#a city of sadness

[voidincinema]

Tony Leung in A city of sadness (1989)

[everything-maxriemelt]

“A City of Sadness” 4K restoration version

[trials-blooms]

Hou is interested in the private pains of upheaval. Prisoners write poems before they die. Hiromi writes in her diary. Wen-ching writes notes. The two lovers write to each other, having no other way to communicate. These texts appear in large block print that occupy the entire screen in a way that recalls old silent films. Why so much text? The film’s screenwriters, Hou, Chu T’ien-wen, and Wu Nien-jen, were born after the violent uprisings and grew up during a time when it was forbidden to talk about them. To write City, they sifted through diaries, letters, and private archives. The film thus stands as a reflection on what remembering feels like: sifting through text. That activity is soundless. You must imagine the lives of people who have dared to leave a trace. Consider, in contrast, the simple yet poignant narratives of the White Terror that have emerged in the mainstream news since government archives opened in the early 2000s. The BBC reported one such story. “My most beloved Chun-lan,” a father wrote on the night before he was executed, to his five-month-old daughter, “I was arrested when you were still in your mother’s womb. Father and child cannot meet. Alas, there’s nothing more tragic than this in the world.” He wrote that in 1953. The government confiscated it and never delivered to his family. His daughter would receive it fifty-six years later, at age fifty-six. She cried when she read it. “I finally had a connection with my father,” she told BBC. “I realized not only do I have a father, but this father loved me very much.” Narratives like these have a beginning (arrest, execution), middle (prolonged, multidecade separation between father and child; suspended wondering), and end (cathartic reception of the letter; connection established). One of the central precepts of trauma healing holds that we reclaim events of loss through narrative. Hou refuses a narrative, thus refusing reclamation, suspending us in the psychic trauma of his generation.

on a city of sadness, the paris review (2023)

[lonelylonelygirls]

[cristalconnors]

73. A City of Sadness (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 1989)

Comprehensively charts the beginnings of the White Terror not by didactically delineating key historical bullet points, but rather through the lens of Social History, gracefully and devastatingly illustrating the ways in which the KMT’s brutal, suppressive regime imposed itself on the everyday lives of ordinary Taiwanese families. Rating: 9.6/10

[holdoncallfailed]

here is the life i've always longed for.....!!

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Get Their Ass.

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[feluka]

Egypt 1919

[sad-leon]

did ya boi enter week 3 of @tmntfashioncompetition just to dress up my blorbo in a villain outfit? yes, yes i did ^_^

anyways~

yes, tis me, going up against @thegunnsara and @cokoweee

outfit is just Talulah (Arknights) cosplay :D

also special thanks to @v-albion for hyping me up everytime i shared progress shots <3

[midnightblue66]

Jinlan City in a nutshell

[palskippah]

Hi!

I drew this because I was feeling really sad, but it works as a Bowser's birthday thing too woooo!!

[captainkirkk]

Everytime Batman and Red Hood see each other they end up shouting across the streets of Gotham emotional shit like JUST COME HOME SON and YOU'RE NOT IN CHARGE OF ME ANYMORE OLD MAN and it's just Not Subtle in the slightest

No one knows that Jason is an ex Robin so everyone comes to the very logical conclusion that the Red Hood is Batman's rebellious blood son that ran away from home to pursue a life of crime and they're not even fucking wrong

[myfairkatiecat]

Hey guys I know a really guilty Empath in this series

[grapecaseschoices]

some of the extremely supportive but slightly[?] unhinged things wyll can say to the dark urge as they fight the wyll [haha] to peel off his face.

[c-kiddo]

omg noooo theyre so little 😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢

[snowberry-pie]

what i like about ascendant astarion is that he’s completely undeniably pathetic. he’s scooby doo levels of cartoon villainy. he monologues on and on and on about ruling baldur’s gate as a diabolical overlord when every plan he has ever concocted is some variation of “step one: succeed at task, step two: profit”. if you kick him in the nuts he throws a tantrum and leaves your party. guarantee you he either he dies in a ditch in a few months time or he spends the rest of his days regularly getting thwarted perry the platypus style