'Yi Yi': a family drama with noble, interesting characters

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"Yi Yi," Edward Yang's charming three-hour drama of a family in modern Taipei, is full of nice small moments that add up to a deeper whole.

It holds our interest because the main characters in the Jian family - the father, NJ (Wu Nien-jen); the teenaged daughter, Ting-Ting (Kelly Lee); and the 8-year-old son, Yang-Yang (Jonathan Chang) - act nobly in an ignoble world.

The film begins with the wedding of NJ's brother-in-law, A-Di (Chen Xi-sheng), to his visibly pregnant girlfriend. A superstitious man, A-Di actually put off the wedding until the luckiest day of the year, but several events occur which indicate that the day may not be lucky after all.

Movie Review *** 1/2 "Yi Yi" with Wu Nien-jen, Issey Ogata, Elaine Jin, Kelly Lee, Jonathan Chang. Written and directed by Edward Yang. 173 minutes. In English, Taiwanese, Mandarin and Japanese, with English subtitles.

A-Di's ex-girlfriend shows up and makes a scene. Then his mother, fatigued, expresses the desire to go home, where she suffers a stroke. Even small moments suggest trouble, as when NJ, distracted, places the welcoming wedding photo of bride and groom upside-down in the holder.

The stroke of the grandmother, and her subsequent coma, help delineate the character of each family member. Instructed by doctors to talk to the comatose figure, Yang-Yang refuses from fear, A-Di goes on about money matters, while Ting-Ting, who feels the stroke may have resulted from her forgetfulness, expresses guilt. "If you forgive me," she pleads, "wake up." Eventually NJ's wife suffers an existential crisis because she has nothing to say to her mother. "I live a blank," she tells her husband in tears, before leaving Taipei on a religious retreat.

NJ is in the middle of several crises of his own. He runs into his first love, Sherry, for whom feelings are still strong. His computer-gaming business is in financial trouble, and he and his partners battle over which company to sign: a reputable Japanese firm called Ota, whose president NJ finds honorable and trustworthy, or a Taiwan knockoff company whose name, Ato, is deliberately designed to confuse it with Ota.

Ting-Ting, meanwhile, acts as liaison between her friend, Lili (Adrian Lin), and Lili's sometime boyfriend, Fatty (Chang Yu-pang), until things become romantically complicated.

The most interesting character of all may be the youngest. Yang-Yang is teased at school by older girls, and bullied by an inept teacher. But he's a smart boy who puzzles things over. Aware that people see only half the truth, he comes up with a childishly ingenious solution to help them see the half they're missing.

The mood throughout the film is one of extreme patience - events unfold before us like a flower slowly opening itself before the sun - and writer/director Yang makes exquisite use of juxtaposition and transition. At one point, we watch a sonogram, but the voice-over is from the following scene: a Japanese woman talking about the nascent computer gaming industry. Her comments reflect on both scenes.

Later, NJ's nostalgic date with Sherry is juxtaposed with Ting-Ting's first date with Fatty.

Yang won the Best Director award at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival for "Yi Yi," and is considered a leading figure, with Hou Hsiao-hsien, in Taiwan's cinematic New Wave.