Review - Paradise in Service

August 13, 2015

Paradise in Service – Taiwan, 2014

Doze Niu’s Paradise in Service is bookended by two historical footnotes. Only one of them is actually necessary, and unfortunately it comes at the end of the film. From that footnote, we learn that from 1951 – 1991, the Taiwanese military ran a brothel, perhaps in the belief that sex would make mandatory military service and the possibilities of war and death easier to bear – a notion that the late Iris Chang disputed in her book The Rape of Nanking. What is also important to know is that the brothel, officially known as Unit 831, was closed after an inquiry into its gross violations of women’s rights. It isn’t hard to see why this information is withheld from viewers until just before the closing credits, for knowing it beforehand would change the way certain early scenes are viewed, rendering some of them tremendously hard to take at face value.

The film is about a young soldier named Pao-Tai Lo (Ethan Juan). Lo has just arrived on the island of Quemoy (also known as Kinmen), which is close enough to Chinese territory for bombs to occasionally land on the beach and for military propaganda blared over loudspeakers to be heard by the island’s residents. In the film’s opening scenes, Lo tries and fails to earn a spot in the military’s elite group known as the Sea Dragons. During an interview with a senior commander, he is grilled about personal matters such as whether he has a girlfriend and if he plans to marry her. He answers in the affirmative, and as a sort of ironic punishment, he is assigned to Unit 831. It’s almost as if his superiors are challenging him to stay both faithful and inexperienced.

Through Lo, we meet the women of Unit 831, and in early scenes, the film does not seem to be true to women in their situation. There is, for example, an amplified joviality to their conversations and exchanges that simply doesn’t gel with what we learn later. They flirt with new officers, smile from head to toe, and seem genuinely not to mind all that their situation demands of them. The only thing that seems to get them down is the occasional rough treatment by a soldier or a rude comment by a particular colleague. This is of course a façade, but even after revealing the women’s backstories, the film keeps it up, showing the women joyfully going shopping and hanging out in hair salons. They don’t even seem to mind that they are handcuffed to prevent them from running away.

In one of the film’s most incredulous storylines, Lo strikes up a friendship with his former commanding officer, Sergeant-Major Chang (Jianbin Chen), who has fallen in love with one of the women at the brothel. There’s also a minor plot point about a friend of Lo’s who is being bullied and abused by his fellow soldiers. He too falls in love with one of the women in the notorious unit. And then there’s Lo himself, who despite his intentions to stay chaste and committed finds himself torn between maintaining his morals and giving in to his attraction to Nini (Regina Wan), another member of the unit. Notice a pattern here?

Hurting the film is the way it falls back on standard themes for Taiwanese films. No character must be truly evil, and so the two women we see at each other’s throat in early scenes must eventually be there for each other in a time of need. The woman who intrigues Lo, like the main love interest in Niu’s 2010 film, Manga, is of course a decent woman put in a terrible position, and this justifies Lo’s interest in her. A more challenging film would have given her a darker side or portrayed as a femme fatale.

Tragedy strikes, as it must, but the film never seems to be breaking new ground. It has nothing to say about the military and its reliance of units of this kind, and it only rarely delves into the women’s pasts. This leaves Lo to shoulder most of the film, and he does not prove to be a terribly interesting character. As written by Niu and Li-ting Tseng, he is always moving one step forward, two steps back. Therefore, just when we think he’s going to do something important, he retreats, and we have to wait for the next revelation to see if he will finally be active instead of passive. One of the only other fully drawn out characters is Chang. He perfectly captures the inner torment of someone in a land he never thought he’d stay in permanently, preparing for a war against a country that he likely still considers his home. It is understandable that he would grasp at happiness if he felt it in reach. However, the film saddles him with one of the worst cases of mother issues that I have seen in some time, and too many scenes are devoted to conversations and flashbacks concerning her. I didn’t necessarily mind these scenes as much as I didn’t believe that a man like Chang would confess so much to a person in Lo’s position.

In the end, Paradise in Service has a good premise, but little in the way of payoff. It fluctuates between extremely involving scenes to ones that put some of the characters and their circumstances at such a distance as to make it difficult to fully empathize with them. The women of Unit 831 all seem to have a story, an injustice or destructive pattern. We learn some of these; I would like to have learned more of them. If the movie proves anything, it is that prostitution and the military are a dangerous combination. This is not a new message, but if anyone needs a reminder of it, the film provides it.

Paradise in Service is never unwatchable, and parts of it are indeed eye-opening. I particularly enjoyed the film’s use of black and white, and I admired the performances of Chen and Wan, who bring both humanity and a degree of joy to the film at key moments. However, by the time the end credits started rolling, I felt less of an emotional punch to the gut as I should have. This is a film that should have been powerful and hard to take. Instead, it settles for being about three possible romances during a very trying time in Taiwan’s history. Again, it’s not the worst choice the film could have made. It just wasn’t a very original one, and as such, the film feels a bit like a missed opportunity. (on Blu-ray in Hong Kong)

3 stars

*Paradise in Service is in Chinese and Taiwanese.

* At the 51^st Golden Horse Awards, Jianbin Chen won Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film. Qian Wan picked up Best Supporting Actress.

Review – Monga

July 22, 2010

Monga – Taiwan, 2010

In almost every travel guide for Taiwan, there is a small section devoted to Longshan Temple, a large, rather impressive temple that according to Lonely Planet enshrines one hundred and sixty-six deities, the most important of which is Guanyin. Across from the temple, the streets are lined with street venders, and close by there is a night market commonly referred to as Snake Alley, where people can buy souvenirs, get a foot massage, and eat a serving of snake soup, if they are so inclined. When I tell my students that I have been in this area several times, they usually ask me if I’ve eaten snake (I haven’t) or what I thought of Longshan Temple. Inevitably, a concerned student will be sure to tell me not to go there at night, explaining that when the sun goes down, the area becomes a bit seedy. I’ve been there after dark, and while the area indeed has a different feel to it at that time, I’ve never had a problem there. Reputations are hard to shake, however.

Monga takes place in this area of Taipei in 1986, and the Wenhua District, as it is more commonly known, was quite different back then. In the film, the area is divided into two sections, and each section is run by its own boss. On one side, there’s Boss Geta. He is head of a group called the Temple Front. On the other side, there’s Boss Masa, who’s the leader of the Back Alley. Both of these men are Taiwanese, and while their foot soldiers may do battle from time to time, they are more likely to sit down to tea together to discuss important affairs, the most important of which has to do with “Mainlanders” trying to get in on the action. Exactly what this action is, is not clear. We see streets lined with prostitutes doing their best to lure customers in, yet this was legal at the time. A few characters talk about gambling, but there’s no reference to either boss running illegal gambling parlors. There’s also no mention of drugs or organized crime at all. I suppose this is because we are meant to like these characters, and perhaps we wouldn’t if we say all of the illegal activity they were involved in.

Monga is mainly about five high school students – Mosquito, Dragon Lee, Monk, A-Po, and Monkey - collectively known as the Prince Gang. In the film’s opening scenes, we see why it might be important to be part of a gang at this time, as schools abound with bullies who demand bribes for such things as using a stairwell to get to class. On his first day at a new school, Mosquito has to fend off six members of a gang after refusing to surrender part of his lunch to the class bully. His skill catches the attention of the Prince Gang, who ask him to join them and then offer him protection. To Mosquito, the gang represents a brotherhood, a collection of close friends, which he has never had before. The violence he witnesses and is asked to take part in after joining the gang brings tears to his eyes initially. The tears eventually go away, but Mosquito never quite understands why the violence is necessary in the first place. Perhaps that’s because it shouldn’t be.

Monga should work better than it does. That is doesn’t is the result of a rather uneven script. First, screenwriter Li-ting Tseng initially can’t decide whether he’s crafting a gangster film or a comedy, and so early in the film, we get an odd scene in which the Prince Gang bumps into average people while running away from a larger gang. The people they run into, including a man in a wheelchair and a man lying on the ground begging for spare change, then stop what they’re doing and join the chase. People run left, then right, then left again. The chased become the ones doing the chasing. If it sounds familiar, it’s because it’s been done many times, from American comedies to Japanese cartoons. In addition, instead of focusing on how deeply the Prince Gang is involved in gang activity, screenwriter Li-ting Tseng shows us example after example of just how close the gang is. We see them training together, having a water fight together, playing basketball together, and to emphasize just how great each moment is, director Doze Niu slows them down for us, so that all of the smiles and laughter last even longer than they normally would. I get it - They’re good friends, and they have fun together. What else have you got?

Two other subplots are not given enough time to be convincing. The first has to do with Mosquito becoming involved with a prostitute, a bit of a cliché in a film of this genre. Their scenes may be sweet, but the two characters never completely seem in love. In order to do that, they have to talk, and more often, they listen to samples of Air Supply songs together. I suppose it’s a realistic way for them to escape from their daily lives, but it does not create a strong enough bond between the two characters. The second has to do with Mosquito beginning to think of Boss Geta as a father figure. This is an important development, for many of Mosquito’s actions in the second half of the film relate to it. Therefore, more is needed than just a dropped piece of shrimp and a karaoke duet to make it realistic. In addition, while the film’s final thirty minutes are meant to be surprising, most of the plot twists that occur during this time can be seen a mile away. Moreover, the Prince Gang’s tearful outbursts during this time seem more out of character than heartfelt, again the result of a problem with the script.

Monga does contain very good performances. Mark Chou makes a memorable acting debut in the role of Mosquito, and Ching-Tien Juan plays Monk with an intensity that is fascinating to watch. However, the film’s best performance belongs to Ju-Long Ma, who is especially good as Boss Geta. However, actors can only do so much, and when a script fails them, which is the case with Monga, their efforts and their energy are simply not enough. Monga had great potential; it just didn’t live up to it. (on DVD in Region 3)

2 and a half stars

*Monga is in Min Nan and Mandarin with English subtitles.