Taiwan Movie Theatre - God Man Dog
Date: Wednesday, December 18, 2019
Time: 1 pm
Venue: Taiwanese Canadian Cultural Centre (8853 Selkirk Street, Vancouver)
Tel: 604-267-0901
Free admission
God Man Dog
2007｜119min｜Color｜Narrative Feature｜Mandarin
2008 Berlin International Film Festival - Tagesspiegel Readers’ Jury Award
2008 Durban International Film Festival - Best Screenplay
2007 Busan International Film Festival
A car accident involving a stray dog connects unlikely characters with life-changing results. A hand model caught in an estranged middle-class marriage, tries to recover from the loss of her baby, but neither religion nor extramarital affairs can help her. A poor aboriginal couple resort to God to get rid of their alcohol problems, transport top-class peaches to the city and hope to reunite with their daughters. A one-legged truck driver collects abandoned deity statues hoping to be blessed with a new prosthetic. Some of them will face a surprising turn in life, others will be caught in new dilemmas.
This multi-character rhapsody evokes the pluralism of community, class and religion, as well as their conflicts, in contemporary Taiwan. Contrasting values permeate the film: deities are reduced to objects worshipped to gain fortune, and expensive peaches discarded after a commercial shoot are poor people’s only source of income. Diverse characters with different social positions and life experiences, are nevertheless united as wandering minds in search of spiritual redemption amid the impermanence of life.
Director
Singing CHEN
Born in 1974, acclaimed Taiwanese director Singing CHEN has demonstrated in her films her unique perspective towards contemporary Taiwanese society. Her work is often fast-paced, tightly structured, emotionally layered, and with a sense of humor. Additionally, CHEN’s expertise in scoring gives her films a distinctive rhythmic tone.
This section selects five of CHEN’s films to explore the creative trajectories of her feature films and documentaries farming a unique creative focus and cinematic aesthetics. Her narrative features brilliantly illustrate the absurdities of modern society using magical realism, and depicting characters and their plight with considerable depth to address the society’s fundamental structural problems. For years CHEN has dedicated herself to making documentaries on theater, dance and sound art to delve into the rich and colorful lives and creations of artists.
