A Brighter Summer Day

             

Edward Yang's A Brighter Summer Day, from 1991, is a tragic epic of one teen's descent into criminality in Cold War era Taiwan. Yang portrays New Frontier Taiwan as a repressive militaristic society in constant preparedness for an invasion from China. Corridors, grid like classrooms and offices are emphasized to show how the Taiwanese youth and their even more alienated elders are confined by their culture. The teens in the film are all enraptured with American culture to such an extent that it heightens their alienation as displaced Chinese. They end up resembling the disaffected youths in Nicholas Ray's Rebels Without a Cause, albeit without jalopies. They form gangs, listen to and perform Elvis, and have shifting romantic allegiances just like Ray's misfits. Yang is not as hysterical a director as Ray, and that has its pluses and minuses. The young actors were tightly controlled by Yang and, thus, there aren't the seismic tremors that Ray elicited from James Dean and his cohorts. However, Yang's reserve fits his perspective on his culture and his exploration of the theme of the sins of the father being visited on the sons is more controlled and powerful than in Ray's film. A scene where the protagonist sees his father beating his brother is much more effective than a demasculinized Jim Backus wearing a frilly apron in Rebel....

A Brighter Summer Day is, perhaps, a little lengthy, but it is out of the love for his characters that Yang indulges his muse. The beauty of a tracking shot that follows two juveniles dashing away after harassing trysting teens displays Yang's affection for the fleeting moments that are largely lost upon youths themselves.