Hou Hsiao-hsien

This is a story of reminiscence, remembering my long-deceased Grandpa. To remember is to transcend, therefore it’s a story of time and space, overlapped and intertwined. It’s also a quest of love and work, a spiritual and emotional journey; and through which values are re-examined and life reaffirmed.

Dancer SHEU Fang-yi’s career has been told through her modern dance dramas such as Sparrow, Stranger, Wall, and Martha GRAHAM‘s Heretic. Martha GRAHAM once said: “A dancer dies twice — once when they stop dancing, and this first death is the more painful.” At this intersection of her life, SHEU Fang-yi commemorates her glorious past two decades with a funeral, to farewell her past self, and to get ready to move toward her unknown future.

“I Remember” tells the story of sister writers Chu Tien-wen and Chu Tien-xin, from co-founding the San-san magazine to their respective creative and political efforts up to the present.

A new documentary by Daniel Raim and Eugene Suen on the making of "Flowers of Shanghai," featuring behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with Mark Lee Ping-bing, producer and editor Liao Ching-sung, production designer Hwarng Wern-ying, and sound recordist Tu Duu-chih.

One of Hong Kong's most influential filmmakers, Ann Hui, becomes a “star” for the first time in Man Lim-chung's directorial debut. A forerunner of the New Wave, Hui’s tumultuous, forty-year career is an unequivocal testimony to her unyielding dedication to filmmaking, and her expedition into the metamorphic city. This biopic probes into the acclaimed director’s idiosyncratic world, where we witness her rashness and goofiness, as well as her humanistic concerns for the everyday nobodies which make her films so moving.

Chu Tien-Wen, frequent screenwriter for Hou Hsiao-Hsien, makes her directorial debut with this entry in The Inspired Island documentary series. With Hou as producer, cinematographer Yao Hung-I and editor Liao ChingSung, Chu takes a deep dive into the story of her parents, famed authors Chu Hsi-Ning and Liu Mu-Sha. Through family albums, old letters and interviews with fellow writers, Chu crafts a deeply personal portrait of her parents’ romance, literary careers, family roots and the unfinished opus her father left behind.

When a woman who was abandoned at birth because of a genetic disorder sees a child facing the same fate, she finds herself trying to persuade their parents to reconsider and goes to extreme lengths to save the child.

On his 60th birthday, Van is told that he is seriously ill. But instead of going to Taipei for treatment, his illness leads him to Japan. Together with his son, he goes in search of the father who abandoned him 50 years ago. At the same time, a young man with a mysterious connection to Van's past is travelling from Hong Kong to Taiwan.

Hsu Zi-qi, who raises parrots in her apartment, keeps getting wrong phone calls for someone named Johnny. Lee, the autistic son of Zi-qi’s landlady, reads old newspapers every day and wanders around. Handyman Feng, who works odd jobs around the apartment, feels disheartened and frustrated when his beloved car breaks down. The lives of these three lonely souls cross over when one of Zi-qi’s parrots escapes one day. Johnny is missing, but he’s hardly the only one lost in the urban jungle of Taipei.

Yves Montmayeur takes Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon as the starting point for his study of the new female warrior in Asian pop culture. From Beijing to Tokyo and Taiwan, he went to meet with the most iconic muses of this new trend, including Michelle Yeoh, Zhang Ziyi, Shu Qi, and Asami.

In 2013, the Golden Horse Film Festival celebrated its 50th anniversary. The ministry of Culture commissioned director Yang Li-chou to make a documentary about the history of Golden Horse. What is unique to this film is that it's not an ode to celebrities but about the role cinema plays in ordinary people's lives. It's a love letter to cinema, filmmakers and audiences.

No século VIII, durante a dinastia Tiang, Yinniang (Shu Qi) é uma assassina profissional, treinada com os melhores mestres. Ela é encarregada de matar um homem do governo, mas não consegue cumprir a tarefa quando o vê segurando um bebê recém-nascido. Punida por sua covardia, ela recebe a tarefa mais difícil de sua vida: matar o próprio primo, por quem é apaixonada, e com quem deveria se casar desde a adolescência. Yinniang tem que se confrontar ao passado para cumprir as ordens de sua mestra.

No século VIII, durante a dinastia Tiang, Yinniang (Shu Qi) é uma assassina profissional, treinada com os melhores mestres. Ela é encarregada de matar um homem do governo, mas não consegue cumprir a tarefa quando o vê segurando um bebê recém-nascido. Punida por sua covardia, ela recebe a tarefa mais difícil de sua vida: matar o próprio primo, por quem é apaixonada, e com quem deveria se casar desde a adolescência. Yinniang tem que se confrontar ao passado para cumprir as ordens de sua mestra.

No século VIII, durante a dinastia Tiang, Yinniang (Shu Qi) é uma assassina profissional, treinada com os melhores mestres. Ela é encarregada de matar um homem do governo, mas não consegue cumprir a tarefa quando o vê segurando um bebê recém-nascido. Punida por sua covardia, ela recebe a tarefa mais difícil de sua vida: matar o próprio primo, por quem é apaixonada, e com quem deveria se casar desde a adolescência. Yinniang tem que se confrontar ao passado para cumprir as ordens de sua mestra.

With Taiwan remaining in the grip of martial law in 1982, a group of filmmakers from that country set out to establish a cultural identity through cinema and to share it with the world. This engaging documentary looks at the movement's legacy.

Set in the island Kinmen, often seen as the most dangerous military base because it’s geographically close to China, "Paradise in Service" follows the adventure of a boy who serves his military service in Unit 831 from 1969 to 1972, in preparation for a war that could erupt anytime. Through an unlucky lottery draw result, Pao, a twenty-something young man from Southern Taiwan has to serve the military in the remote and perilous Kinmen. Moreover, he is assigned to the Sea Dragon (ARB), a unit noted for the toughest physical training. It never occurs to Pao, however, that the greatest challenge in his military service lies not in the Sea Dragon but in Unit 831, a special task he is later appointed to… In this peculiar assignment, Pao vows to keep his virginity against all odds.

Documenting Taiwan from an aerial perspective offering a glimpse of Taiwan's natural beauty as well as the effect of human activities and urbanization on our environment.

Documenting Taiwan from an aerial perspective offering a glimpse of Taiwan's natural beauty as well as the effect of human activities and urbanization on our environment.

A contemplative trip down memory lane with one of the leading voices of the Second New Wave of Taiwanese Cinema. Saw Tiong Guan clearly established a very personal bond with his subject, and also found many of Tsai Ming-liang’s colleagues prepared to complete this portrait of a quiet yet outspoken artist.

A Special Day é um documentário que nos apresenta um dia na vida de 34 diretores lendários de cinema, entre eles Roman Polanski, Nanni Moretti, Ken Loach, Claude Lelouch, Gus van Sant, Ethan e Joel Coen, Aki Kaurismäki, Abbas Kiarostami, Walter Salles, Wong Kar-Wai, Zhang Yimou entre outros. Em 2007, Jacob filmou e entrevistou estes cineastas quando estiveram em Cannes para a celebração dos 60 anos do festival e a apresentação dos 33 curtas-metragens do projeto de Jacob, Cada um com Seu Cinema (Chacun son Cinéma). Dessa experiência daquele ano, surgiu o documentário que estrou no Festival de Cannes em 2012.

All the way, Cao Li has come alone. From Fuyang to Shenzhen. From Shenzhen to Shanghai. From Shanghai to home? Leaving hometown is her choice, the choice out of no choice. Returning home is her dream, the dream getting blinded by the neon lights in the city.--

One of the best-known Chinese figurative painters, Liu Xiaodong goes back to his hometown of Jincheng, in the province of Liaoning (North-East China), to re-paint again friends and relatives after several years have gone by. With a soundtrack by famed composer Lim Giong (Millennium Mambo, The Assassin).

10+10 is a project initiated by the Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival to demonstrate the solidarity between Taiwanese film-makers. 20 directors are invited to make a 5-minute short film each on the theme of the “Uniqueness of Taiwan,” but allowed total freedom in all other aspects.

Concentra-se nas pessoas, suas histórias e arquitetura que vão desde meados de 1800, quando Shanghai foi aberto como um porto comercial, até os dias atuais.

Doris simply wanted to open a refined, stylish coffee shop in a bohemian Taipei neighborhood, but when she's stuck with a load of useless gifts from the opening celebration, her younger sister Josie turns the café into a burgeoning bartering business. There, even a soulful song (by Japanese singer Atari Kosuke in a cameo) is a tradable commodity. One day, a traveler brings in 35 soaps from around the world with a story for each of them, awakening Doris' imagination about the outside world that she has never seen.

A woman is transported into a world as strange and beautiful as her dreams in this fantasy. Singing, who comes from a family of poor shopkeepers, earns her living as a cleaning woman on a ferry that services a military base. Singing has a recurring dream in which she meets a handsome stranger who speaks in language she cannot understand, and one day on the ferry she meets Tsai Hsien-tsung, a soldier who resembles the man in her dreams. The soldier is immediately smitten with Singing, and when the power goes out on the ferry, the two are thrown into a strange netherworld where they sail to South America on a deserted vessel as Singing loses her heart to the military man.

Focusing on Mark Lee Ping-bin, one of the most talented and prolific cinematographers in Asia, the movie details the itinerant lifestyle of a deeply observant and philosophical artist and the tolls that his profession takes on his family life.

Pascal Lamorisse is the son of filmmaker Albert Lamorisse. He is also the little hero of some of his father's films (White Mane, The Red Balloon and Stowaway in the Sky). Over the years, Albert Lamorisse, who took his son on all his shoots, sought to transmit his expertise and his passion for filmmaking, even on his last film, The Lover's Wind. There is something in the story of Pascal Lamorisse that touches on a fabulous story: it is the story of the transmission of cinema from father to child.

Chinese film school students and the professors from the Greater China Region gathered together at Hong Kong Baptist University to discuss the many serious film issues in the region.

A collective film of 33 shorts directed by different directors about their feeling about cinema.

A family in 1940s Taiwan goes to see a film in a suddenly abandoned or decrepit theatre.

Simon tem sete anos e um misterioso balão vermelho segue-o por Paris. A mãe, Suzanne, é marionetista e prepara um novo espectáculo. Totalmente absorvida pelo trabalho, contrata Song Fang, uma jovem estudante de cinema, para a ajudar a cuidar de Simon.

Simon tem sete anos e um misterioso balão vermelho segue-o por Paris. A mãe, Suzanne, é marionetista e prepara um novo espectáculo. Totalmente absorvida pelo trabalho, contrata Song Fang, uma jovem estudante de cinema, para a ajudar a cuidar de Simon.

A couple is torn by conflicting emotions. Jing and Mi are two women living in Taiwan who have been lovers for some time; Jin is a singer in a rock band who suffers from severe mood swings and has been suffering from a fractured relationship with her mother, while Mi is the more sedate and level-headed of the couple.

Três diferentes épocas, três histórias, o mesmo actor e actriz, evocando três reincarnações de um amor inacabado... 1966 - "Um tempo de amar". Uma jovem, May, e um soldado, Chen, conhecem-se numa sala de jogos. Partilham momentos numa maravilhosa noite quente. 1911 - "Um tempo de liberdade". Durante a ocupação japonesa da Formosa, um diplomata casado ganha, através da sua bondade, a admiração de uma cortesã, num bordel em Dadaocheng. Contudo, os seus princípios modernos não permitem que a tome como sua concubina. 2005 - "Um tempo de juventude". Sob a ameaça de guerra com a China, a Formosa encontra-se instável. Uma jovem bissexual, Jing, envolve-se num triângulo amoroso. Paixões secretas fervilham por entre mal-entendidos, rejeições e relações modernas que florescem e falham à distância segura de sms e de emails.

Três diferentes épocas, três histórias, o mesmo actor e actriz, evocando três reincarnações de um amor inacabado... 1966 - "Um tempo de amar". Uma jovem, May, e um soldado, Chen, conhecem-se numa sala de jogos. Partilham momentos numa maravilhosa noite quente. 1911 - "Um tempo de liberdade". Durante a ocupação japonesa da Formosa, um diplomata casado ganha, através da sua bondade, a admiração de uma cortesã, num bordel em Dadaocheng. Contudo, os seus princípios modernos não permitem que a tome como sua concubina. 2005 - "Um tempo de juventude". Sob a ameaça de guerra com a China, a Formosa encontra-se instável. Uma jovem bissexual, Jing, envolve-se num triângulo amoroso. Paixões secretas fervilham por entre mal-entendidos, rejeições e relações modernas que florescem e falham à distância segura de sms e de emails.

Making her way through life by forming superficial relationships, Yoko keeps everyone at arm's length, whether it's her father and stepmother or Hajime, the owner of a small bookstore who could be the father of her unborn child. Yoko seems most at home when she's riding the train, speeding around the city with only her thoughts to entertain her.

Making her way through life by forming superficial relationships, Yoko keeps everyone at arm's length, whether it's her father and stepmother or Hajime, the owner of a small bookstore who could be the father of her unborn child. Yoko seems most at home when she's riding the train, speeding around the city with only her thoughts to entertain her.

Richly illustrated with film clips and interviews, OUR TIME, OUR STORY tells the still-evolving story of the Taiwanese "new wave," from its rise in the early 1980s, as the island was democratizing after decades under martial law, through growing international recognition and domestic debate in the 1990s. Spearheaded in its early years by such filmmakers as Edward Yang, Ko I-cheng, Hou Hsiao-hsien and Wan Jen, the movement revitalized Taiwan cinema through low-budget experiments that emphasized personal stories, political reflection and stylistic invention. Said filmmakers, writers and actors like Wu Nien-jen and Sylvia Chang, even "second wave" directors Tsai Ming-liang and Lin Cheng-sheng provide fond reminiscences and retrospective insights in this compelling account of one of the most distinctive national cinemas of the last quarter-century.

The beautiful Vicky drifts through her empty life in the neon-lit Taipei, maintaining a pointless relationship with her loser DJ boyfriend, Hao-Hao, and an unsatisfying career as a nightclub hostess. As her romance becomes increasingly strained, she decides to take up with Jack, a caring but criminally connected businessman. But this new relationship can't change Vicky's aimless nature, and her future remains as doubtful as ever.

Tung-Ching’s life has changed since a car accident three months ago. The lifeline on his right hand was scratched off in this incident. A nurse told him that his life is no longer controlled by fate but has become unpredictable since then. Three months later, Tung-Ching’s father has suffered a stroke so he has to take over the family pawnshop. His girlfriend, Eiko, who is interested in palm reading, wants to retrieve Tung-Ching’s lifeline. However, Tung-Ching is apathetic to know what the future holds. He starts to flirt with one of his female customers who he names her “ Know-all”.

Entry on Taiwanese new-wave filmmaker Hou Hsiao-Hsien for French television's "Cinéma, de notre temps" series, directed by Olivier Assayas.

Women struggle in a Shanghai brothel where everything only appears to be beautiful.

Women struggle in a Shanghai brothel where everything only appears to be beautiful.

This highly personal film essay demonstrates that Chinese cinema has dealt with questions of gender and sexuality more frankly and provocatively than any other national cinema. Yang ± Yin examines male bonding and phallic imagery in the swordplay and kung fu movies of the '60s and '70s; homosexuality; same-sex bonding and physical intimacy; the continuing emphasis on women's grievances in melodramas; and the phenomenon of Yam Kim-Fai, a Hong Kong actress who spent her life portraying men on and off the screen.

In this portrait of small-time hoods rendered in rhythm-of-life anecdotal detail, Gao is the leader of a circle of layabouts including his sidekick, Flathead, and their girlfriends, Pretzel and Ling. He is also the originator of petty crime schemes, which promise to get the gang nowhere fast.

Sega's children, born into post-war Chinese rule, can't relate to their father's love for Japanese culture, having grown up under Japanese rule before WWII.

An actress preparing to play in a historical epic is terrorized by someone faxing her pages from her stolen diary; has colorful flashbacks of her affair with a now-deceased man; and imagines black-and-white film-within-a-film scenes of the movie she is about to appear in.

In June, 1993 , the gravestone of Hsu Ching-Lan was finally found in Liuchangli by his brother after 40 years of searching. Hsu was killed by the KMT during the 'White Terror,' the organized suppression of leftist activities in Taiwan in the 1950s.

Hou Hsiao-Hsien centra este seu filme (Prémio do Júri do Festival de Cannes 1993) na vida e carreira do marionetista Li Tien-Lu, cuja vida pessoal combina com a história de Taiwan entre 1909 e o fim da dominação japonesa da ilha em 1945. "The Puppetmaster," como é internacionalmente conhecido, é o segundo dos títulos da trilogia histórica do realizador, também composta por "A City of Sadness" (1989) e "Good Men, Good Women" (1995).

A tribute to the legendary Japanese film director featuring the reflections of filmmakers Lindsay Anderson, Claire Denis, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Aki Kaurismäki, Stanley Kwan, Paul Schrader, and Wim Wenders

A group of young Taipei residents is drawn into the city’s underworld through the growing obsession of one, the boyish Ah-feng, for the sexy Cantonese mistress of a gang boss.

From the 1980s to the 1990s, New Taiwanese Cinema gained international attention for adopting a completely different approach to that of the commercial films which had preceded it. This piece contrasts Hou Hsiao-hsien and Edward Yang, two rivals who were the driving force behind New Taiwanese Cinema. The closing of a cinema invites us to reflect on society and the passage of history.

A-Guo and A-Dou are two teenagers living in an industrial town in Taiwan, who fight, loaf, and cause trouble all day and hang out with Jie, a young gangster. When Jie's gangland patron is gunned down, the trio set out to revenge the killing. As a result, the two teens are forced into hiding.

Song-lian perde o pai e as dificuldades financeiras a obrigam a abandonar os estudos e a se tornar concubina de um homem rico. Ao mudar-se para sua mansão ela descobre que o senhor já possui outras três esposas, e que escolhe todos os dias uma delas para passar a noite, colocando lanternas vermelhas na porta de seu quarto. Aos poucos Song-lian vai começar a entender as intrigas e sabotagens, o jogo que acontece entre as mulheres que competem pela atenção do marido.

Two independent stories involving chess wizards are interwoven to satirize the politics of the Chinese Cultural Revolution as well as Taiwan's capitalist boom of the 1970's.

Filme que narra uma série de acontecimentos em Taiwan entre 1945 e 1949 a partir das experiências de uma família de quatro filhos, um patriarca e alguns agregados. Destaque para o trágico acontecimento de 28 de fevereiro de 1947, quando mais de 20 mil taiwaneses foram mortos por tropas nacionalistas chinesas.

Lin Hsiao-yang tries to keep her family together while working as a waitress at Kentucky Fried Chicken and going to night school. With no mother and her father currently working out of town, it is up to Lin Hsiao-yang to take care of her younger siblings, who are slipping into a life of crime.

Ip Cheung and her husband, a senior police inspector, had been happily married for 18 years. One day, Ip runs into her neighbour, a Taiwanese woman. As they are talking, three men suddenly appeared and tried to kill them. The Taiwanese woman is killed but Ip and the kid, Yen, managed to escape. At the same time, Ip's husband commits suicide. His superior suspected him of corruption. Ip finds out that the Taiwanese woman was her husband's mistress and Yen, his illegitimate son. Ip is given custody of Yen but they are unable to get along. However she will save his live when the gang go after him.

Aparentemente feitos um para o outro, um casal de jovens namorados abandona sua pequena cidade para viver em Taipei, onde começam a procurar trabalho. Aos poucos, a relação vai se deteriorando frente às dificuldades que encontram no dia-a-dia.

O filme apresenta a história de uma família chinesa que se muda para Taiwan. A princípio temporária, a nova moradia acaba se tornando definitiva.

O filme apresenta a história de uma família chinesa que se muda para Taiwan. A princípio temporária, a nova moradia acaba se tornando definitiva.

Bi Bao-Liang is a 29 year-old man who believes that he will have bad luck if he touches a woman before he turns thirty. Liu Xiang-mei is a beautiful woman who had a love affair with her married boss, and now she is pregnant. In order to give her child a family name, she decides to find a man to have a one-year marriage contract. Bi Bao-Liang is the perfect man she is looking for because he is afraid of women. However, their marriage does not follow what they've planned...

A young woman urgently seeks to navigate the maze of contemporary Taipei and find a future. She hopes that her boyfriend Lung is the key to the future, but Lung is stuck in a past that combines baseball and traditional loyalty that leads him to squander his nest egg bailing her father out of financial trouble.

A young woman urgently seeks to navigate the maze of contemporary Taipei and find a future. She hopes that her boyfriend Lung is the key to the future, but Lung is stuck in a past that combines baseball and traditional loyalty that leads him to squander his nest egg bailing her father out of financial trouble.

Historia do menino Tung-tung e sua irmã caçula Ting-ting que são mandados para o interior, para a casa de seu avô materno, enquanto sua mãe está doente, internada num hospital em Taipei.

Historia do menino Tung-tung e sua irmã caçula Ting-ting que são mandados para o interior, para a casa de seu avô materno, enquanto sua mãe está doente, internada num hospital em Taipei.

A boy fell in love with a girl, then the girl left. Years later, the boy found that he is a father now.

Taiwanese comedy film.

Composed of three separate stories, the film vividly portrays Taiwan during the cold war period when the country developed its economy with help from the United States.

Ah-Ching and his friends have just finished school in their island fishing village, and now spend most of their time drinking and fighting. Three of them decide to go to the port city of Kaohsiung to look for work. They find an apartment through relatives, and Ah-Ching is attracted to the girlfriend of a neighbor. There they face the harsh realities of the big city.

Ah-Ching and his friends have just finished school in their island fishing village, and now spend most of their time drinking and fighting. Three of them decide to go to the port city of Kaohsiung to look for work. They find an apartment through relatives, and Ah-Ching is attracted to the girlfriend of a neighbor. There they face the harsh realities of the big city.

Two friends who haven't seen each other for thirteen years reunite. One is a successful concert pianist just back from a European tour and the other has just started a new business.

The startling contrast between old and new Taiwan is the subject of Wan Jen's epic of traditional identities coming into conflict with an urban life, emphasizing the situation of women.

The story follows a young man as he changes from an intelligently aware youth, to a teenager with much less confidence than he once had, and finally, to a stable adult.

A substitute teacher from Taipei arrives in a country village to teach a class of mischievous students. He soon falls in love with nature, country life and a fellow teacher at the school.

A substitute teacher from Taipei arrives in a country village to teach a class of mischievous students. He soon falls in love with nature, country life and a fellow teacher at the school.

A photographer travels with her boyfriend to a seaside village in Penghu. There she strikes up a relationship with a blind man. When they reencounter one another back in Taipei, where he is preparing to undergo an operation to restore his sight, their connection intensifies.

A photographer travels with her boyfriend to a seaside village in Penghu. There she strikes up a relationship with a blind man. When they reencounter one another back in Taipei, where he is preparing to undergo an operation to restore his sight, their connection intensifies.

Spring in Autumn

Primeiro filme de Hou, Menina bonita é uma comédia romântica que conta, assim como Vento gracioso e A grama verde de casa, com a presença de Kenny Bee, então astro pop de Hong Kong. Bee interpreta um topógrafo que vai ao campo a trabalho e conhece a personagem de Feng Fei-fei, uma moça que mora na cidade grande, mas que está visitando a família no interior. Os dois se apaixonam, mas têm de enfrentar a família de Feng Fei-fei, uma vez que ela havia sido prometida em casamento a outro homem.

Primeiro filme de Hou, Menina bonita é uma comédia romântica que conta, assim como Vento gracioso e A grama verde de casa, com a presença de Kenny Bee, então astro pop de Hong Kong. Bee interpreta um topógrafo que vai ao campo a trabalho e conhece a personagem de Feng Fei-fei, uma moça que mora na cidade grande, mas que está visitando a família no interior. Os dois se apaixonam, mas têm de enfrentar a família de Feng Fei-fei, uma vez que ela havia sido prometida em casamento a outro homem.

Zhijie, in her bid to find a wife for her mentally-challenged son, found Chu Lien to become her daughter-in-law. From then, Chu Lien's life becomes miserable, constantly being physically abused. Fortunately, Shun-hsing took pity on her, both of them quietly exchange solemn vows to each other...

A loose youth passes the time freely until he comes across a young, female broadcaster who works at a radio station.

A romance about a girl who falls in love and marries a music teacher. The couple struggle through life as the man does not want to accept money from his rich father.

Chao Ta-jung and Yuan-yuan met at the seashore by chance. Ta-jung was impressed with Yuan-yuan's compassion towards those who were less unfortunate even though she had given him a hard time. They soon fell in love and decided to get married but due to Yuan-yuan's heart problem, there is a possibility that she may not conceive.

In 1989, the disparity between the rich and poor in Taiwan grew with the turbulent stock market.

Focuses on the relationship between an elderly father and his son.

Taking place in modern-day Taipei, Hou Hsiao-Hsien focuses on a lonely river goddess whose waterways have now been covered by modern roadways.