Eleventh. A Borrowed Life by Wu Nien-jen (1994)

A Borrowed Life (1994)
Director: Wu Nien-jen
Award: Grand Prize at The Torino Film Festival in Italy

A Borrowed Life was the first film that talked about the intergenerational gap of the rural working class as one of the social colonial effects in post-second World War in Taiwan. In the film, the protagonist's father, Duo Sang, faces a huge generation gap with his son and daughter because they lived in an era of changing times. While Duo Sang was Japanese and Minnanese educated, his children were Mandarin educated and know little of the Minnanese dialect. Throughout the film, we could see that there was an erosion of culture and the replacement of another just within a family. Duo Sang felt that he was not living his own life anymore. Although his son, Wen Jian, tries to be emphatic towards his father, it was never appreciated. In fact, I felt that whenever Wen Jian tried to help his father or gave him money, Duo Sang had let his ego take place and rejected it. It was as though Duo Sang was trying to tell his son that no matter how emphatic he is, he could never understand how he felt in this agonizing changing society. At the same time, it reminds and pains Duo Sang of his misplacement in the society.

I felt that this generation gap issue is also evident in our own society as well. Although it is not as drastic as having language barriers as we could still communicate with our parents, however I felt that there was still a slow distancing cultures and ethos in this fast changing global community. As we have known, the proliferation of the Internet exposes all of us to different cultures in the world and people could choose how they wanted to be educated. At the same time, while the younger generation is adapting to the global culture, it leaves the older generation behind in their own times. More often than not, we do see a hybrid of cultures and acceptance of other cultures. Unlike in A Borrowed Life, Duo Sang's daughter could not appreciate her father's love for Japanese music and stuff. A simple example can be that there is an increase in the number of Chinese in Singapore being attracted to the anime or manga from Japanese, at the same time watching Hollywood blockbuster films are also part of their favourite past times. Traditions were often lost, if not argued as something that is superstitious and that it is not practical.

I felt that in this aspect, it is good in a sense that the new generation starts to be able to appreciate other country's culture. However, the dilution of traditions is not a good thing as I believe that some of the traditions actually has an imbedded certain moral value which holds the community at peace, at where it is now.

[1] A Borrowed Life (1994) FILM REVIEW; Generation Gap for a Generation. Retrieved on 27 April 2011 from http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/review?res=990ce5db1038f93aa15750c0a963958260
[2] Island on the edge: Taiwan new cinema and after By Feiyi Lu.
[3] Borrowed Modernity: History and the Subject in A Borrowed Life by Chaoyang Liao; Vol. 24, No. 3, Postmodernism and China (Autumn, 1997), pp. 225-245