You have talked about the Coalitionfor Equal Opportunity1 and TaiwanDemocracy School elsewhere. When youtalked about that, you were very muchwithin that situation. Now probably youcan talk about it from some distance sincethe climax of the School for Democracy and

the election has passed. Can you tell uswhat all this meant to you?

Hou:

After participating in the School forDemocracy and trying to get involved withthe election, I found that actually there is nospace for the middle way in Taiwan, andthe whole political situation is really diffi-cult. I tried to understand what the localmeant and came to realize that it is impossi-ble, unable to make any change. The voters

took sides on either the Green or Bluecamp. This was the basic condition. Therewas no middle way. The middle spacewas completely emptied, a complete void.By then you would know it was impossibleto make a change.

I used to think that we, as representa-tives of ideals, might stand a chance. Butactually what we talked about was withinthe urban space. We were talking to somerational citizens in a civil society. Yet, aftera while, all these people gave up. Perhaps

they thought it was good but it did notmake any difference to them after all. Theybecame indifferent after some frustratingexperiences. This is what I thought after thecandidates we supported lost the election.Ms Cheng Li-wen got a high rating in thepoll but she lost. We actively supported SuYing-gui but he lost, too. Because of thesetwo cases, we realized what the structure of

the voters was composed of. It representsthe whole structure of Taiwans politicalculture. It is very difficult to make a change.The ad hoc National Assembly passed aconstitution amendment to reduce thenumber of members in the Legislative Yuanfrom 225 to 113. I dont know what theimpact will be, but it can be expected that,

in the short term, nothing will change. Eventhough the size of the constituency hasbeen reduced, the basic condition is verymuch the same and it cannot be changedright away.

Chen:

Can you talk about your participa-tion in this election? It is complex enoughbeing in the culture circle or the film circle,but this circle is probably even morecomplex since it involves intellectuals andpolitical figures. We dont mean to gossip.

What wed like to know is the differencebetween this circle and the film circle interms of their complexity. In the process ofparticipating in politics, you met some keypolitical figures and got involved in theelection campaign, has this made you seethe people and the society of Taiwan in adifferent light?

Hou:

For me, of course, it is different anddoes not really make a huge difference. Thereason is that making films is basically a

way of understanding people. If you dontknow how to see through people, firstly,how can you work with them? Secondly,how can you direct them? This has been along-term training. It is not difficult for meat all. The essence and experiences of eachperson make them what they are. Apersons blind spot is their weakness. Butmost people cannot see it; they cannot see


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An interview with Hou Hsiao-Hsien

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through themselves, including some high-profile political figures.

Everybodys opinions have somethingto do with their background. In your grow-ing process, if you find family unable to giveyou enough support, you would find some

outside help. Once you look out for support,youll change your attitude. You need anidentity, a certain sense of security, manypeople join a group or a community becauseof this. Thats what matters to many people.We can see such personality in a lot of polit-ical figures, although they are not aware ofit. To have such an awareness is very hard,few people have it. However, I found outthat many people in the Coalition for EqualOpportunity have such an awareness. Theyknow their conditions and do their jobs

persistently. I quite like those people.

Chen:

You just mentioned the Coalition. Ifwe measure, evaluate it in terms of thesuccess and failure of the election, it doesnot mean much since no one in this campgot elected. But if we look back and examineit from the perspective of that moment,what political effect do you think it made? Itdoesnt necessarily have anything to dowith the election.

Hou:

I realized that such an effect does notlast long. Both parties manipulated ethnicityand made it an issue in elections; we stoodout as the whistle-blowers and shoutedloudly, You cannot do this! At that time,both the Blue and Green camps tried to winthe middle ground voters. They probablythought that we might have had some influ-ence on the middle ground voters.

Chen:

So you are saying that actually they

made a wrong political judgment? (Laughter)

Hou:

In the end you might find that theirjudgment was not wrong. It is exactlybecause of this, that the extreme means

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wastaken. After the bullets, the Blue campalmost collapsed. Either in the election forlegislators, or the elections for the ad hocNational Assembly, the turnout was ratherlow; yet the voting in the presidential elec-

tion was tough. It is clear that they want tofight for the most powerful position. Theyhavent realized that, in a democratic soci-ety, the balance of power is important. Youcannot take all the pieces for yourself. Youcannot take all just because you have been

elected as the president. I have a feeling thatfor the average middle voters it is hard tounderstand such a way of thinking.

Chen:

So far what you have said sends amessage that you are very aware of whatyou have been doing. Politics is a field foryou to deal with your own problem. Yousomehow turn back to your own art, yourwork, is it right?

Hou:

In fact, to participate in politics was

never my decision, because I never am apolitical person. Every profession has itsknow-how, its environment. If you want tobuild up an environment, it takes a longtime. It is impossible to stride across politicswith my reputation in the culture circle. SoI was very clear about this in the very begin-ning. Besides, I was not really a member ofthe Coalition at first. I was dragged into themeetings three times. They said we neededto organize, so we got it a name. We needed

a convener, so they all turned to me and saidthat I was well-known. I thought about itand accepted the offer. The more you getinvolved, the more you invest in it. Sinceyou face it, you would put more faith inwhat you believe. There is so much to doand I have no time to loaf around.

As for my artistic production, suchparticipation may broaden my experience,which means I have more materials. I wasnot so sensitive to many parts of Taiwanscontemporary history earlier on, but now

I am. I turn back to my film career and thinkabout all this.

Chen:

When I went to some electioncampaign gatherings, I noticed that evenyou were placed in the political space, andthere was something else, which was notdirectly related to the elections. I remembersuch an instance in one gathering, at a pubon Chung Shan North Road.


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Chen Kuan-Hsing and Ti Wei

Hou:

Well, that was for the Organization forHelp for Industrial Injury. It was a perfor-mance held for laborers who had sufferedfrom industrial injuries.

Chen:

Such activities do not relate to elec-

tions. I was rather surprised to find youusing ordinary peoples language with ease,especially in an authentic Min-nan dialect.Can you talk a little bit more about suchform of political participation? What I meanis that you are a bit like a cultural politicalfigure, the ways in which you interact withthe masses. When you look back, what doyou think of the whole thing? Did youconsciously use some of your resources?What made you communicate with them sowell?

Hou:

I have no problem communicatingwith people. As a film maker, I have allkinds of contacts. Besides, I dont have theso-called class consciousness. I dont havethat in any way. Betel-nut culture, beingfriends with workers, all these helped usget along very well. It is not hard for me atall. What is hard is whether I have time todeal with this part. In the end, I can onlydeal with it from where I stand. I joined

them with my visual-image resources.Sometimes the power of visual imagesis much stronger than that of participatingin movements, especially when you get itright. For example, when I was workingwith the Coalition, I sensed the people werereally nice. At some point, we reached a tacitunderstanding and a consensus. We allappreciated each other and spoke what wethought. So I chose one day to set the lightsand shoot what everyone said, whichbecame the documentary of That Night of

the Coalition. (The full title is At ThatNight, Hou, Hsiao-Hsien Was Shooting theCoalition). It turned out quite well. Somepeople made 10,000 copies for distributionlocally and abroad.

Interpretation of history is dominatedby rulers. They can say this and that and playfast and loose. How can we recover history?We may use words. But the masses cannotread them. Only very few people will read

them. Thats why I want to recover it withimages. For me, it is jigsaw-like. Perhaps itwill last only 20 to 30 minutes, a short andfeature film type of thing. Some charactersmay interest you, some episodes touch you.Take Jiang Wei-shui for example, he studied

typhoid bacillus with some medical studentswhen he was in the fourth or fifth yearof medical school. He attempted to killYuan Shih-kai with the bacillus. He went toTokyo and then to Manchuria. The wholething became like a play for absurd theatre.Something like this can make a 30-minutefilm. Whats more is that they wanted to killthe Japanese Emperor, they even injected thetyphoid bacillus into tangerines and plannedto send them to the Emperor. He establisheda forum for culture at that time and also

fought cunningly with the Japanese secretpolice. It can be shot in a documentary form.To put everything together is just like fittingthe jigsaws. We can do it within a certainscale and pile up all the images. Finally thewhole picture may emerge/come clear.

From politics back to the images

Chen:

I want to ask you a critical question:What have you learned from this political

participation which you hadnt learned inthe past?

Hou:

For me it is like this: since you under-stand more about this part, you have agreater feeling about it, you will re-thinkabout your own production, your own posi-tion, the whole environment and what direc-tion your production is taking. Now I reallyregret that I did not make a huge amount ofmoney earlier. If I had made a lot of money,I could have done so many things by now.

If I were Wen Shih-ren,

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I would extend myscope to a tremendous scale (sigh), includ-ing some stuff for the new settlers, foreignimmigrants and so on. Now the populationstructure in Taiwan has changed enor-mously. The elites have moved out andmore and more new immigrants are movingin. Yet the social resources are not distrib-uted to these new immigrants; no one looksafter them.


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Those who marry foreign women arenormally the lower-middle and the lowerclasses. They have contributed a lot toTaiwans economic growth in the pastdecades. They were the spine of the wholeassembly line. They did not move to the

craftsmanship or learn any skills for agricul-ture. We learned the skills and the set-up offactories from the United States. The set-upknow-how is movable. It moves accordingto the values of land and labor costs. Thatswhy it moved to Thailand, to SoutheastAsia, and now to mainland China. Theseremaining laborers cannot find suitablewives, so they marry foreign brides.Recently New Journalism

and Business Week

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had special reports on this issue. In Vietnamonly we can find more than 3000 Taiwanese

kids. Probably because of dysfunctionalfamilies, economic reasons or failedmarriages, these kids went to Vietnam withtheir mothers. Since their nationality isTaiwanese, they cant attend the localschools. They cannot learn anything. Nowthe Eden Foundation is trying to help out.This is indeed a serious matter. Just thinkabout it: the elites emigrate abroad; newimmigrants come in, start families and havekids. The whole society does not take this

seriously and does not provide a well-planned structure to justly distribute socialresources. No institution or organization isestablished to deal with this change. Thus,these kids cant be educated and brought upproperly.

Sometimes you wouldnt think it ispossible to deal with all these because thereare so many things for you to do. As forfilms, I have achieved certain things,because of my age and my spending such along time making films. Many new people

have appeared, which means the wholeworld is changing. All film forms are chang-ing and the directions of film festivals arealso changing. The problem I am now facingis that originally I made films for myself, formy individuality. I have tried to go beyondmyself even though I am aware that the selfcannot be separated from the society he isin. You always observe society and alwaysfeel like saying something about what you

observe. All these drive you back to theessence of humanity. But now you will findsuch space has become narrower andnarrower. Since the internet has become acommon way of communication and thewhole world has changed, you realize that

there is no use influencing intellectuals orolder people. You have to have impact onthe young generation. This calls for adjust-ment, adjusting your current position andfinding a proper place to talk to them.

At the moment I am thinking and find-ing another position. The position Im nowstanding on is rather safe because I can getmoney from Europe and Japan. It is fairlyeasy for me to make films. I can make what-ever films I like. I can always make somevery individualistic films. But the problem

is that the impact is weaker. Ordinarypeople wont watch them at all. Only thefilm students or some culturally-sensitivepeople will watch them. But I want to havemore impact on more people. When wewere young, we watched mainstreammovies. What this means is that thosemovies were dreamworks. Stardom is adreamwork; genre films are dreamworkstoo. In the end, Chinese [Hua-ren] filmcircles will target audiences from mainland

China. The Chinese (Hua-ren) includepeople from Hong Kong, Taiwan andSoutheast Asia. On this map, what on earthcan you do to develop local genres, to attractother markets? At least the genre filmsshould be built up, then they can haveenough energy to grow. After that, we cantalk about some individualistic, experimen-tal and indie films that some people like todo. This energy should reflect back on themainstream films. If the mainstream filmsdont exist, the experimental part can hardly

exist.What I am trying to do, is to change to

another position to create some new genrefilms in Chinese circles. If I could say thatmy films used to be less dramatic, more real-istic, a kind of very much my style, such astyle is actually more lyrical. Or put itanother way, it is about some aura amongpeople or about some peoples personalities.It is very much in the Chinese lyrical and


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expressive tradition. The dramatic part isimplicit, underneath. But now, can I turn itaround and apply what I have already gotin a more dramatic structure?

I believe that the infrastructure ofTaiwans film industry needs building. The

training needs unceasing operation. Take

kung fu

movies as an example, we need tobuild up the scale and formats, such ascomputer special techniques, arts, wire-

kung-fu

fighting, and so on. Actually, youneed to train more new people. This is whatwe Chinese can do. If we can complete theinfrastructure by ten percent, twenty, orthirty percent, we would gradually improveourselves and the young blood can take agreat leap from such a foundation.

Chen:

So all these are your tasks?

Hou:

All these have been on my mind for awhile. I think that those tasks should becompleted. So I have many directions todevelop. One is the direction of Three Times

(the literal translation of the Chinese title is

The Best Times

); the other is documentaryfilms. Of course I wont do a documentarymyself. Ill ask Lan Bozhou and others to doit. Many young people can do that quite

well.

Chen:

Will you expand your partnerships?

Hou:

I have many projects in mind. Forexample, after making the film The Last RiceFarmer

(or Let It Be

), people should makeanother film about fallow paddy fields.These stories have been covered by the

China Times

. I knew all these a long timeago. They dug out the soil and sold it, thendumped the soil and left the field unat-

tended. That existed since earlier times. TheLast Rice Farmer deals with one chunk ofsuch stories. You need to do several of themto make the whole picture clear. Thats whyI said I wished I had more money to do this.

Chen:

So, your latest film, Three Times

is alsoa kind of representation of the process ofyour social and political participation, isit right?

Hou:

Actually in the process of participatingin the political campaigns, I discovered anew angle of examining the films I madeabout Taiwans contemporary history,including the history of the JapaneseOccupation Period, before that period,

after Japanese Occupation and when theRepublican government came to Taiwan.The White Terror, too. I can make a film onHsiao Kai-ping. He was a forensic doctor.His father was Hsiao Dao-ying. They foughtthe Japanese with Chung Hao-dong duringthe Second World War. They joined theunderground organization and werearrested when they got back to Taiwan. Atthat time, Hsiao Kai-ping was just a kid, hecould not accept it. He has written some-thing about this experience. Li Guo-yuan, a

pianist, also had a similar experience. Sheplayed the piano in the second part of myfilm, The Best Times, which is named TheDream of Freedom. She was sent to Austriawhen she was very young because herparents were political prisoners and did notwant her to get involved and suffer. Duringher study in Austria, her father wrotehundreds of letters to her and explainedwhat had happened. This can also make ashort piece.

Chen:

You have been emphasizing shortproductions. Actually in your early work,we have seen some short pieces, or the ideasof short pieces. Do you think it would beeasier for common people or the whole soci-ety to understand these jigsaws of shortpieces in contrast to the longer pieces?

Hou:

Short pieces are faster to make. Youdont need to spend a lot of time on screen-plays, thinking of the beginning, develop-

ment, climax, and conclusion, or the causeand effect, etc. Short pieces can digest a lotof exciting materials and also be combinedtogether as a series of documentary-styledfilms. We did something on Lan Bo-zhousstory before, something like Why We DidNot Sing.

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Long interviews sort of thing.This is supplementary. After watching thefilm, some people may take interest in itand would like to find more materials to


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read in order to understand the wholething.

Chen:

So you are trying to tell us yourpresent and future directions for makingfilms after the political participation?

Hou:

I have a long-term plan, which is theso-called best times. What I mean by thisis that not a certain time is beautiful. WhatI try to express is that the past cannot berepeated. So I will do a series of films on this.In the middle of doing this, I will alsodevelop the documentary vein. ActuallyI am still in the process of recovering history.This covers many fields, many differenttypes of people. Sometimes you need todelineate the people from other angles.

For example, Nanking was a veryimportant base for the Republican govern-ment. They built many mansions at thattime. Some of the mansions are still there.Recently, a scholar in Nanking worked onthe stories of these mansions and developeda very interesting narrative since eachmansion has its own story and the peoplewho lived in these mansions were somehowrelated to each other. This is fascinating.What I mean is that sometimes words are

not enough, I have to use images as a supple-ment. I thought of making telefilms but nowI find I dont need to do that. Telefilms aredifficult to make. You have to retrieve thecontemporary situations, costumes, andatmosphere. The most difficult part is withthe actors. You just cannot retrieve the wholething. Previously, I thought of doing it at theSchool for Democracy. I found it very inter-esting when I joined the forums and gotsome ideas. For instance, people like ChienYung-hsiang, Su Ying-gui and Zhu Yun-han

see things differently even though they areexamining the same topic. It was really fasci-nating to me. Something like this would benice if it were like At That Night, HouHsiao-Hsien Was Shooting the Coalition. Totell a story with images is different from tell-ing it with words.

Chen:

So far you seem to be telling us twodifferent things. One is the use of images as

the medium of intervention in society. Inother words, you consider intervention apossibility after the experience of politicalparticipation. Or is it because there is noother way? Another thing is that there is adirect object you are addressing. You kept

emphasizing retrieving history. Can I put itthis way? You are anxious to have adialogue with this direct object because thecurrent political situations or politicalfigures tend to over-simplify the interpreta-tion of history and tend to be one-sided. Butthe true situation is far more complex. Youwant to represent the complexity. It seems tome that there are two different things. One isto intervene in the interpretation of historythrough images; the other is to retrieve thecomplexity of history that has been lessened

by the political manipulation. These twothings are what you are concerned about inthe present and the future?

Hou:

For me these two things seem to bejust one thing. This is complicated. But interms of form, making films can be assimple as writing articles. For me retrievinghistory basically has to be as objective aspossible.

Chen:

So the plans you talk about will bemainly on the historical part? In the vein ofTaiwans modern history?

Hou:

The authoritarian regime has caused agap and, to a certain degree, distorted ourunderstanding of Taiwans modern history.Only very few intellectuals and/or elitesknow about such a gap. Such an under-standing is rather limited. For most people,the gap is there and they cannot fully under-stand who they are and what such history

means to them.

Wei:

I have a feeling that your earlier filmsalso tried to retrieve history to some degree,for example, the Taiwan trilogy. Is there anydifference between the earlier films andwhat you are planning now?

Hou:

For me, the Taiwan trilogy are simplyfilms. What I mean by film here is that


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I only see the history bits from the angle ofcharacters. Because the complexity, diver-sity and multiple facets cannot be dealt within those films, I concentrate on the charac-ters. I only delineate a kind of atmosphere,an aura.

Wei:

So what will you do afterwards?

Hou:

Spread, spread out even more.

The way out for Taiwans cinema

Chen:

Can you talk a bit about the Associa-tion of Taiwan Cinema Culture that you arein charge of. What does it do?

Hou:

At first, trying to organize this associa-

tion is trying to organize some activities.Originally we thought we could set up alearning and training center for apprentice-ship. Roughly at the same time, the oldAmerican Ambassadors Residence as thehistorical site was conserved and refur-bished by the Culture Bureau of Taipei.They wanted to set up a cinema culturecenter on this site, so they came for me. Theplan was to have a bar on the second floor,and a caf and bookstore on the first floor.

We didnt do it ourselves since the know-how was not simple for us. We sub-contracted the work to the professionals.The old garage was turned to a small theateraccommodating 88 seats. This is what younow know as Taipei-Spot Film House. It isrun by the Association of Taiwan CinemaCulture.

When we first started, the money wasmainly borrowed from my own company.We spent at least seven or eight millions NTdollars for decoration, hiring the staff, and

all the hardware facilities. Now it looksquite glamorous but it did take a lot ofeffort and time. Then came the softwarepart and management. I proposed the ideaof the third section to the Association. Thiswas inspired by Peter F. Druckers autobi-ography, Adventures of a Bystander

. Incontrast to the public and the privatesectors, i.e. the government and the enter-prises, the third sector is the social section,

which is a non-profit section and is basedon public interest. Only when we developthe function of the third section can we beindependent and multicultural. By doingso, the values of human society can bemaintained and guarded. Thus, we can talk

about cultivating community leadershipand civil society, and so on and so forth.

So the films we choose to play are verydifferent from those of the mainstreamtheaters. We have our own standards andtasks for choosing films and organizingsmall film exhibits. For example, we hadNorth European Film Exhibits, Digital FilmExhibits, East European Film Exhibits,Indian Film Exhibits, South European FilmExhibits, Latin American Film Exhibits, andmusic-centered Taiwan and Chinese Film

Exhibits, and so on. Once one exhibit inTaipei is done, it tours Hsinchu, Kaohsiungand Taoyuan. We can find the Visual ImagesMuseum, Film Library and PerformanceHall respectively in the above cities andshow these films to the local people. Ifthey take interest, we will be more thanhappy to share. What I am really proud ofso far is that we organized the Film Exhibitfor Celebrating the 100th Anniversary forYasujiro Ozu. We got hold of 36 of his exist-

ing 35 mm film copies, which are quiteamazing. Moreover, we published a specialbook dedicated to Ozu, which is the mostcomplete introduction to his works inChinese so far. The theater has graduallyestablished its style and reputation. Since itstarted three years ago, the box officenumbers have increased three times.

Above all, the most important role thatthe Association plays is to train and supportmore young talents. The best way to trainpeople is let them do it: practice. We have

operated the Cinema Apprentice Center fortwo years. Now we have several groupswho are working and getting sponsoredby Taiwan Semiconductor ManufacturingCompany Limited. After the members writetheir screenplays, we tell them how to putthem into practice. They have no experience.I offer my producers and casting of mycompany to them; tell them if any problemarises, they need to negotiate. What we have


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done so far is not enough. I have the feelingthat practical operation mainly derives fromme. Probably we need to find some othersupport and find more energy coming in.For instance, telefilms. We can shoot tele-films in the scale of making films. Such

training will be more useful. If such a plat-form can be established in a few years time,we stand a better chance. Because nowTaiwans cinema is promising, many morepeople would like to invest in it. Such anopportunity should not be wasted.

Wei:

It is dangerous while you try to make achange. You dont succeed and then youcannot move on. You need a certain amountof energy and quantity to accumulate first.Then it can bring in a positive cycle.

Chen:

The whole structure of the filmindustry in Taiwan has reached the thin-nest sustenance. To slowly strengthen itmeans to re-build the structure of the filmindustry

Hou:

The reason is simple. If you dont haveenergy and quantity, there will never betalents. If you want to shoot a film, you haveto find people from Hong Kong or Japan.

We cant find enough talent here. Besides,we dont have producers. Producers knowwhere to find the right people, get the rightteams and right directors. Also, they knowhow to find the right stars, how muchpeople can achieve, and what ways are mostefficient. Furthermore, they know how to dospecial effects, and where to find photogra-phers to take the right shots. In any case,photography, special effects, and art designare all related. You have to make the rightjudgments about all this.

Chen:

Im thinking of another problem. Toestablish a Taiwans film association can bevery meaningful. It can be a contact point tothe outside world. I dont know if they havesimilar associations in Mainland China,perhaps they have a writers association, ora film association. All these can be linkedup to work out something together. If sucha linkage is set up, it might be easier to

promote Chinese cinema as a whole. It canbe a greater coalition. Maybe coalition is notthe right word. It can offer a kind of imagi-nation, a Chinese (hua-ren) film organiza-tion. But we dont find support or adequateconditions to do it, right?

Hou:

I think that I should achieve some-thing first. For example, if you want to workwith Asian countries to make films, youshould find the market first. It is doomed ifthere is no market, because it just meansinvesting money in others films and no oneinvests in yours. In mainland China they areworking toward that aim. They either makebig-scale epic films for propaganda, or somevery small-budget auteur films. Directorslike Wang Xiao-shuai, Jia Zhang-ke are

more auteur-like. Feng Xiao-gang is doingvery well in the mainstream.

Chen:

What do you think of film schoolsand academic training? For example, thedepartments of film and the colleges of film.From your experience, what do you think ofthis training?

Hou:

It does matter if they work or not. Wecannot deny that we get quite a lot of people

from film schools. Basically it must be thelove for films which drives a person to entera film school. But whether this person willjoin this field depends on the conditions ofthat person. I studied at a film school but noone worked in this field except me aftergraduation. Somehow at least I persist.

Chen:

What I want to ask is that if a filmschool asks, will you join them?

Hou:

You mean teaching?

Chen:

Yes, more or less.

Hou:

My opinion is this: if you really wantto do it, you should start from elementaryschools. Try to get the copyrights for educa-tional showing for elementary and second-ary schools. If there can be an organization,supposedly a government-sponsored foun-dation of culture or arts, which takes charge


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of seeking the good movies for the young-sters from the whole world, we can reallymake this happen. They make the copies orversions for public showing and promotethem. Actually Denmark has done this verysuccessfully. Even some European countries

want to buy from them and ask for theircatalogues. You need to have a vision inchoosing the right films for youngsters. Youneed to establish such an institution andthen this task can be gradually achieved.Regarding film schools, what I find difficultis not the technical parts but cultural liter-acy. Techniques are easy to learn. You justneed to practice. If you learn it on the spotfor several films, then you can grasp it allright. But cultural literacy is another story.I dont think education should emphasize

techniques and skills. Its better to provide aholistic training instead of just techniques.

Wei:

You mentioned that we should seewhat role Taiwan can play in the wholeChinese culture world, or in Asia. Can youtalk about this since we have not reallytouched on it yet?

Hou:

Taiwans New Cinema in the 1980swas a big change. It did not happen out of a

void. It came to bloom because peoplespower accumulated to a certain extent andmatured. Peoples autonomous space wasthe soil for the New Cinema. By contrast,the development in mainland China faces agap in cultural continuity. They do not havesuch strong peoples power. Hong KongsNew Wave was also a change. But theytook a different route. Because Hong Kongwas a colony, they went in the direction of afilm industry and mainstream cinema. Theybasically followed the Hollywood style in

terms of the entertainment and form.Taiwan is different. Taiwans New Cinemais a reflection on the progress of growth andlife. This is somewhat unlike Hong Kongsconcerns. However, New Cinema cannotbecome the mainstream. It was originallythe alternative for the mainstream market.It belongs to some people who enjoy filmsand make films the ways in which theythink they are more like auteurs. When we

talk about New Cinema, we have tomention Ming Chi. He was a weird guy. Hestarted a training course at the CentralMotion Picture Co. for four years andbrought in many film technicians to theindustry. While he was the general manager

of the Central Film Co., he recruited HsiaoYeh, and Wu Nien-chen to be schemers. Atthat time, many new directors got their filmdegrees abroad and came back. It was just aperfect timing for everything. You had goodopportunities, a lot of promising people andthe right atmosphere. Thats why NewCinema came to maturity.

The realistic aesthetics of New Cinemaand humanistic concerns are its legacy andstrengths. In comparison with mainlandChina which is now releasing its peoples

power, Taiwan shows the social power thathas lasted three generations. Such powerruns deep and wide. Unlike the CulturalRevolution, which created a major gapbetween different generations, our culturaltaste has not suffered from that gap and hasbeen rather enriched for three generations.The process of modernization in mainlandChina is too short and too fast. Many hard-ware facilities have been built right away(dao-wei) but the software set-up has not

been established or cultivated. It is notready yet. So, that is where we stand inthe Chinese-language world. Regardingcinema, no matter if you want to movetoward the mainstream or the alternativetrend, the legacy and the strengths that theNew Cinema left us should be what wecherish and further develop.

Cinema, politics and culture across theStraits

Chen:

We have been talking about thewhole, which involves mainland China.Actually you are close to them, arent you?As far as I know, the researcher friends ofmine, Dai Jing-hua for one, thought thatyou support mainland Chinas film-makersunconditionally in terms of film production.What I want to ask is probably beyond thecinema level. For instance, we cannot neglectsome intrinsic conditions in mainland China


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if we want to think of the whole Chinese-language world from Taiwans standpoint.What do you think of their soil? Accordingto your previous observation, many aspectsare not ready yet. If you want to establish amore mainstream Chinese-language market

on such soil, you need to understand howthe society works.

Hou:

The last time I was there was nearlyeight years ago. I went there again lastmonth and stayed for ten days. I was inShanghai and Nanking. I went to theirmorning markets around six oclock. I liketo go to their markets and see their dailylife. Just by taking their bus, and seeinghow they live their lives, you will realizethere is a huge difference between the tran-

snational and the local emerging power. Bywatching their TV and reading their news-papers, you will know that they still havesome kind of restrictions. There is a longway to go in terms of their concept of publicsphere and urban civil society. But if filmswant to focus on this, I sense that we cannotdo it immediately. As I just mentioned, atdifferent stages you make different films.You have to be effective first and then makeadjustments later.

Chen:

To put it directly, working with main-land China can be operated at variouslevels. One is film schools, another is thefilm industry, yet another includes trainingfor directors. How do you see such linkageand cooperation at this level?

Hou:

I havent contacted them, so I reallydont know. The fastest way to know if itworks is by shooting a martial arts film inChina; then the mode of cooperation will

emerge.

Chen:

Id like to examine this on a broaderpolitical environment, especially after Lienand Song visited mainland China. WhatI am aiming at is actually something movingbeyond cinema and involving all fields,which includes three connections, directflight etc. What do you think of the trend inthe near future after their visits? I dont

think it makes any sense if we just talk aboutcooperation with mainland China withoutsetting a premise on that.

Hou:

Regardless of whether Lien and Songwent to mainland China or not, what I care

about is to set up something on thisChinese-language chunk. I like to focus onwhat we can do in this area. We have someadvantages on some fronts because wehave been through the process of modern-ization, we see things much clearer andknow how to function. What Liens andSongs visits mean to the people there,the intellectuals in particular, is that theysaw certain kinds of leaders who wereimmersed in an atmosphere of liberalism,thus making Lien and Song a kind of stan-

dard, a model. They have never comeacross such kinds of leaders in mainlandChina. Now they have met such leaders inperson. In Taiwan, most political figuresplay smart. Lien Zhang is not that type.When he was in China, his attitude, hisperspective, and his personality was broad-cast on Central TV. People over there thenchanged their impression of Taiwan. Manypeople said dont fight, we cannot possiblyfight against them.

Chen:

Their reactions seem very interestingfrom our perspective. Lien is quite a dullperson in Taiwan but he showed hisdemeanor while he was in China. It seemsto me that Beijing in some ways is like alarge platform. For people like Lien itworks almost therapeutically. This helps usto consider some problems in Taiwan.Compared to the scale of mainland China,Taiwan is small but packed with peoplewho have talent and potential. The plat-

form of Taiwan is now becoming narrowerand narrower for these people. In thesecircumstances, many of them need to goout and find some other space or platformfor them to perform on. Besides, the politi-cal condition also pushes some people tomainland China. Such a condition is ofcourse bad for Taiwan itself. We all knowthat there are at least 600,000 Taiwanesenow in Shanghai.


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Hou:

Ive sent my film copies to Beijing FilmCollege before. I did not expect my filmswould actually provide them with a differ-ent perspective. They had never seenChinese movies take such a perspectivebefore. They had never thought about it.

They were more influenced by the Russiansystem, which is different from the Euro-pean-American system.

I feel that if you have a strong base ofChinese culture, you will have more powerto tell a story while you get in touch withsome Western stuff. And what you showwill be different from the west. I thought ofthis a long time ago: why should we makefilms like the Europeans or the Americans?You cannot compete with them by imitat-ing them since the whole background is

different. They have their own traditions,logic, and abstract thoughts. We havesomething else. Yet when you confrontthem, you will start to look at your ways ofrepresentation in a different light. Most ofthe cities in China are still developing. Theythink that the fifth-generation directors,such as Zhang Yi-mou, started prolificproductions more freely and creatively, yetthe sixth-generation directors are moresubtle and down-to-earth. They take more

interest in local issues. Otherwise, the filmswould be shot more with the Westernersviewpoints. They learned from the Westand shot in the Wests perspective.

Epilogue: the best times

Chen:

My final question is, when you lookback at the time you worked with friends ofthe Coalition, do you think it is the besttime of your life?

Hou:

Oh, yes. They were all different andwith healthy personalities. I sensed that wasan important point. These people areworthy of my admiration. They have done alot in their own fields.

Chen:

Do you want to say something else,which we did not have a chance to askyou? Especially about this participationprocess?

Hou:

Well, probably people think I am kindof falling into silence. I dont care if it issilence or not. If I achieve something in theend, that will tell. During the period overthe heated incident of gunshots, somepeople through various channels asked me

to make a film about it. They got theirmoney ready. I told them I could not do it insuch short period. This is not just about thegunshot incident itself, it extends to some-thing else, including the meaning behind itand why it happened. In what way can I tellsuch a story and make sense? Once we passthe heated discussion, something willslowly emerge. What was not clear earlierwould become clearer. I can do it but to do itto what extent and to what means are whatconcern me. I cannot be taken advantage of

by any political party. It is impossible for meto make any film for a single partys interest.

Wei:

So the most significant impression ofthis experience on you is that it helps toshape and adjust some of your ideas andtasks while you make films?

Hou:

It seems to open another window forme. It is much broader, much clearer andhelps me take a firmer belief in what I will do.

Wei:

So the film practice, social practice andpolitical practice are all linked together in aclearer way?

Hou:

Simply put, I got more material formaking films. I always see from the view-point of humanity. Whatever I do is alwaysrelated to this. I see the negative side ofTaiwan is expanding, which is bad forTaiwan.

(Interviewed at SPOT-Taipei Film House,October, 2005.)

Notes

1. The coalitions aim is to urge local politicians tostop manipulating ethnicity issues for partisaninterests.

2. Here Hou meant the gunshot attack on Presi-dent Chen Hsui-bian and his Vice-President,Annette Lu. The day before the election, Chen


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survived a mysterious election-eve gunshotattack that slightly injured him and helped himwin re-election.

3. A very successful entrepreneur in Taiwan, hedied in his mid-50s. Wen devoted himself tocharity work in his 50s and helped reduce theilliteracy in mainland China.

4. Two magazines issued a special report on thistopic, see New Journalism

(No. 906, July 2004);

Business Week

(No. 917, June 2005, Taiwan).5. Lan, based on Jiang Bi-yus life and her times,

made this documentary to record part of thehistory of the White Terror period in the 1950s.

Translators biography

Ken-fang Lee is associate professor and chair ofthe Graduate Institution of Translation and Inter-pretation at National Taiwan Normal University.Her research interests lie in feminism, ChineseAmerican literature, cultural translation and trans-

lation studies.

Contact address:

Graduate Institution of Translationand Interpretation, National Taiwan NormalUniversity, 162, He-ping East Road, Section 1, Taipei106, Taiwan.

14 political participation in 2004 - an interview with hou hsiao-hsien

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