Journey to the West

Tsai Ming-liang has made narrative films, but this is not one of them. Here he and Kang-sheng Lee try to capture the essence of Zen on film. No beginning, no end, no story, no meaning. Just being, and awareness. Total awareness of every step you take on your path. I left the theatre calm and soothed, and carried the feeling with me.

I admire Lee for his devotion and vulnerability. His slow walk must have required rigorous training and discipline, and application. Only by reaching that Zen state of mind could he descend those stairs the way he did. And walking through the crowded streets of Marseille like that, even though there must have been some security around, took courage.

This is not a narrative film to consume as entertainment. It is the registration of an event, and it reaches out on a much deeper level.

This is a piece of art work that is extremely unique . You are sitting and exploring all the items and characters in the scene, like sitting in front of a painting and watching it. Examination of events. Which randomly happens in it, ordinary people around the main character. It is a confrontation between traditional form of life and modernity. Calm concentration in front of hustle and bustle.

"The longer you stay on the shot, greater the pressure" - is something we're familiar with when it comes to directors like Tarkovsky, he doesn't shy away from staying with his camera on a scene for as long as necessary. With this film, I did felt quite intimidating with the first shot of the film of an older man's face staring into the camera, lying down and giving off the impression (to me) that he had woken up. The shot lasts for about 8 minutes.

We then follow a monk throughout the rest of the film, walking in ultra-slow-motion, the longest one was probably how walked down stairs during 14 minutes, lots of people passing by him, some watching him, some ignoring him and just moving on. At first I was into this, actually finding the shots really beautiful and soothing to rest my eyes upon, but I then ended up falling asleep, not only once, but twice, having to go back to the spot where I think I fell asleep.

The most disappointing thing to me however is that this is categorized as a drama, the monk is actually played by an actor and so is the old man that we sometimes see just watching either the monk or nothing at all. I've seen documentaries before with monks walking like this, the most famous one from Godfrey Reggio's QATSI trilogy, a trilogy moving in a very rapid pace to fast music. This film however is more like scenes from Roy Andersson's films, the camera locked on a spot and then something taking place in front of it, only that this film got no plot, it got no music and in the end I didn't really learn anything at all from it, compared to the QATSI films. It could've been a great "opposite-film" to those films with its slow pace and a message to the people to slow down, take it easy, but in the end I just ended up being a bit bored and disappointed by the whole experience.

I did however give the film 5 stars out of 10, because some of the shots are just fantastic with it's natural lighting, especially the staircase scene with the rim light around the monk and the sparkling points on the railings.

Sometimes minimalism irks me. Sometimes it gets me. Journey To The West gets me. It offers no discernible dialogue or plot, instead it's a 50 minute meditative art piece wherein Holy Motors' Denis Levant meditates and a monk walks very, very slowly, often in public. Without doing much at all, it's hilarious, infuriating, profound, poetic, and utterly brilliant. I haven't seen any of Tsai Ming-liang's other films yet so I don't have any context but this works on its own. Like Chris Marker with La Jetee before him, Journey To The West questions the motion in motion picture. It questions the ambiguities of life - ideas of motivation, drive, purpose, relief, but also cinematically in the sense of conventional setup and payoffs and journeys. Above all, it's a film that revels in the tranquility of the moment (or not so tranquil), and while it's surreal in mood it feels utterly real, refreshing and revealing of the human condition.

Granted, the film definitely tests the boundaries of tedium, and if it were any longer I probably wouldn't have tolerated it as much, but instead Ming-liang is restrained and economic with all his dozen or so shots. Scenes like watching the monk climb slowly down a subway staircase for 15 minutes bleeds so much life. It's pure meditative cinema, stripped down but honest. Other shots are almost a case of Where's Wally in finding the monk among the crowd. It's delightfully entertaining and makes you think about cinema can do. Self-aware moments certainly confirm that Ming-liang isn't ignoring the audience. I can't tell whether he's is truly pretentious or laughing at us with this, but it works on so many levels. It holds a tense and quirky atmosphere that's interesting and strangely poignant, yet quietly exuberant. Helps that it's such a rich aesthetic experience with its gorgeous cinematography and dense sound design. I understand why many find the film hallow but this is a rich tapestry for me.

8/10

This is nothing like anything I have ever seen before. Quite an interesting film, but not for everyone. Yep, I thought it was boring in the opening, but later I get used to it and began to analyse. A film that has only a concept, but there's no beginning or the ending. However, displaying the film subject in the variety of angles was stunning. Sometimes I was keenly looking for where the subject has gone. At sometime it felt like a lazy afternoon under the shades while bright sunlight was on the other side.

It was a Taiwan-French co-production and an hour long film that documents a Buddhist monk who has undertaken a slow walk procession in the streets of southern France coast city Marseille which is accompanied by a French actor. It reminded me the recent animation I had seen 'Zootopia', where sloths comes into the scene. Had so much fun, but in not here.

I don't know what the monk did was called, but definitely it is a fine study material. Like in this modern world where everything is fast and superfast, what it would be like being superslow and how people reacts to it. Actually, many were simply minding their own business, but a few were curiously looking at, like a cultural and/or the religious difference is something to do with it. A cool film, an art film, but not recommended unless you're not looking for the entertainment only.

7/10