According to "Indiewire", 76-year-old international director Hou Xiaoxian, one of the representative figures of Taiwan's new films, will officially bid farewell to the film industry due to dementia. People familiar with the matter said that he would not make movies again, and "Assassin Nie Yinniang", released in 2015, became the last work of his directorial career.
Hou Xiaoxian. The Paper
"IndieWire" quoted Hou's friend and authoritative British film critic Tony Rayns as saying at a screening of Hou's "Childhood" at the London Garden Cinema on October 23, saying that Hou Xiaoxian has retired, and curator George Crosthwait confirmed this fact. In addition, people familiar with the matter revealed that Hou Xiaoxian's Taipei studio has been closed, and all staff, including assistants, have been dismissed. In fact, in the industry, the news of Hou Xiaoxian's illness has long spread in recent years, but this fact has not been officially announced.
As early as 3 years ago, there were rumors that Hou Xiaoxian was suffering from Parkinson's disease, and Zhu Tianwen, a longtime work partner, clarified that he just "had a bad memory when he was old".
Liao Qingsong, a long-term co-editor director, also said when asked about Director Hou's health: "At this age, people can't remember their names clearly, and I remember them when I remind them, and I often do this myself." ”
Liao Qingsong revealed in an interview that Hou Xiaoxian was preparing to write a script about the problems of elderly families, and he also urged Hou Xiaoxian to write faster and make another film. At the same time, he also said that Hou Xiaoxian has always maintained exercise habits and is also very restrained in eating, "Climbing mountains every day, eating is very controlled, he was fat when he was young, now he is thin, I told him, eat like me to indulge." ”
Hou Xiaoxian. The Paper
In September 2022, the digital restoration version of Hou Xiaoxian's masterpiece "City of Sorrow" for the 33rd anniversary premiered in Taipei, and Hou Xiaoxian, as the soul figure, was absent, and the reason given by Taiwanese media at that time was that Hou Xiaoxian was diagnosed with the new crown.
In February last year, at the launch of the Taiwanese literary documentary "They Write on Islands", Hou Xiaoxian was present as a producer, and he laughed that he was "only responsible for eating", in order to make it easier for his old friend Zhu Tianwen to raise funds. At that time, Zhu Tianwen also revealed the state of Hou Xiaoxian, saying that they would go to the café every day to party, "Whether there are new ideas or not, anyway, just squat over there, squat until one day things may come out." ”
In April last year, Taiwan's classic gangster movie "Boy, Anla! The 4K restoration version held its world premiere at the Golden Horse Fantasy Film Festival, Hou Xiaoxian also attended as a producer to support, the scene of the former team editor Liao Qingsong, sound effects artist Du Duzhi, as well as actors Yan Zhengguo, Wei Xiaohui, and the film soundtrack distributor Ni Chonghua reunited, everyone helped him celebrate his 75th birthday, Hou Xiaoxian held a cake to take photos, and deliberately made a "hand slide" funny action to make everyone laugh.
A still from "Assassin Nie Yinniang"
After Hou Xiaoxian finished filming "Assassin Nie Yinniang" in 2015, there has been no new film. "Assassin Nie Yinniang" won Hou Xiaoxian Best Director Awards, including Cannes and Golden Horse, when he received the trophy from Ang Lee, he said, "I haven't won the Best Director Award for a long time, this film is very happy, I hope to have the opportunity to continue to shoot the Tang Dynasty." ”
After that, the most accurate news about his new film is a movie about the river god "On the Shulan River", the original is a non-fiction literature that explores the region along the river to find the river god, with a full of humanistic atmosphere and nostalgia, I think it is very consistent with Hou Xiaoxian's temperament. A video of Hou Xiaoxian speaking to Shu Qi and Zhang Zhen in 2020 has been released on the Internet, and the film has also begun to look for exteriors, and there were even rumors that Yi Yangqianxi would join the film, but at present, all this can only stop at the good expectations of fans.
"On the Shulan River" poster, the film has also appeared in "Looking for the River God", "Otaku Love River God" and other titles, originally planned to be released in 2025
Hou Xiaoxian was born in 1947 in Meixian, Guangdong (now Meizhou City), and moved to Taiwan with his family when he was four months old. At that time, my father's idea was to return to his hometown after a few years of development in Taiwan. However, those years were turbulent, and the hometown became a place that was close at hand but could not be returned. Foreigners have thus become the motif of Hou Xiaoxian's subsequent films, and his calm perspective on Taiwan in the film has achieved a unique peak of Chinese cinema.
In 1973, director Li Xing wanted to find a scene, and Hou Xiaoxian was recommended to enter the film industry. He has served as a scene reporter, assistant director and screenwriter. In the early years, he wrote and filmed Qiong Yao dramas starring Feng Feifei such as "It's Slippery Her", which is different from the later slightly dull author's film style, and the former Hou Xiaoxian also won Taiwan's box office championship, but he also quipped, "That's not me." ”
In 1983, "The Man from the Wind Cabinet" won the Best Film Award at the Three Continents Film Festival in Nantes, France, and Hou Xiaoxian established his own style and opened a vigorous creative life, telling the throbbing and pain that had been buried in the land of growth in a solemn long lens.
As one of the representative figures of Taiwan's new films, Hou Xiaoxian has won the Golden Horse Award for Best Director three times, and his representative works include "City of Sorrow", "Goodbye Southland, Southland", "Millennium Mambo", "Best Time", "Good Man and Good Woman" and so on. He has influenced a large number of Asian creators including Jia Zhangke, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Li Cangdong, Bi Gan and so on. In 2020, the Golden Horse Award unanimously passed the lifetime achievement award to Hou Xiaoxian.
Hou Xiaoxian once summarized that the biggest gain of his film life is that he chose the path of film and achieved some achievements. "There shouldn't be an end to creation, I feel like I've been on that road, I want to keep doing it, and the film is still very, very joyful for me."