October 10, 2013
Touch of the Light
– Taiwan, 2012
A bank in Taiwan has an advertising campaign that features someone
in need being ignored over and over. In one of their commercials, a man stands
in the rain sneezing, and person after person declines to offer him a spot
under their umbrella. In another, an elderly man is riding his bike when his
hat blows off his head, and a string of passersby elect not to pick it up for
him. All versions of this commercial end happily though, for at last a lone
decent character offers assistance. The point of the ads seems to be that the
world can be a cruel place, but if you are someone who bucks the trend and
shows compassion to his or her fellow man, good things will happen. It’s a nice
message, but I wonder how many people pick up on the ads’ not-so-subtle
critique of society as a whole. It seems to be saying that decent people are,
at the very least, in the minority, and a helping hand may not be as
forthcoming as it should be.
I was reminded of this by the first part of Chang Jung-Chi’s
film, Touch of the Light, which is a
sweet, yet predictable film about likeable characters living in an often
uncaring world. The film is about a blind musician named Huang Yu-Siang (playing
himself in the film) and a young woman named Xiao Jie (Sandrine Penna), who
yearns to be a dancer. The musician is from the countryside, and as the film
opens, he is on his way to Taipei to study music at a university. He is hardly
welcomed with open arms. Instead of being offered assistance, he is “thanked”
for wasting one of his classmate’s time, and it is clear that his classmates as
a whole consider him to be little more than a burden.
Jie is in an equally challenging situation. Her mother is unemployed
and spends all of her time ordering things she sees advertised on a home
shopping channel, her father works nights and just may have a drinking problem,
and her boyfriend clearly has eyes for someone else. To top it all off, she has
had to give up the thing she loves most in the world – dancing. In her mother’s
eyes, it just isn’t stable enough. Given that these two characters are a
musician and a dancer, it is only a matter of time before they meet and one is
dancing to the other’s accompaniment.
A film like this wouldn’t be complete without a group of
oddballs, for in movies, it is almost always the oddball that can accept and befriend
someone who is “different.” The chief oddball in this film is Chu Tze-Ching, a
kindhearted and fun-loving college student whose goal is to form a group that
can rival all of the other music clubs on campus. Oddly enough, what they come up
with reminded me of what was produced when Lisa became the music teacher for a
day on Saved by the Bell.
Touch of the Light
has its share of powerful, irresistible moments, despite its rather predictable
story arc. I enjoyed seeing how Siang learns to get around, while also questioning
the necessity for so many of these scenes. I also found a conversation about
what Siang is looking for in a young lady interesting. His answer? A nice
voice. And I was rather moved by the joy and freedom that can be seen on Jie’s
face as she rediscovers her love for dancing. In addition, the conversations
between Siang and Jie feel surprisingly authentic given the leap of faith that
is required to think they would keep bumping into each other, and a later trip
that they take together is particularly insightful, even if I wasn’t quite sure
enough had happened to make such a trip entirely realistic. Finally, that the
two lead characters end up where they do is not a surprise for a film of this
nature, yet it is still rather moving to see two characters standing up and demanding
to be noticed.
One of the most interesting aspects of Touch of the Light is the way it enables viewers to see a bit of
the world as Siang sees it. Throughout the film, we see Siang developing a way
of picturing the world in his head. He accomplishes this partly by using both his
hearing and his memory to form a picture of his surroundings. He also uses
something I’ll call substitution. In one scene that demonstrates this, Siang
asks what dancing looks like, and Chu Tzu-Ching describes it as being similar
to the spinning blades of a fan. This is clearly an image that Siang is
familiar with, and he is able to then juxtapose the image of a person dancing over
the image of a spinning fan.
The cast of Touch of
the Light is particularly strong. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Lee
Lieh’s portrayal of Siang’s mother. She makes it possible for the audience to
see just how hard it is for a parent to step back and let a child with visual
or physical impairments take care of himself. Also, I appreciated the
authenticity that Hsieh Kan-chun brought to the role of Ching. He turned what
could have been a stereotypical character into one with heart and feelings. However,
the film clearly belongs to Sandrine Penna. She gives a truly amazing performance
that will likely remind viewers a bit of Natalie Portman’s award-winning turn
in Black Swan. The difference is that
while Portman’s Nina Sayers was slowly driving herself mad while dancing, Penna’s
character is rediscovering what it means to be alive. Showing this requires
Penna to act with her entire body, for the audience must be able to see just
how much dancing affects Jie and just how different she is after she starts
dancing again. To say Penna nails this is an understatement, and her
performance is well worthy of the recognition it received at the 2013 Golden
Horse Awards, Taiwan’s equivalent of the Academy Awards. All in all, Touch of the Light is a rather conventional
film, yet it is also quite moving. It is certainly worth checking out if you
have the chance. (on DVD and Blu-ray in Taiwan)
3 stars
*Touch of the Light
is in Min Nan and Mandarin with English subtitles.
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