Café Lumière

Acutely observed and exquisitely realized, Hou Hsiao-hsien's 16th film, Café Lumiére, is a loving tribute to the great Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu on the centenary of his birth. The film, the first by Hou to be shot in a foreign location, pays homage to Ozu by depicting themes repeated in many of his films: relationships between aging parents, the marriage plans of a grown child, the coming and going on trains, and the quiet contemplation of everyday life. The style, however, is still unmistakably Hou, with its long takes, extended silences, and focus on mundane conversations. In one scene inside a tempura shop, the camera simply observes people coming and going for several minutes while we hear the sound of plates clattering, and food being fried.

Yo Hitoto is Yoko, a young Japanese writer who is researching the life of a real Taiwanese musician Jiang Wen-ye, who was popular in Japan during the 1930s. Yoko was raised by her uncle in Yubari but lives in Tokyo with her father and stepmother. She becomes friends with Hajime (Asano Tadanobu), the owner of a secondhand bookstore and they meet often in her favorite coffee shop, making small talk and enjoying the passing scene. He is a train buff who spends his days riding the subway, recording the sound of trains, public address announcements, and the conversations of passengers. Though they are best friends and not lovers, he is startled to find out that she is pregnant by a Taiwanese whom she does not want to marry. Yoko's father (Nenji Kobayashi) and stepmother (Kimiko Yo) urge her to marry though her father is uncommunicative in spite of his wife's best efforts to get him to open up. Oko's uncertainty about her parents demands for marriage is reminiscent of Late Spring, An Autumn Afternoon, and other Ozu films on this subject.

Café Lumiére pace is deliberate, painstakingly detailed, and without much narrative thrust but it may be the film that Ozu would have made if he lived in the modern age. Beautifully shot by Lee Ping-ping, the film allows us to view the world the characters inhabit, providing extraordinary details of Tokyo life including outlying districts such as Jimbocho, known for its many bookstores, and Kishibojin with its look of old Tokyo. Millennium Mambo may be considered minor Hou and Café Lumiére, transitional Hou but whatever category it is placed in, Hou's work, for me, is illuminating and unforgettable.

Eh, I thought this was slightly above average for Hou. Which means I still didn't care for it much, but I didn't exactly dislike it, either. As far as the (non- or possibly anti-) story goes, it's probably his slightest yet. A young woman is newly pregnant. She wanders around, rides the trains, hangs out with a friend, has half-heard conversations on a cell phone, eats, drinks milk, eats some more and generally avoids the issue of what's in her belly. So, yes, it's pretty dull. But Hou does capture an ambiance that is pleasant, at the very least. I have in the past likened Hou's work to sitting on a bus and eavesdropping. Funny, as one of the main characters in this film enjoys recording ambient noises on passenger trains. At least in this film you get to hang around a pretty Japanese girl and Tadanobu Asano, star of such great Asian flicks as Ichi the Killer and Last Life in the Universe. I loved the last sequence and the final shot.

Ozu is dead. If there's one thing that Hou manages to prove in his tribute to Ozu's centennial, it is that Ozu is dead. Never is there going to be another man who can portray human relationships in the same light as Ozu. The same steadfastness they have as they try as hard as they can to hold on to each other; the sadness they feel when having to leave the family; the difficulties of living together in one household; the moments of regret that they have when one of their family has to leave; and their final acceptance that these are all but a part of life.

Hou shows us a Japan that has changed so much from the Japan that Ozu so painstakingly tries to hold on to by capturing it on his camera. Each tear, each regret, each joy is now lost in a world that tries too hard to change. Wim Wenders first laments this in Tokyo Ga on how banal Tokyo has become and how much of an imitation culture new Japanese culture is. Cafe Lumiere, while not being as impassioned as Wender's masterpiece, is every bit as pensive about its regret of the passing on of the old Japan that Ozu loves so much.

While in Ozu's films, a pregnancy would herald a big event in a family's lifeline, in Cafe Lumiere it is merely a passing thought. While in Ozu's films, the lead character (most often played by goddess-like Hara Setsuko) would usually be self-sacrificial as best she can to ensure the family's togetherness, here Yoko is determined on striking out as a single mother, regardless of her father's silently burning disapproval.

Undeniably, Hou doesn't pass much judgment on his characters. In fact the portrayal of Yoko only shows her as a very modern and much independent Japanese female that is fast becoming the norm in Japan. The female who does not want to be tied down and holds little regard of familial values. And definitely, it would be seen as regressive should Japan return to the past for the sake of the days when family was at the core of societal structure. After all, the definition of progress is change right? Yet, one can't help but feel the absence of Ozu in this movie, the absence that makes its tone all the more poignant in spite of its spots of warmth. Ozu seems to be like the ghost of Maggie Cheung in 2046, or the missing woman in L'Avventura; he is not there, and is never referenced in the movie, and yet, the opening shot of the movie and a few scenes of familial warmth gives one such a pang in the heart that is so distinctly Ozu. In fact, that Hou decides to have many shots of trains departing and leaving and criss-crossing each other in modern Tokyo, and letting us hear the all-familiar sounds of trains going across railways that is so definitive of Ozu's films, only shows that he is fully aware of this fact, and, like Wenders, is seeking to find what little there is left of Ozu's spirit. In the overwhelmingly modern backdrop of Tokyo, we see how something of the past, like the cafe that Yoko hunts for, that some people so want to preserve, has been turned into another urban development project. However, in the film, Hou also shows us that although the landscape of Tokyo now denies Ozu, there is still decidedly some of Ozu's warmth in human relationships. Like how Yoko still feels the same kindred spirit as she tucks in to her favorite dish that her mother has prepared; seeking out old sights in her hometown, sights that remind her of times when she was a kid and still not thinking of independence. And just perhaps, in showing all this, Hou is persuading us to accept life as what we can, just as how the people in Ozu's movies eventually have to accept the loss of one of their family members.

I went to Tokyo last June and coincidentally, Kamakura was part of the itinerary. I remember how excited I was, since Kamakura was many a setting for Ozu's films, and it was the place where Ozu was buried after his death. As I reached the Kamakura station on the Enoshima metroline, my heart was all awashed with glee to see that the station looked almost exactly the same as it looked in Ozu's films. The same old signboard, and the same railway tracks against looming mountains. And yet as I walked around Kamakura (now a popular tourist spot for its famous Daibutsu or Big Buddha), I couldn't help but notice how foreign it was despite its quaint Japanese-ness. There were so many tourists walking around the town amidst its quiet surbuban houses, and so many signboards blaring English signs. In a bid to find Ozu's grave, every time I saw a cemetery I would go over to look if there was a tablet that has only a 'mu' character on it. But I never found it. Sigh.

No user comments from me for some time. It would be arrogant to suggest that I have fans out there who may be speculating why someone who for so long penned at least one review each week has remained largely silent. I can hardly remember the last time my words evoked a response but if by any chance someone may be wondering about my silence I can answer in one word - disappointment. For me the main reason for writing criticism is to impart enthusiasm for works that have excited and moved me in some way which is why my eulogies far outweigh adverse comments. If I ever venture into the latter territory it is generally to question something that I feel has been excessively praised. What I find disappointing about many of the films I have chanced to see recently is that several have been made by directors I very much admire; the two Chinese titans for instance, Chen Kaige and Zhang Yimou. How could the former for instance have conceived "Together", a facile foray into the "mystique" of musical talent beside which Wes Craven's "Music of the Heart" seems almost something of a masterpiece, or the latter's "House of Flying Daggers", yet another martial arts kids flick and nowhere near as much fun as Ryhei Kitamuru's "Azumi". Even Michael Haneke, the Austrian master of unease was way below his usual form with his Armageddon vision "Time of the Wolf" which somehow lacked the incisiveness that someone like Tarkovsky might have given to so potentially powerful a theme. I could go on and cite others but there would be little point. However the greatest disappointment of them all can hardly go unmentioned as it involves two directors whose work I absolutely reverence. I refer to the Taiwanese Hou Hsiao-Hsien's tribute to the Japanese Yasujiro Ozu on the occasion of the centenary of his birth, "Cafe Lumiere". How could such a great opportunity so sadly misfire? Try as I can - I have given it three viewings - I cannot discover the film's secrets. The storyline is basically very simple. A young Japanese woman returns to her home in Tokyo from a visit to Taiwan where she has been engaged on research into the work of a Taiwanese composer. She confronts her parents with the fact that she is pregnant by a Taiwanese boyfriend but is clear in her mind that she has no intention of marriage. In Tokyo her friend and confidante is a young bookseller whose main obsession is the local railway scene. When not sitting in his bookshop he is out and about making recordings of railway sounds. And that's about it. True there is a sort of homage to Ozu's minimalist style: long sequences without camera movement punctuated by carefully composed shots of settings (here, as occasionally in Ozu, trains and stations). What is missing is content. Ozu's films are carefully constructed studies of human relationship. His characters are vibrant and beautifully drawn with tensions between different generations always subtly realised. Perhaps he has only one basic message to impart, that life is disappointing, but the fascination of his work lies in the seemingly endless different ways he has of saying this. In Hou's tribute we have nothing but the disappointment of a curiously empty film.

I am a complete stranger to the works of Hsiao-hsien Hou and Yasujiro Ozu, but I would like to give my opinion on this anyway.

Probably like me, strangers to the works of those directors will find this slow-paced, a little repetitive (with Yoko constantly getting on/off trains) and somewhat confusing in places.

However, watching it I noticed how simply human it was. Most films have a terrible dilemma, which usually are very much unlike real life. But this is a very simple film, in which in the dilemma is simply that she is three months pregnant but does not wish to marry the father of the unborn child. Very human.

Another way it was a very human hearted film was the relationships between her parents - who watch their growing daughter with concern slowly become more independent - and between her bookshop friend - having little chats in the bookshop, not going into deep conversation but having light-hearted chat.

It didn't have to be complicated, and that's what I liked most about this film. It was something to relate to.

This film is definitely a piece of art. Notice how the only soundtrack within the whole picture (music-wise) is Weyne's pieces (that is, during the film - there is a song during the credits). This brings more emphasis on the humanity of the film and the artistic camera shots used. It's a very poetic and serene film.

Cafe Lumiere probably means more to Hsiao-hsien Hou and Yasujiro Ozu fans than it did to me. But it was a sweet film and I'd definitely recommend it to those who just want something simple and quiet to watch.