The name wind cabinet has its own special connotation.
If you have read Zhu Tiantian's original novel, you will know that the Wind Cabinet is a village on a small island. Zhu Tiantian spent a lot of ink to describe, here is barren, full of bare stones, the vegetation should be some shrubs. The sea breeze carries salt, and when it falls here, it will be locked by the stones here.
In the movie, this is also a rural village with few individuals and a lack of material and cultural life.
I would think so, the sea breeze, represents youth, wanton, wild, but here it is locked, dumb. This is the theme of this film, the enthusiasm of youth between the countryside and the city, nowhere to rest, and finally turned into a confused poetry.
Both the film and the novel were written in 1983. That was the era of Taiwan's economic take-off. I have not consulted the information, but it is conceivable that a large number of rural youth have come to the cities. They were originally fishermen or farmers, but they went to the cities and became workers. They grew up in the cramped space of their hometown, the barren environment could not tolerate the dreams of their youth, they were destined to have no one to pay attention to, to be unknown, and to live this life. But this era gave them the opportunity to go to the city, and in a process of "globalization", their world became bigger. So they get to know more people, they see newer movies, they are deceived by city people, they chase love, and then they can't find their coordinates between unfamiliar cities and familiar villages, and their youth is full of confusion.
Hou Xiaoxian's "Wind Cabinet" is about the myth of youth in the background of such a big era. I've always felt that this theme is actually universal. Whether it was the 80s in Taiwan, the 90s on the mainland, and even the whole of countries large and small that were moving toward globalization, there were works with similar themes, which tried to discuss the series of processes from the countryside to the city, from agriculture to industry, from children to old age, how we face it, where the soul should be placed.
"Wind Cabinet" is also a good thing, that is, it is taiwanese, but it is something that everyone can understand and empathize with. The film begins with dilapidated marblehouses in depressed villages by the sea, then to the path by the sea, to the bare reef, and to the ruined temple under the sea, which calmly but strongly show the picture of Taiwan. In the few films that I have seen, Hou Xiaoxian has always been able to accurately but quietly show the unique style of Taiwan. It may be that he is good at depicting these scenes with static or simply long shots, and they are naturally integrated into the film narrative and become a pivotal lens language. Such a shot with local characteristics of Hongo makes his film full of a unique temperament. This slow but evocative vernacular visual symbol is not only Taiwanese, but also easy for non-island audiences to grasp. After watching "Wind Cabinet", Jia Zhangke was surprised to find that although the picture was a fishing village in Taiwan, why was it exactly the same as his hometown in Shanxi. I think one is the universality of the theme, and at the same time they must also have their own unique locality. The harmony and resonance of the two make them find the same spiritual motif.
"Wind Cabinet" is a very attractive movie. The story is simple, you can tell it in three words, but its lens, in the three dimensions of narrative, emotion and emotional expression, all reflect a very rich visual language.
For example, the image of the father in the movie is always associated with a rocking chair. Ah Qing has no father, but his heart lacks fatherly love, lacks his father's love, and is also one of the sources of his youth confusion. In the film, the image of the father is gradually established through several memories, from him being injured by baseball, to him taking Aqing to fight a snake (his father's protection, later Aqing was lacking, so he was especially eager to get), and finally his father died, and Aqing returned to the funeral. Before, the narrative was prose-like, the emotions were scattered, the emotions were even a little blurry, and finally they were pushed to a high point in the empty shots of the acting - the father is gone! This hint reminds the audience of the previous shot, and suddenly feels the release of the accumulation of emotions, it turns out that Ah Qing needs him so much, and he will fall into a new confusion.
Another example, A Qing, who was in Kaohsiung, wanted to watch a movie and was deceived. When you arrive at the so-called "cinema hall", it is a house under construction that overlooks the thriving Kaohsiung.
The sight of them lined up together for a bird's-eye view of the city is also interesting. Narratively, it reflects their little and more energetic; emotionally, they are not willing to be deceived, they are not adapted to the city but at the same time marvel at the magnificence of the city are also brought out; emotionally, they face the smallness of the city... A few seconds of footage, so that these contents are sandwiched together, but the magic is all beyond words, and the whole film can still maintain the ethereal rhythm of prose poetry.
"Wind Cabinet" is not a movie that can be clearly explained in a short article, it is worth watching slowly frame by frame. My friend said he liked it very much and had seen it no less than five or six times. I admit that it is a little difficult to accept and integrate its emotions today, and today everything is too fast-paced, in the words of Han Dong, "people now can't stand it when they are a little lonely." But sinking in, this is a poetic but also rich film, the process of watching the film is not only to explore the hearts of the people in the play, but also easy to remind yourself of your youth - this is good enough!