Secret, or The Secret that Cannot Be Told (Jay Chou, 2007)
On 35mm at the Clay Theater during the 51st SFIFF with Lucía, on 4 May 2008, at 21:00.
At the other end of the spectrum from Tout est pardonné, we have the lush mainstream film from the massively popular Jay Chou. It’s probably worth noting that the cinematography is by Mark Lee Ping-bin, who probably made more money working on this film than all of his work with Hou Hsiao-Hsien, et al, combined. It certainly shows—the film is gorgeous.
It seemed to me an amazing amount of effort is put into the realistic hand motions of the piano playing (in stark contrast to the unrealistic piano playing itself, given the context). Jay Chou’s preference for Chopin certainly shows, and I won’t pretend that I don’t have a soft spot for the significant role that piano-playing plays in the film (and yet I didn’t really like Shine or The Piano).
Overall an enjoyable film, although I’m pretty sure I could have made it about 45 minutes shorter without detracting from the film in any way.
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