In the last few days of self-isolating due to having Covid, I went online to the Manchester HOME cinema site to book a ticket for the upcoming 35MM screening of Nadja (1994-also reviewed) I found out about a "Taiwan's Lost Commercial Cinema: Recovered and Restored" season taking place.

Finding a showing of an obscure Taiwan Film Noir taking place a few days after my self-isolation period was to end,I got ready to meet the six suspects.

The plot:

Note:Review contains some plot details.

Deciding to change sides and use his private investigating skills to line his own pockets, Tenn Kong-hui begins slyly keeping an eye on his ex-girlfriend Tai-giok having an affair with the man engaged to the daughter of the major steel businessman in town (with the engaged man also taking bribes to approve construction deals.)

Wanting to get a slice of the action, Kong-hui decides to play his hand, and blackmail everyone by saying that unless they pay him, he will leak details of their dealings. Responding to a report,the police discover that Kong-hui overplayed his hand,and has been murdered,which leads to the cops finding six suspects with links to Kong-hui's death.

View on the film:

Detailed in the introduction before the screening that over 1,000 Taiwanese films were made from the 1950's-1970's, on low budgets by indie studios. With no film archive in the country at this time, just 200 movies from this era survive.

Opening with a scroll stating: "Please ignore all the societal horrors depicted in this film, everything is okay" (this was when Taiwan was under Kuomintang) the screenplay by Yi-Yun Lin & Min Kung impressively fights through the strict censorship of this period, by intelligently using the set-up of a Film Noir mystery, to slice into the increasing industrialisation taking place in Taiwan, which is built on a foundation of shady dealings, where the only moral is making a quick buck.

Peeling open flashbacks from each interrogation by the cops, the writers unveil a rich a Film Noir pessimism in their line-up of decayed characters haunting the streets, from Tai-giok having all the men wrapped round her little finger, to Kong-hui (played by a excellent Wai Wang, who wraps a devilish, cat who got the cream wide grin across Kong-hui's face.)

Originally a playwright and one of two films he made in 1965, (with this one remaining in the vaults for years, with the film maker later saying he was not happy with how the movie turned out.) Despite the dissatisfaction later expressed, for the last film he would make, director Tuan-Chiu Lin takes a bow with a magnificently French New Wave (FNW)-inspired stylised Film Noir.

Listening in on secrets with Kong-hui down dark alleyways, Tuan-Chiu crosses a simmering Film Noir atmosphere, with Pop-Art stylisation, as shimmering, FNW- styled, fluid dissolves,whip-pans and thrilling on the street tracking shots down the side streets of Taipei, are threaded with refine close-ups under smoky low-lighting of Kong-hui revealing all the juicy details he is using for the blackmail,as the six suspects are rounded up.