Charles Dickens once began a novel with 'It was the best of times, it was the worst of times' and to these Western eyes the latter obtains here. It's a nice touch - though not exactly revolutionary - to have three sets of lovers in three time zones played by the same two actors, Chang Chen and Shu Qi but the third episode is SO out of kilter with the other two (and they don't exactly complement each other) that it totally negates all that has gone before and almost brutalizes the eye. In their different ways the first episode (1966) and the second (19ll) have lots going for them stylistically. The first episode is almost a definition of oriental inscrutability and it is very difficult for a Western eye to comprehend that ANYTHING at all is going on between the man and the girl. Of course the very concept of a girl both working and participating in a snooker hall is alien to Europenas - or at least the English - especially in 1966 which was smack dab in the centre of the 'swinging sixties' when girls were far more preoccupied with the pill, sexual freedom and the drug culture than something as 'old fashioned' as snooker - but if we go along with it as normal in Taiwan there still remains the problem of the all-but-invisible nuances between the couple. The second part is much more stately and comes complete with the equivalent of Title Cards and an off-screen piano accompaniment and has been shot in a manner suggesting an old daguerrotype. By contrast the last segment is in-yer-face and seems to wallow in the worst excesses of modern culture where it is almost impossible to find even one character with whom we can empathize let alone SYMpathize. Those guys and gals who 'teach' film at universities will be creaming in their pants but the rest of us will wonder what all the fuss is about.
Review of Three Times
