Unspoken Cinema

Days Q&A with Director Tsai Ming Liang and Professor Chris Berry, King's College, London (YouTube) 30'53" (East Asia Film Festival Ireland) 24 March 2021

"What I’m striving toward, though, is to present a vision of human connection despite that. In The Hole, you can see that final image of the hands reaching out, of one person lifting another up. I will include that visual image in a film, such as in No No Sleep, with two people on the mattress, almost as if that type of human connection can only happen in a dream, in a fantasy—in a film. I want to present those kinds of human connections against the backdrop of urbanization in all its loneliness, alienation and solitude." Isaac Feldberg; Vanishing Points: Tsai Ming-liang on movie theaters, loneliness and the disappearing world; interview for Letterboxd ; 16 July 2026

  Tsai Ming-liang: El cine y la conciencia del tiempo (YouTube) 6'42" (Cátedra Ingmar Bergman UNAM) 9 Abril 2021 "Las películas de Tsai Ming-liang son fragmentos de un diario donde se registran las anotaciones de un observador, invitaciones a la contemplación de la vida como una expresión del tiempo. Esta conversación en la Cátedra Extraordinaria Ingmar Bergman en cine y teatro, en el marco de FICUNAM, es una oportunidad de acercarnos a esa mirada poética que danza entre la soledad, el deseo, los cuerpos, la intimidad y el silencio."

  The Role of Water in Tsai Ming-liang's "The Hole" (1998) (YouTube) 5' (CinemaBlog) 30 Jan 2021  "Here, I take a deep dive into the role played by the motif of water in Tsai-Ming-liang's "The Hole" (1998)."

  139. HKIFF50: Interview with Tsai Ming-liang (Deep Cut) 27'38" ENGLISH 5 july 2026 "The seventh and final director interview Wilson conducted at this year’s Hong Kong International Film Festival is with the legendary Taiwanese filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang. Wilson asks one of his cinematic heroes about the state of filmmaking today, his methods for working with actors, and his decades-long collaboration with Lee Kang-sheng."

 New addition to the Library page at Unspoken Cinema: "This thesis explores Slow Cinema as a form of quiet resistance to contemporary cultures of acceleration through carefully designed mise-en-scène and sustained duration. As life is increasingly shaped by speed and efficiency, cinema has mirrored these changes implementing rapid editing and spectacle. Drawing primarily on Byung-Chul Han’s (2015) exploration of “burnout” provides a framework for understanding these changes.  By situating this thesis within this cultural context, the research considers how slow cinema disrupts linear time and space and offers an alternative affective experience that encourages contemplation, relaxation and stillness as a response to the exhausting, pressurised current cultural condition.   Through a visual analysis of Goodbye, Dragon Inn (2003) directed by Tsai Ming-liang, this thesis examines how production design creates interstitial spaces that function as temporal containers, al...

"Acclaimed filmmaker Tsai Ming Liang has opened a new space in the hills of Xindian, and it feels like an invitation into his world. Set inside a restored mountain house, the newly unveiled art space extends the director’s long-standing exploration of time, solitude, and slow living beyond the cinema screen. Visitors will find paintings, film posters, video installations, personal collections, and a café serving coffee and light meals curated by Tsai himself. Known for films that linger in silence and embrace the passage of time, Tsai has spent decades crafting a cinematic language defined by slowness. That same sensibility now shapes the space itself, where every detail, from the exhibition layout to the atmosphere of the café, reflects his personal touch. In a city that rarely slows down, this may be one of Taipei’s most unexpected new cultural destinations." The Taipei Edit; 5 June 2026; Instagram ; Substack . No. 152, Zhangchun Rd, Meitan Village, Xindian District, New Ta...

A Sociological Analysis on Tsai Ming Liang's "I Don't Want To Sleep Alone"  (YouTube) 6'13" (zeogonzo) 3 march 2024  "A short analysis on the themes and concepts introduced in Tsai Ming Liang's only film done in Malaysia. Made as an assignment for a sociology class in my film school."

  So You Want To Get Into...Tsai Ming-liang (YouTube) 16'17" (Dion Wyn) 1 March 2021

  Tsai Ming-liang and The Slow, Quiet Devastation of Loneliness (YouTube) 8'35" (Joel Talks About Movies) 17 Sep 2022 "Films mentioned in this video: I Don't Want to Sleep Alone Stray Dogs Rebels of a Neon God The Wayward Cloud The River"

  Seeing Patterns in the Films of Tsai Ming-liang (YouTube) 1'55" (Fandor) 24 Apr 2018 "Along with Hsiao-hsien Hou and Edward Yang, Tsai Ming-liang is one of the most celebrated directors of Second New Wave Taiwanese Cinema. He has made ten internationally acclaimed feature films —including Stray Dogs, now streaming on Fandor—that, along with telling unvarnished and complex stories of contemporary life in Taiwan and Malaysia, make use of a number of recurring themes and motifs: phone booths, sexuality, mirrors, and musical numbers, to name a few. This video dives into the aesthetic and thematic patterns of a daring yet subtle minimalist auteur, and the ways he uses his many trademarks."

  Regarder tenir feat. Olivier Zuchuat (YouTube) 40'19" (Microciné Revue de Cinéma et de Télévision) 25 mars 2026 "À l’occasion de la parution de Attraits de la durée, Olivier Zuchuat revient sur un travail qui, sous des allures théoriques, reste profondément lié à une pratique du cinéma. Il ne cherche pas à redéfinir frontalement ce qu’est un film, mais à déplacer légèrement le point d’attention, à partir d’un élément simple — le plan — pour en éprouver les conséquences. L’idée, au fond, tient en peu de mots : le montage ne serait pas seulement ce qui relie les plans entre eux, mais ce qui s’opère déjà à l’intérieur du plan lui-même, dans sa durée, dans ses déplacements, dans la manière dont il organise l’espace et le temps. À partir de là, tout se reconfigure. Ce que l’on croyait stable — découpage, rythme, progression — devient plus incertain, plus diffus, comme si le film se mettait à respirer autrement. Certains exemples rendent cela immédiatement sensible. Dans les...

Latest addition to the Library page at Unspoken Cinema: "In popular and scholarly discourse on twenty-first century international film, slow cinema has emerged as an area of vibrant discussion. Among cinephiles and film critics, slow cinema grew in prominence as a topic in the early 2000s, and it has since become a source of rigorous debate in academic circles as well. With slow cinema now a central discussion in film culture, numerous authors have attempted to specifically define the parameters of this mode. Tiago de Luca describes slow cinema as a group of films “characterized by measured pace, minimalist mise-en-scène, opaque and laconic narratives, and an adherence to the long take as a self-reflexive stylistic device”. De Luca’s conceptualization of slow cinema is one of many, but it sufficiently captures the scope of the stylistic features typically attributed to slow cinema. To provide my own brief definition as a guide for this project, I will understand and interpret slo...

Latest addition to the Library page at Unspoken Cinema: "The concept of "slowness" which has gained significance in response to the rapid pace of industrialized and urbanized modern society, can be seen as a reaction to the challenges posed by consumer culture. When examined in conjunction with movements that embrace slowness as a way of life, such as "Slow Food," "Slow City," and "Slow Media," it becomes evident that this concept has developed a rich cultural and social ideological framework. The notion of slowness, which has garnered increasing attention in literature since the late 1980s, particularly through the works of Petrini and Berthelsen, has also found its way into the realm of cinema. This cinematic trend, often referred to as "slow cinema," is characterized by deliberate cinematographic choices. It can be traced back to the cinematic narratives of the 1960s and continues to influence contemporary filmmaking. Since the...

  if these holes could talk, they'd sing... - the hole by tsai ming-liang (YouTube) 1' (ilestsixheures) 1er avril 2020 

  Hoodie bleu < UNSPOKEN CINEMA > " Tout ce qui ne bouge pas finit par parler " (Days/TSAI Ming-Liang) Image originale HD gratuite sur demande Blue Hoodie < UNSPOKEN CINEMA > "Everything That Stands Still Ends Up Speaking" (Days/TSAI Ming-Liang) Free HD original image upon request    

Watch More Like This Film : Goodbye, Dragon Inn (2003/Tsai) keywords = Building + Emptiness + Mutism + Ghosts More like it: Fantasma (2006/Alonso) More spectators: Shirin (2008/Kiarostami) More spectators: Where is my Romeo? (2007/Kiarostami) short More child spectators: 10 minutes older (1978/Frank) short More empty: Hôtel Monterey (1973/Akerman) More abandoned: Homo Sapiens (2016/Geyrhalter) More scenography: Le Bal (1983/Scola) More testimony: Man in Black (2023/Wang)

Latest addition to the Library page at Unspoken Cinema: "Even though slow cinema intends to have the audience attend to all the details of real life, it by no means tries to submerge the viewer within its mundaneness of it. Just the opposite, it tries to defamiliarize the audience with the images of life they experience. The perspective shaped by the long take fixes the viewer in a designated spot, at which the viewer becomes a bystander and gazer of other people’s life, since this kind of gaze is rare in real life.  The effort to introduce defamiliarization in slow cinema is triggered by the fact that the viewer finds it unattractive to watch something familiar on the screen. As mentioned earlier, according to Bazin, the aim of long-take photography is to preserve the spatial-temporal continuum so that the viewers are involved as much as possible as the duration of the long take is synchronized to the real-time that the viewer is experienci...

  Film In Conversation/ Tsai Ming-liang (YouTube) 1h08' (QAGOMA) 1st April 2025 As part of Asia Pacific Triennial Cinema, Taiwan-based Malaysian filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang joined us for an Australian-exclusive in-person In Conversation event. Celebrated as one of the greatest living directors and a key figure in the second wave of Taiwan New Cinema, Tsai has re-shaped understandings of the artform through his feature films (including the Golden Lion-winning 'Vive L’Amour' 1994 and the ghostly masterpiece 'Goodbye, Dragon Inn' 2003), his innovative video works and his mesmerising 'Walker' series. Tsai Ming-liang discusses his acclaimed career, his long-standing creative partnership with Lee Kang-sheng and his singular vision of cinema. Recorded at the Australian Cinémathèque, Gallery of Modern Art (Sun 1 Dec 2024) Moderated by Robert Hughes, Associate Curator, Australian Cinémathèque 11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (30 Nov 2024 – 27 Apr 2025) Q...

  Video Essay: "Days Passed" | Lee Kang-Sheng Through the Eyes of Tsai Ming-Liang  (YouTube) 3'22" (MUBI) 20 Nov 2020 "Days Passed: Lee Kang-Sheng Through the Eyes of Tsai Ming-Liang" by Michelle Cho  A video essay exploring the fragile passage of time through the shifting textures of Lee Kang-Sheng's face in the films of Tsai Ming-Liang.  A double bill focused on Tsai Ming-liang and Lee Kang-sheng is currently showing on MUBI US: https://mubi.com/specials/tsai-lee   "Presented in this double bill are two of the duo’s early standouts, Vive L’amour and The River. Vive L’amour is is a three-fold tale of urban alienation in the vein of Antonioni, steeped in an eroticism that is led by Lee’s sense of quiet longing. The River sees the actor apply his deadpan style to Tsai’s bleak and metaphysical vision of the nuclear family. Made immediately after their joint debut feature, Rebels of the Neon God, these two films are cornerstones of one of the most inf...