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The Terrorizers

Original title: Kong bu fen zi
  • 1986
  • 1h 49m
IMDb RATING
7.7/10
6K
YOUR RATING
The Terrorizers (1986)
CrimeDrama

A metaphysical mystery about the lives of three couples in Taipei that continually intersect over a span of several weeks.A metaphysical mystery about the lives of three couples in Taipei that continually intersect over a span of several weeks.A metaphysical mystery about the lives of three couples in Taipei that continually intersect over a span of several weeks.

  • Director
    • Edward Yang
  • Writers
    • Hsiao-Yeh
    • Edward Yang
  • Stars
    • Cora Miao
    • Li-Chun Lee
    • Shih-Chieh King
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    7.7/10
    6K
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Edward Yang
    • Writers
      • Hsiao-Yeh
      • Edward Yang
    • Stars
      • Cora Miao
      • Li-Chun Lee
      • Shih-Chieh King
    • 14User reviews
    • 19Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • See production info at IMDbPro
    • Awards
      • 4 wins & 2 nominations total

    Photos88

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    Top cast15

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    Cora Miao
    Cora Miao
    • Zhou Yufang
    Li-Chun Lee
    Li-Chun Lee
    • Li Lizhong
    • (as Lichun Lee)
    Shih-Chieh King
    Shih-Chieh King
    • Zhou's lover
    Pao-Ming Ku
    Pao-Ming Ku
    • The Cop Ku
    Ming Liu
    Ming Liu
    • Shu An's mother
    An Wang
    • Shu An
    Shao-Chun Ma
    • Little Qiang
    Yu An-Shun
    Yu An-Shun
    • Da Shun
    • (as An-Shun Yu)
    Chia-ching Huang
    • Little Qiang's girlfriend
    Feng-Kang Chu
    • Business Manager brothel frequenter
    Shan-Chun Hung
    Te-Ming Lu
    Chung-Hua Ni
    • Little Jin
    Ming-Yang Shih
    Zhiwen Xiao
      • Director
        • Edward Yang
      • Writers
        • Hsiao-Yeh
        • Edward Yang
      • All cast & crew
      • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

      User reviews14

      7.75.9K
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      Featured reviews

      9bengssimon

      Relationships as a robbery of life itself

      Edward Yang is not the romantic type. In fact, The Terrorizers shows us romance as a crime. To use your partner for your own gain and thus robbing them of themselves. A man consumed by his identity as a cog in the capitalist machine has no chance of finding himself after he's used, been used and consequently drenched without him even knowing it. He no longer exists.

      This movie is so philosophically sound, and its beauty lies in its loyalty to its message. The theme of terrorizing romance overlaps in every single frame of the movie. A wife leaving her oblivious, ignorant husband is the same as a hooker robbing her customer.

      I think what we learn from this movie is that for a relationship not to be a crime, a collective direction is needed. The young girl knows this. Don't steal things from each other, steal together, from others.
      7DICK STEEL

      A Nutshell Review: The Terrorizers

      The opening film of this retrospective a few days ago, The Terrorizers was presented in a gorgeous restored digital transfer that is beautiful to gawk at every frame, and in essence what would have probably been seen during its first ever debut back in 1986. It's not cheap nor easy to have a film remastered and restored to get rid of pops, cackles and dirt, or to readjust its colour grading, as seen during the promotional clip on its restoration before the film proper, and it's really an excellent job done given the tremendous amount of effort behind the scene.

      Edward Yang's third feature film, co-written with Hsiao Yeh, may have given the audience an ultimate red herring with an action oriented introduction complete with cops and robbers and a shootout, only for that to serve as just about the only real action sequence in this film that's steeped in what would be a relatively violent outcome by the time the end credits rolled. The Terrorizers tells a myriad of inter-weaving story lines involving a myriad of characters, such as Wang An's delinquent Eurasian girl who runs a call girl scam where she robs her clientele in hotel rooms and a photographer's obsession with her when he snaps her escape from the cops.

      But the storyline that just begged for attention, is something similar like his first two films that dealt with the breakdown in relationships against the backdrop of modernity, and how modern life and its expectations chip at passion and romance, where couples rarely emerge unscathed from failure to communicate their true intentions. I suppose it is akin to the filmmaker's way of constant warning, given a trilogy now focused on this aspect, that to have emotions kept within oneself would only pave way for a massive blowout when the last straw is reached, and this offers no chance whatsoever for reconciliation, only destruction, and the humiliation that comes along with it.

      We see it all coming from the first time the couple of Yue Fen (Cora Miao) and her husband Li Zhong (Lee Li Chun) got introduced, where the former's writer's block complaint becomes an avenue to be chided by her husband, who deemed her issue rather unimportant given that it is a work of fiction, and not life and death. Clearly this lack of sensitivity was the seed sowed, before a random cataclysmic event evolves this into her wanting to leave the matrimonial home for a place where she can get some escape and seek out inspiration, which turned out to be nothing more than seeking out an ex-lover to carry out an affair with.

      While you may want to sympathize with the husband, wait. Edward Yang and Hsiao Yeh for some reasons crafted a number of characters here who are mostly lacking in morals. Li Zhong, eyeing a promotion which he thinks is a given with the death of his boss, goes to the extent of framing a fellow co-worker so that he can eliminate the competition for that move upwards, which makes him quite the bastard who gets his karmic just desserts through the infidelity of his wife, which ultimately humiliates the man who has to wear a green hat, and is without a defining career which he so highly prizes it as sort of a beacon in social stature.

      One can imagine just who the real terrorizers are in the film - it's easy to point the fingers at criminals as depicted in the beginning of the film, or whoever is holding that gun to exact some form of revenge against pride, but clearly in this instance, it's really the female of the species who continue to torment emotionally especially when the silent treatment gets exacted, which I feel is possibly the cruelest form of torture to a loved one. The ending is much talked about, and in my opinion seemed to stem either as material from the fictional book that Yue Fen finally churned out, or an alternative reality which points to a consistently bleak outcome of that modern day grind in life.
      9photonicsculpturalarray

      Poetry Via Celluloid

      There's an interesting visual grammar at work in The Terrorizers, consisting of its approach to framing, movement, and pacing. The film is one of the better demonstrations of how images can serve as the basis of a conceptually rich experience. People and objects, because of how they're framed, because of the moment at which we encounter them and because of the light in which they're cast, evoke an atmosphere. In The Terrorizers, even a normally prosaic, and ignored, thing like, say, a staircase or foyer, is imbued with aching suggestiveness.
      7mehobulls

      Extraordinary ! Speechless.

      The Terrorizers is not on par with Yang's two most famous films - but it's pretty damn close. Melancholic throughout, all of the loosely connected characters are stricken by Antonioni-like ennui in a modernized, concrete Taipei, reflecting on lives that are heading in unwelcome directions. The ending(s) feel abrupt given the careful build-up, but the style and beauty of Yang's later gems are also displayed here.
      7the red duchess

      The other side of Edward Yang.

      Edward Yang is one of the few filmmakers who can made the present-day seem like a dystopia. He is often compared to Antonioni: this is his 'Blow-up' - an ascetically formal, fragmented murder mystery stumbled on by a photographer. In his use of dream narrative and a character who writes a mystery novel, Yang goes beyond the Italian in narrative obscurity. 'The Terroriser' shares many themes with his more accessible masterpieces 'A Brighter Summer Day' and 'Yi-Yi' - the alienation of capitalist, urban life; the alienation of relationships and aimlessness of youth; the mind-numbing compromises and betrayals in the workplace - but in a framework that coldly precludes identification.

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      Growth Period
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      Storyline

      Edit

      Did you know

      Edit
      • Trivia
        At around 1 hour and 4 minutes in, during the night club scene a tv monitor shows a clip from the movie 9 1/2 Weeks
      • Quotes

        Zhou Yufang: It happened on the first day of spring. If you truly feel for the seasons, you'll discover that changes are merely endless rebirths of the past. This spring, it is not different.

      • Connections
        Featured in Guang yin de gu shi: Tai wan xin dian ying (2014)
      • Soundtracks
        Please Pretend You Would Not Let Me Go
        Performed by Tsai Ching

        Played in the final scene and end credits

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      FAQ16

      • How long is The Terrorizers?Powered by Alexa

      Details

      Edit
      • Release date
        • December 14, 2011 (France)
      • Country of origin
        • Taiwan
      • Official site
        • Official site (Japan)
      • Languages
        • Mandarin
        • Min Nan
      • Also known as
        • Le Terroriste
      • Filming locations
        • Taipei, Taiwan
      • Production company
        • Central Motion Pictures
      • See more company credits at IMDbPro

      Box office

      Edit
      • Gross worldwide
        • $14,633
      See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

      Tech specs

      Edit
      • Runtime
        • 1h 49m(109 min)
      • Color
        • Color
      • Sound mix
        • Mono
      • Aspect ratio
        • 1.85 : 1

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