What Time Is It There?

REVIEW
Director Tsai is a filmmaker oft spoken about in the same breath as Antonioni and Buster Keaton. What sounds like a strikingly disparate pairing is an apt description of the combination of urban isolation and deadpan comedy that marks his What Time Is It There? With the delicate touch of a silent movie director, Tsai crafts an elegiac story about loneliness, loss, love and synchronicity that brings as many smiles to one's face as tears. A young watch vendor in the streets of Taipei sells his own watch (which has dual-time capabilities) to a young woman who is about to leave for Paris. Meanwhile, the behavior of his recently widowed mother becomes increasingly erratic as she is convinced that her late husband's spirit has returned to their home. The film shifts between the widow who makes dinner for her deceased husband's spirit, the watch vendor who begins setting Taipei clocks to Paris time and watching Parisian movies such as Truffaut's The 400 Blows (keep a look out for Jean-Pierre Léaud's inspired cameo!) in an attempt to connect with the woman who now drifts lonely and disconnected in a foreign land. In this age of quick edits, insipid dialogue and overly loud soundtracks, Tsai's minimal use of dialogue and music and his extensive use of the long-take are quite refreshing. The viewer is given ample time to digest the gorgeous cinematography and let the content of the character's lives stir our emotions rather than being told what and when to feel. (Mandarin, Taiwanese and French with English subtitles)