Review | A Sun film review: grief and violence in slow-burn Golden Horse awards winner
- Suicides, pregnancies and gangland violence punctuate this two-and-a-half hour examination of unaddressed grief and unspoken expectations
- The film, streaming on Netflix, follows the head of a working-class family in Taipei who turns his back on one son in jail and invests everything in the other
3.5/5 stars
Veteran actor and filmmaker Chen Yi-wen stars as A-wen, the emotionally inarticulate driving instructor at the head of an ordinary working-class family in contemporary Taipei. Turning his back on elder son A-ho (Wu Chien-ho) long before he is sentenced to three years in juvenile detention, A-wen invests instead in younger son A-hao (Greg Hsu Kuang-han), who is applying for medical school.
Imprisoned for being an accessory in a violent assault, A-ho must contend with hostile cellmates and conditions, as well the discovery that his underage girlfriend Xiao-yu (Wu Tai-ling) is carrying his unborn child. Meanwhile, Radish (Liu Kwan-ting), a low-level gangster and the perpetrator of the attack, is also eagerly awaiting his release.
A-hao, meanwhile, appears just as lost as his sibling, clashing with teachers at his school, and too closed-off to accept the advances of a female classmate. A more sensitive soul than his brother, he proves tragically ill-equipped for the pressures facing him at home and out in the world.
Evoking the slow-burn style of Taiwanese New Wave masters and filmmakers Hou Hsiao-hsien and Edward Yang, A Sun explores the crumbling relationships within the family – not through heated conversations and emotional conflict, but with extended sequences of painfully drawn-out silence, as long-held grievances simmer persistently.
At driving school, A-wen preaches the mantra “Seize the Day – choose your path”, but it soon becomes apparent that he is incapable of practising what he preaches. Faced with financial obligations as a result of A-ho’s crimes, A-wen closes off completely, leaving his wife (Samantha Ko Shu-chin) to deal with Xiao-yu and her litigious guardian (Ivy Yin Hsin).
The film’s title offers a number of different interpretations, not least the obvious play on words that hints at A-wen’s refusal to recognise that he has more than one son, until tragedy forces his hand. At one point, A-hao refers to the sun as being “the fairest thing in the world”, without explaining why.
Perhaps he means that from its celestial vantage point, it shines indiscriminately on us all, regardless of our station or accomplishments. A sun also features prominently on Taiwan’s flag, suggesting that Chung perceives his story as a universal one, and the struggles as ones faced by his nation as a whole.
Performances throughout are naturalistic, though frustratingly inert at times, while Chung demands total commitment from his audience, and offers little levity in return.
Liu is particularly intimidating as the relentlessly manipulative Radish, determined to drag A-ho back into a life of crime. It falls to Chen’s defiantly belligerent patriarch, however, to deliver the film’s climactic revelation, as A Sun builds to a hard-earned yet undeniably cathartic crescendo.
A Sun is streaming on Netflix.
