Review of What Time Is It There? (2001) by Asim D — 18 Jul 2005

[i]What Time Is It There? [/i]is a difficult film to watch. Tsai Ming Ling's style involves beautifully composed shots that linger for minutes, where characters peform the most dull of actions. At first this may seem tedious and pretentious, but it has purpose, it allows us to see glimpses of their pain as they strike a look of genuine sadness amidst the banality of their actions.

It is much like ourselves, as we sit and reflect on missed connections, past hardships, and uncertain futures. We lay on our beds and stare at the ceiling. We stand in the kitchen, eating food off the counter.

We take the long way home and get lost in our music. All of this we do to escape that nagging feeling - is there something more than this? The beautiful reality of it all is that although we may be alone, we are together in our loneliness.

Ming-Liang understands this and creates it with haunting realism.