The River

The River
by Ming-liang Tsai

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Category: DVD
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DVD details

Actor: Ann Hui, Kang-sheng Lee, Shiang-chyi Chen, Tien Miao, Yi-Ching Lu
Director: Ming-liang Tsai
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Subtitled); Mandarin Chinese (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Format: Color, DVD, Letterboxed, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 115 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-02-04
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Fox Lorber

DVD Reviews of The River

DVD Review: Ha ha, wow.
Summary: 5 Stars

This film is an unbelievable masterpiece. Tsai Ming-Liang continues to outdo himself at every turn, creating yet another of the best films since the advent of sound. His quiet but relentless attack on the entire idea of the modern narrative film would do Eisenstein proud. Anyone doubting the supreme genius with which he seeks to confound the cinema illiterate West need only read the other reviews on this page. The fact that one confused reviewer had the unmitigated audacity to trash this film after appointing himself "Enlightened One" had me holding my sides with laughter.

If you are sick of spastic, attention-deficit editing; if you hate being told how to feel about your movie by a ridiculous, invasive orchestra score; if you no longer need to be told how important a scene is by the volume of the actor's voice, Tsai Ming-Liang just might be for you. I am still chuckling to myself as I write this, imagining some clueless art-house hipster adjusting the brightness on his set and trying to figure out how tell what a character is feeling without a close-up of their face.

Good Lord. Imagine what these people would make of Bela Tarr.

DVD Review: 50/50
Summary: 3 Stars

This is simply the kind of film that one will either like or dislike. I really can't see there being two-ways about it.
It has only been a year or so since I emersed myself into the world of independent/international/arthouse/whatever you want to call it, films. The River is not for the novice!

I forced myself to finish the film because I felt it was important to at least give the director's vision a chance before judging. I am glad I did. The film has no music in it, all you get is the natural ambiance of the characters surroundings. That kinda leaves a haunting echo over each scene.

DVD Review: Dead in the water . . .
Summary: 5 Stars

This downbeat film about a family in Taipei is open to many interpretations, which will make it intriguing for viewers who like movies that make them wonder about what they are watching. There is something of a storyline in this film - a young man falls mysteriously ill and his parents attempt to find a cure for him - but its chief purpose seems to be little more than the thread on which each scene is strung together. Not that there's anything wrong with that . . .

What we see is three people living in the same small apartment who are almost completely estranged from each other, rarely speaking, deeply bored and reaching out for human contact through occasional moments of illicit and unsatisfying encounters. The absence of familial affection and the emptiness of its substitutes are brought together in a final ironic incident between father and son.

Water, the bringer of life and purification, is instead a menacing presence in the film - from a polluted river to a leaky ceiling that seems unrepairable. Winner of many awards when it was released, the film is a troubling portrayal of modern urban life. While its long, slow scenes require some patience from the viewer, there is much to ponder as the closing credits begin to crawl - and for hours afterward.

DVD Review: Beautiful film by a brilliant filmmaker
Summary: 5 Stars

Highly recommended if you are a fan of Antonioni, Tarkovsky, Tarr or other filmmakers who utilize time (especially slow pacing) and landscape to help develop the internal states of their characters. Tsai's films are very meditative and contemplative; they help you to understand a character by observing their daily routine and most intimate moments played out in full. His works are challenging, but well worth the effort.

DVD Review: You Won't Forget It
Summary: 4 Stars

This movie is not what we Westerners are accustomed to in movies, therefore we tend to dismiss it. We like all emotions openly displayed. lots of dialogue and the plot must be resolved.
You will find none of this in this movie, but it is certainly worth viewing and once you understand the reason for the lack of interaction between characters, it does make sense.

Another aspect that makes the movie difficult is the long scenes when nothing is happening on the screen. That was the director's approach.

The family is totally disfunctional as a unit. The parents never speak to each other, they all eat alone, and they function in their own little worlds with virtually no emotion.
Even sex is random with no emotions attached.

After the encounter between the son and the father, no one speaks of it and life continues on as before. There is no resolution to anything. That is the horror of the whole movie.

Description of The River

The strange, elliptical movies of Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-Liang (The Hole, What Time Is It There?) defy encapsulation. A description of The River will tell you about a female elevator operator, her pornography-selling lover, and her husband who goes to gay bathhouses. Her unhappy scooter-riding son runs into an actress he knew a few years earlier; she brings him to the set of a movie she's working on, where the young man gets a role as a corpse floating in a river. But none of that amounts to a plot in any conventional sense, and that summary doesn't capture the slow but hypnotic pace of Tsai's movies, or how the seemingly ordinary images will burn themselves into your memory. The lack of conventional action will frustrate some viewers, but others will find deadpan humor and an eerie cinematic poetry. --Bret Fetzer

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