The Great Buddha +

大佛  普拉斯

Taiwan, 2017, b&w/colour, 1.85:1, 103 mins.

Director: Huang Xinyao 黄信尧.

Rating: 6/10.

Blithe satire on the haves and have-nots in Taiwan rural society is sometimes too artful for its own good.

STORY

Rural southern Taiwan, the present day. Du Cai (Chen Zhusheng) has an ailing mother who requires treatment and a job as a night security guard at Globe, a small metalworks that makes cultural artifacts and is currently engaged on a major job of a giant buddha for a new centre in Gaoxiong city. During the night Du Cai’s friend Cai Pu (Zhuang Yizeng), who collects rubbish for recycling, generally comes by for a chat and the two watch TV together and eat cheap expired food from the local corner shop run by Tudou (Na Dou). One night, on his way over, Cai Pu sees an attractive women waiting by a car nearby and wonders who she is; Du Cai has no idea. When Du Cai’s TV breaks down, Cai Pu suggests they steal the video files from the car-dashboard camera of factory owner Huang Qiwen (Dai Liren) and watch them on the computer. On one file they hear Huang Qiwen talking to a teenage girl as they drive to a love hotel; next night they hear him having sex with a half-Chinese woman who calls herself Gucci (Lei Jiexi). After a visit by the Buddhist association that has commissioned the statue, work gathers pace. That night, while browsing through the dash-cam files, Cai Pu and Du Cai find one in which Huang Qiwei can be heard meeting his longtime mistress Ye Fenru (Ding Guolin), who knows all about his affaire with Gu Chi and threatens to call his wife unless he pays her off; there is then the sound of a struggle. Another file shows Huang Qiwei’s car arriving at the metalworks and him bludgeoning Ye Fenru to death. Cai Pu and Du Cai are both shakes by what they have seen, and discuss till dawn whether they should inform the police or not. A week after Ye Fenru’s disappearance, the local police bring Huang Qiwei in for questioning.

REVIEW

The division between Taiwan’s haves and have-nots comes in for some surprisingly pointed satire in The Great Buddha + 大佛  普拉斯, an artfully played black comedy that’s let down only by its pointlessly over-artful packaging. The feature debut of Tainan-born documentarian Huang Xinyao 黄信尧, 44, it’s an expanded version of his 23-minute short The Great Buddha 大佛 (2014, see poster, left) – hence the “普拉斯/+” in the Chinese and English titles – and is a very rare example of a politically engaged feature film from the island. (Remember how The Rice Bomber 白米炸弹客, 2014, spectacularly dropped the ball?) Buddha‘s satire is more in the philosophical than agit-prop realm but it’s still on the nose and often effective within the format of a rural doofus comedy.

It will be interesting to see where, after the film’s rapturous welcome by local critics last year, Huang lands next. With its b&w photography and lean, low-budget look, Buddha poses as a very modest production. In fact, it has some powerful support: the creative producers are Ye Rufen 叶如芬 and Zhong Menghong 钟孟宏, the latter (who’s an established director in his own right, Parking 停车, 2008, Godspeed 一路顺风, 2016) handles the photography under his usual Japanese alias Nakashima Nagao 中岛长雄, and the cast includes names like actors Dai Liren 戴立忍 [Leon Dai] and Na Dou 纳豆 (both in Godspeed), other known performers like Lin Meixiu 林美秀 and You Anshun 游安顺 popping up in cameos, and another director, Chen Yiwen 陈以文, dropping by to play a corrupt politician.

The main burden, however, is carried by the original short’s two stars, who repeat their roles here – Zhuang Yizeng 庄益增, as a night guard at a small metalworks, and Chen Zhusheng 陈竹昇, as his layabout pal who drops by for a chat most evenings. When the TV breaks down, and they’re bored with looking at porno magazines, one suggests watching the video files from the boss’ dash-cam – which leads to both learning more about his debauched private life (and more) than they really want to know. The idea of only hearing the boss’ peccadilloes (as the dash-cam is always focused on the road ahead) until a revelation that changes the characters’ whole worlds is a clever one. The film’s political subtext springs not so much from the portrayal of the two social strata – both lightly satirical – but more from the voice-over narration by Huang himself, who already has a reputation for humorous, absurdist documentaries.

Huang’s voice welcomes viewers to the film, points out when it’s halfway over, and introduces characters, gradually moving in the latter stages (as the tone darkens) to a more philosophical commentary on the injustices of life and the power of religious superstition in people’s lives. The tone is resigned rather than crusading, a kind of sad comedy of manners rather than a political pamphlet. Huang’s chatty narration is the film’s masterstroke, and helps to sustain interest when things become rather stretched in the final half-hour. At the end of the day, Buddha doesn’t really build a case for being 100 minutes rather than, say, 60-70, and the whole Buddhist side is more a MacGuffin than an integral part of the movie. Another problem is that the humour in the cuss-filled, slangy dialogue, which is largely in local Hokkien dialect, hardly translates into standard Mandarin Chinese, let alone other languages.

Zhong’s b&w images are always clean and well-composed, conveying the lazyday feel of rural southern Taiwan and its scruffy environs. Without being over-arty, the photography favours fixed takes; more affected is the use of colour in the dash-cam sequences – a device carried over from the short – which has no perceptible point other than being clever, and even leads to a joke which uses colour tinting. Arguably it’s all part of Huang deliberately deconstructing the drama and making it clear that the audience is watching a movie rather than a real slice of life; but like some over-extended scenes (local bigwigs carousing in a pool, the two anti-heroes chatting away about this and that, the final Buddhist ceremony), it’s also too artful.

Performances are fine, with Dai bringing a whole career of portraying sleazy types to bear on his factory boss (played by Ke Nengyuan 柯能源 in the original short) and both Zhuang (the old cook in Godspeed) and Chen (the husband in My Little Honey Moon 野莲香, 2012) are fine as the anti-heroes. Like the photography, the art direction by Zhao Sihao 赵思豪 is more flavourful than in the short, and the gentle, song-like scoring (frets, whistling) by Lin Shengxiang 林生祥 helps to sustain the blithe tone as much as possible.

CREDITS

Presented by Mandarin Vision (TW), Creamfilm (TW). Produced by Creamfilm (TW).

Script: Huang Xinyao. Photography: Nakashima Nagao [Zhong Menghong]. Editing: Lai Xiuxiong. Music: Lin Shengxiang. Art direction: Zhao Sihao. Costume design: Luo Wanyi. Sound: Guo Liqi, Du Duzhi, Wu Shuyao.

Cast: Zhuang Yizeng (Cai Pu/Pickle), Chen Zhusheng (Du Cai/Belly Button), Dai Liren [Leon Dai] (Huang Qiwen/Kevin), Zhang Shaohuai (Shijia/Sugar Apple), Chen Yiwen (Gao, politician), Na Dou (Tudou/Peanut, shop owner), Ding Guolin (Ye Fenru), Li Yongfeng (council chairman), Zhu Yaoxin (singer), Lei Jiexi (Gucci), Lin Meixiu (Buddhist follower), Xiaoliangge (Tudou’s uncle), You Anshun (Li, policeman), Liang Hequn (deputy police commissioner), Chen Tuoxian (Huangdi Dou, Cai Pu’s uncle, glasses seller), Zheng Yutong (Valerie), Lu Wenxue (company secretary).

Premiere: Taibei Film Festival (Opening Film), 29 Jun 2017.

Release: Taiwan, 13 Oct 2017.