Tsai Ming-liang appears to have created a My Space profile. See:

http://www.myspace.com/tsaimingliang

But don't get too excited. I have it on good authority that this is a hoax. Pretty funny though.

Actually, it could be funnier. I want testimonials of friendship from Hou Hsiao-hsien and Wong Kar-wai and blog entries about watermelon! Apart from the fact that Tsai is neither straight nor single, there's nothing obviously fake here, especially compared to the hordes of "celebrities" on Friendster a few years ago.

did anyone notice the "masturbation" part of his profile there?
weird...

anyway, there's a whole bunch of real celebrity blog sites over at www.alivenotdead.com with people like Daniel Wu, Terrence Yin, Kelly Hu, Jet Li writing blog posts in there. (i doubt Jet Li really writes his blogs there. chances are, they just pasted his jetli.com blog posts to alivenotdead.com. it's run by the same webmasters.

Speaking of Taiwanese directors, I'm about to watch my first Hou-Hsaio-Hsien movie ever--A 2005 film titled THREE TIMES starring Shi Qi and Chang Chen of CROUCHING TIGER fame---within the next couple of days. I've never heard of it,so has anyone else ever seen it and if so,will it be worth sitting through?
I was just in the mood for a good,long,Asian drama, so hopefully, this will fit the bill!

I have Three Times and it is a good film but HHS is more of a "slice of life" director (in a very artsy way). I find it a bit different than from his other films I have seen in a visual way though. It had more close ups (I'm not complaining)

If you don't like the film please do not let it stop you from watching more of this director - my favorite film of his, actually one of my all time faves is Café Lumiere, I highly recommend it especially if you like Ozu.

Flowers of Shanghai was my first HHS film and it sure got me hooked. I have the non subtitled copy of City of Sadness and patiently waiting for a subtitled release.

Millenium Mambo is also a good film, give it a try if you like the last segment of Three Times.

Actually Three Times is a collection of three _short_ dramas.

;~}

If you want to find a really long HHH drama -- then you need to track down a videtape copy of "City of Sadness".

HHH is, perhaps, my favorite living director -- so I can't possibly be objective. I'd personally think that Three Times may not be the best introduction -- but since it recapitulates his career in some way7s, maybe it is.

The best way, by far, to approach HHH is chronologically -- but the unavailability of much of his work makes this approach almost impossible. The best _available_ introduction is a Box set containing four wonderful, earlier films (available from YesAsia, usually).

Hello Kim (and everyone else),

Actually, perhaps the most economical introduction to Hou is the Olivier Assayas documentary "HHH: Portrait of Hou Hsiao-Hsien," which features lots of extended clips and gives one a pretty good sense of the flavour of Hou's filmmaking. I remember seeing it a few years ago in either Tokyo or Paris and found it to be a solid synoptic introduction that I could share with someone who was just getting acquainted with the director's oeuvre. If it was Tokyo, then the doc will have English subtitles.

My main criticism would be Assayas' lack of focus on Hou's screenwriter-collaborator Chu T'ien-wen, whom really elevated the director's game, so to speak. If you cannot track down the Assayas film, there is a fine article on-line by Leo Chen that does address Chu's invaluable contribution. See:

Leo Chan-jen Chen, "Cinema, Dream, Existence: the Films of Hou Hsiao-hsien," _New Left Review_, 39 (May-June 2006), pp. 73-106. Or:

http://newleftreview.org/?page=article&view=2617

One is reluctant to endorse "City of Sadness" as an introduction to Hou's movies owing to the prickly historiographic issues that envelop the film (February Twenty-eighth) and, indeed, the films relation to other historical events (the anniversary of May Fourth, the end of Taiwanese martial law, the unfolding tragedy of June Fourth.) Perhaps it bespeaks of a personal love of more anodyne entertainments, but "Summer at Grandpa's" has long been a favourite and predates the dramatic turn of "A Time to Live."

I should disclose that I am not a neutral observer in my comments. Once upon a time when I was finishing my BA several years ago, before coming to Cambridge on a fellowship, I was intending on going to Taiwan on a Fulbright to write a monograph of Hou-Chu-Edward Yang-Chen Guofu. I was particularly interested in Chu, whom is my favourite Taiwanese writer alongside her contemporary Lung Ying-t'ai (whose Cambridge public lectures I sadly missed for I was, ironically enough, in LA talking shop with the the NLR's Perry Anderson.) Anyway, I'm not being objective about my fandom and there is more than a little axe-grinding present in this post.

(To everyone): Oh yeah, English subs:

http://www.learmedia.ca/product_info.php/products_id/1049

http://www.eslitebooks.com/Program/Object/...D=2631153620005

Thanks,Mr. Lee--and everybody else---I didn't expect so much useful information,but I'm always grateful for the responses. Of the films of his I've read about,CITY OF SADNESS sounded like the more interesting of the titles, due to its historical subject (yeah,I'm kind of a history geek myself :D ) . His films ARE very difficult to find,that's true,but at least I'll get to see this one! Thanks again!