Director – Chiang Wei-liang – 2024 – Taiwan, Singapore, France – Cert. 15 – 128m
****1/2
An immigrant caregiver is caught between the demands of his exhausted, needy clients on the one hand and his profit-oriented gangster taskmasters on the other – out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 23rd
This gets straight in there with a taboo-breaking shot of a human bottom covered in excrement, something familiar to anyone who has worked as a carer for an incontinent person but a bit of a shock to the rest of us. A hand bearing a cloth comes into shot and wipes the excrement off. When we eventually see the carer’s head, he is wearing earphones as he does the work. All his male client is doing is wordlessly moaning. We watch the carer lift the man, reassuring him, and deposit him in an offscreen chair. An elderly woman dozes on the sofa. He wipes her brow with a fresh towel. She takes it from him and wipes her face. He tells her he’s fed and bathed Hui (i.e. the son, played by Kuo Shu-wei who has cerebral palsy).
The carer goes outside in the rain. In the cab of his truck, his boss asks, what the hell took you so long?… Read the rest
