Challenge Excepted: Taiwan

First film outside of Europe, The Wayward Cloud from Taiwan.

For anyone who hasn't seen this film, I'm sure you've seen at least one of the images on the poster, certainly the watermelon theme going on.

There is a water shortage on Taiwan and people are being encouraged to drink watermelon juice in replacement of water. Hsiao-Kang, an adult film actor and Shiang-chyi, a woman who scrounges for water, meet again and start a relationship.

I say 'meet again' because the characters met before in 'What Time Is It There?' also directed by Tsai Ming-liang. The Wayward Cloud is something of a sequel.

There is very little dialogue and hardly any camera movement, something Tsai is known for. Apart from the very explicit sex scenes (most) of the musical numbers are fantastic. There is great contrast between the solemn reality and extremely colourful and camp musical scenes. In particular the scene filmed at the landmark Dragon and Tiger Pagodas with all the awesome watermelon umbrellas is really amazing. As the film went along the musical number became more exaggerated and stranger too.

Having watched it without muck knowledge of the film before hand I was actually taken aback but  quickly got used to the feel of the film. I'm not sure how to recommend this and the musical number where the lead is dressed up as a penis and running around a giant bathroom is a bit too far for me. Another element is the lack of dialogue, for some stories I can see why its not needed but for this film I wanted to know more but without dialogue the story didn't really move along.

End Line: It's basically a porn musical.

Next: Spain, Sweden, South Korea, New Zealand, Denmark and Japan