of absenting mentor and parental figures. The school bureaucrats and parents shirk away from their responsibilities at every opportunity—only halfheartedly or even indifferently involved in their children’s lives. Xiao Si’r’s father exhibits this inner retreat when he turns from an outspoken father into a father who can’t stand up for his son. But what seems to be the cause?

The title of this film takes after the lyrics of Elvis’ Are You Lonesome Tonight?—the Elvis tape thrown away by the prison guards near the end of the film symbolized the wasted youth. But in Taiwan (and other Chinese territories), A Brighter Summer Day goes by another name: The Homicide Incident of the Youth on Guling Street, which shares the name with the 1961 teenage murder case the film isand Hou Hsiao-Hsien frequently compete in film festivals around the world. Unfortunately, decades of having no critical space has a negative impact on culture. Local box office of the acclaimed international darlings was abysmal since Taiwanese audience was (and to some degree, is) not used to slow and contemplative movies. Critics themselves were split on the New Wave. The commercialism-centric and conservatives Film Critics China even denounced the movement for “overt pretentiousness” and “chasing after foreign praise”. Chiang family’s military dictatorship hampered generations’ cinematic literacy.

A Brighter Summer Day perfectly encapsulates and channels the anxiety and helplessness of a time of stifled speech. In the end, Xiao Si’r failed to change anything or anyone, he was ground down, buried, and silenced by the state machine. Ironically, as one of