The miracle of the Cape
This transformation from frog to prince has been entirely unanticipated. People were simply dumbfounded when Cape No. 7 became a huge pop-culture hit and sent out a clear signal that you could actually make a profit by producing a film in Taiwan for Taiwanese audiences.
What happened? With hindsight, some commentators have ascribed the movie’s success to “serendipitous timing.” Veteran film critic Wen Tien-hsiang, executive director of the Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival Executive Committee, avers that Cape was not just a film but a social phenomenon, a product of prevailing social conditions at the time. “It was a kind of miraculous redemption at a time when the ideals of the DPP administration had collapsed amidst the Chen scandal and the golden future promised by the new KMT administration of Ma Ying-jeou was like a burst bubble.”
Robert Chen, associate professor in the Department of Radio and Television at National Chengchi University, says that if he watches a movie that makes him laugh until his sides ache, he figures it could pull in NT$50 million at the box office, but the figure of NT$500 million would have never entered his head. “The film got a lot of help from the fact that it came out during a window when there were no hot Hollywood films, and there were some unexpected holidays from work because of oncoming typhoons. Also, things weren’t going very well in the country at the time, with political scandals and economic problems. Eventually, the film ‘went viral’ and crossed into that territory where it became ‘the thing to do’ and ‘an event.’ It then had a momentum of its own, and even the content of the film itself was no longer relevant.”
While some point to timing, others take a “dialectical” point of view. They argue that people had been turned off of Taiwanese directors because they were producing almost exclusively art-house films, in contrast to which Cape No. 7 was like a breath of fresh air, simply offering people a pleasant time.
Cape No. 7 brought people who had not seen a domestically produced film in years back to the theaters, and proved to be a powerful morale booster for the whole Chinese-language film industry. When director Peter Ho-san Chan received the 2008 Golden Horse Award for best film for The Warlords, in his acceptance speech he specifically thanked Taiwanese who had gone to see Cape: “You’ve given hope to Chinese-language films!”
Happy as they were, many people in Taiwanese cinema—veterans of numerous failed attempts to relaunch their industry—still worried that the whole thing would just turn out to be a flash in the pan. Events seemed to be pointing in that direction in 2009, when, in the absence of any Taiwan-made blockbusters, the box-office share of domestic films fell to 2.3%, sending a chill through filmmakers.
But then in early 2010 Monga, released at the Chinese New Year, was a huge hit, and even regained for Taiwan—in the person of Ethan Ruan—the Golden Horse Award for best actor, which had not been won by a Taiwan-born performer in 11 years before that. After the near collapse of 2009, Monga recharged the batteries of the Taiwan commercial film revival.
2011 was huge. Led by Seediq Bale, which topped NT$100 million, Taiwan films grabbed over 17% of the market. Other successes were Night Market Hero and You Are the Apple of My Eye. Turning the corner into 2012, the baton was picked up by films like Black and White, LOVE, and Din Tao: Leader of the Parade, all of which also surpassed NT$100 million.
Wang Tung, chairman of the Department of Filmmaking at Taipei National University of the Arts, is optimistic that the trend is likely to continue. This senior director, who won Golden Horse Awards for best director, best dramatic film, and best original script back in 1987 for Strawman, says that the Taiwan motion picture industry has “turned up the heat,” and now is the time to keep feeding the fire.
For decades now Taiwan-made films have been trying to survive in the shadow of Hollywood domination. They have been kept alive largely by the individual genius and perseverance of directors who are today recognized as the doyens of Taiwan cinema, such as: Kevin Chu (photo by Jimmy Lin), Hou Hsiao-hsien (photo by Jimmy Lin), Wang Shaudi (photo by Jimmy Lin), Tsai Yueh-hsun