Review: Rebels of the Neon God blends B-movie with art film
On Taipei's rain-lashed streets, two adolescent crooks break open pay phones for coins. They're tailed by another young man, apparently intent on revenge. It sounds like the setup for a gangster movie, and that's what "Rebels of the Neon God" is. Sort of.
Made in 1992 but not released in the United States until now, “Rebels” is the utterly assured first feature by Tsai Ming-liang. The Malaysia-bred Taiwanese director’s subsequent (and increasingly eccentric) movies, which include “What Time Is It There?” and “Vive l’Amour,” made him an international film-fest star. “Rebels” is his most conventional effort, which doesn’t mean it’s anything like mainstream Hollywood fare.
For one thing, Tsai is in no rush to introduce his main characters. Instead, he tours Taipei, the capital of Taiwan, rendered as garishly lighted and phenomenally damp. The camera snakes through places where alienated youth culture comes alive: arcades, night markets, roller rinks. These bustling realms are contrasted by the small, bare rooms where, periodically, the party kids retreat to face their essential isolation.
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Gradually, the pay-phone looters are revealed to be Ah-tze (Chen Chao-jung) and his sidekick Ah-ping (Jen Chang-bin). The guy watching them is Hsiao-kang (Lee Kang-sheng, the star of all 10 of Tsai’s features). A struggling cram-school math student, Hsiao-kang lives with his impassive father (Tien Miao), a cab driver, and his superstitious mother (Lu Hsiao-ling).
It’s Mom who goes to a temple where she’s informed that her son is a reincarnation of Nezha, a trickster deity whose name is rendered in English as “neon god.” But it’s Dad who indirectly causes Hsiao-kang’s fixation on the motor-scootering Ah-tze. During a traffic altercation, Ah-tze vandalizes Dad’s taxi, inspiring Hsiao-kang to plot retaliation.
At least that seems to be Hsiao-kang’s motivation. The boy doesn’t talk much, and he certainly doesn’t explain his actions. In “Rebels,” the sexual tension is as thick as the humidity; Hsiao-kang’s hostility toward Ah-tze may actually be sparked by jealousy of the petty thief’s new girlfriend, who spends all her roller-rink wages on sexy new outfits.
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The movie includes a direct homage to 1955’s “Rebel Without a Cause,” but in spirit it’s closer to the debuts of Jean-Luc Godard and Wong Kar-wai, who also blended crime drama with love story and city symphony. Like Godard’s “Breathless” and Wong’s “As Tears Go By,” “Rebels” cunningly synthesizes both B-movie and art film.
Viewers familiar with Tsai’s later work will recognize all his recurring motifs, presented here in a more naturalistic context. The real-world locations, however, are backdrops for a plot whose parallel developments flirt with farce. “Rebels of the Neon God” rarely cracks a smile, but it’s as droll as it is disaffected.
Jenkins is a freelance writer.
Unrated.At Landmark's E Street Cinema. Contains violence and sexual situations. In Mandarin and Southern Min dialect with subtitles. 106 minutes.
(3.5 stars)ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7uK3SoaCnn6Sku7G70q1lnKedZLSwtc2gpq6sl6q2pbGOpqavoZWofLOx1aKcsGWimq%2BmuNJmpp9lpJ2ybrrEqKVmn5%2BZeqO4xKebrGWSYrqwwsieZLChpJ16or7TZp2ipJ1kf3F9lGhncGdgbXykfJJvbnFqYmJ%2FcbCUZmhqnWVihXWwlGacm2tnmrJ5scCabWqXo6m8s8WNoaumpA%3D%3D