Formosa Betrayed (the movie)

[ilai]

One of the advantages of being unemployed is that I can waltz down to Boston Common on a weekday morning, watch a movie, and have the theater all to myself. So it was when I went to see Formosa Betrayed today. I was prepared for something less than perfect, having heard about the film before it came out and having read various reviews afterwards

Comments

[gigglefest]

Oh, the simplified Chinese would be a problem for me too. :)

[ilai]

Hee :) I suspect it just comes from shooting in Thailand--one of the storefront banners had a simplified character on it. Most everything else seemed all right, if a bit dated.

[perbac]

Awww man, I'm sorry to hear the movie is not very good as a movie (and too pro-independence). I was looking forward to taking people to see it so they could, I dunno, absorb some of my culture or something.

[ilai]

I might be a bit biased too since I already know the history that they were trying to show, so I felt like I was checking off a checklist while watching the movie instead of letting it engage me. "Yup, that's that incident they're trying to squeeze in, yup that's that other thing they're referencing. Oh look, they're going into lecture mode about this bit of history...."

Who knows, other people might be able to enjoy the movie more, if they're told what to expect and take the political commentary near the end with a grain of salt....

[perbac]

My parents saw it last weekend (and said that although they'd gone by themselves, they looked around the theatre afterward and recognized a lot of faces in the local Taiwanese-American community); my mom said that because she'd left Taiwan in the late 70s, there were actually a few events that she hadn't heard about. Curious if you've compared notes with your parents. :)

Lecture mode - sigh. Well, oh well. I'll still watch it and see how it goes. (Though, it doesn't come to Seattle until April.)

[ilai]

Unless/until it gets released in Taiwan, my parents are unlikely to see it anytime soon :-) (And it probably won't reach Taiwan just because the movie is very much made for an American audience.) I've thought about discussing history with my parents, but they haven't really talked much about the incidents as much as the surrounding environment and the aftermath. One of my mom's recurring stories is about her uncle who ran a bookstore and had to hide in nunneries around Taiwan during the White Terror.

Huh, I'm surprised it's not getting out to Seattle till next month. I'd assumed they were intentionally releasing on the weekend of February 28, but since it's a limited release maybe they couldn't do it everywhere.

(I should note that upon further reflection the movie is probably not as bad as I described, though I think I have just convinced jadia not to see it)