Festive films
Usher in the Year of the Dragon with festive family movies and dragon-themed films at indie cinema The Projector.
To celebrate Chinese New Year, it will be showing two movies with “dragon” in their titles as part of its Enter The Dragon theme.
On the list is Taiwanese auteur Tsai Ming-liang’s Goodbye, Dragon Inn (2003, PG, 82 minutes), about a historic Taipei cinema that is screening its final film; and American director David Fincher’s mystery thriller The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2011, R21, 158 minutes), about a disgraced journalist who teams up with a young hacker to investigate a cold case.
For families who want to watch a kid-friendly movie over the festive period, Pixar’s acclaimed animated film Turning Red (2022, PG, 100 minutes), which premiered on streaming platform Disney+ in 2022, is getting a Singapore theatrical release on Feb 8.
The coming-of-age film follows a 13-year-old Chinese-Canadian girl who turns into a giant red panda every time she experiences an intense emotion.
The Projector is also celebrating Valentine’s Day with Taiwanese film-maker Lee Ang’s early work The Wedding Banquet (1993, R21, 109 minutes). The film follows a gay Taiwanese-American man who has an American boyfriend but is closeted to his parents. He plans a marriage of convenience to a Chinese woman to get her a green card and appease his parents.
Where: The Projector, 05-00 Golden Mile Tower, 6001 Beach Road; and Golden Village x The Projector at Cineleisure, 8 Grange Road
MRT: Nicoll Highway/Lavender; and Somerset/Orchard
When: Various times
Admission: $10.50 to $15 for a standard ticket
Info: theprojector.sg/themes/cny
Perfect Days (PG)
133 minutes, opens exclusively at The Projector on Feb 8
5 stars
In a pairing of greats, German film-maker Wim Wenders directs Japanese actor Koji Yakusho as a dedicated toilet cleaner in Tokyo going through his cyclical rituals: rising every dawn, misting his bonsai plants, downing coffee, then heading out to Shibuya Ward’s 17 public toilets to scrub and mop.
Much like its middle-aged protagonist Hirayama (Yakusho), Wenders has come to embrace the textures and rhythms of the everyday in this gentle character study, which is competing for the Academy Awards’ best international feature in March.
Hirayama listens to cassette recordings of 1970s American rockers Lou Reed and Patti Smith in his minivan. He photographs the trees in the urban park. He frequents a neighbourhood bar and browses a thrift bookstore for William Faulkner paperbacks.
His wordless contentment in his rich yet simple life is a marvel and won Yakusho the 2023 Cannes Film Festival’s best actor prize.
It is ruptured by other people inserting themselves into his solitude – most irrevocably, a runaway teenage niece (Arisa Nakano) and Hirayama’s estranged sister (Yumi Aso).
Spy X Family Code: White (PG13)
111 minutes, opens on Feb 8
4 stars
In the popular spy action-comedy anime series Spy X Family (2022 to present), Loid, his wife Yor, their adopted daughter Anya and pet dog Bond seem like a perfect family. In truth, Loid is an elite spy and Yor is a deadly assassin. Both keep their double lives hidden from their family. But, unbeknown to them, Anya is a telepath who knows all their secrets.
In this film spin-off, Loid (voiced by Takuya Eguchi) takes the family out for a weekend winter vacation, but their holiday is complicated when Anya mistakenly becomes mired in a military operation that threatens world peace.
Despite an espionage premise and the many murders that Yor (voiced by Saori Hayami) commits, the series is a found-family comedy about two people who enter a marriage of convenience, but come to genuinely love their daughter Anya (voiced by Atsumi Tanezaki).
This largely standalone film serves up more of the same.
While there is no need to watch the series nor read the manga to understand the plot, Code: White – like most film spin-offs of anime series – is not concerned with winning over new fans. It is made for people who already love its story and the endearing dynamic the characters share.
