About

‘Light captures changes in the natural light streaming through Taipei’s Zhongshan Hall. In addition to being the setting for Tsai’s feature-length film Your Face, Zhongshan Hall has national significance as it is the site where Japanese forces in Taiwan formally surrendered at the end of the Second World War, ending 51 years of Japanese occupation in Taiwan. The hall also bears personal significance for Tsai, as a site where he had worked as a student, won a filmmaking award, ran a cafe and held screenings of classic films.’ Tate Modern

‘Taiwanese auteur Tsai Ming-liang swaps the virtual-reality splendour of The Deserted…for a contemplative work of close-up portraiture, as paired with a brooding score by Ryuichi Sakamoto. One of slow cinema’s greatest talents, Tsai…crafts what just might be his most reflective, meticulous, stripped-back film yet: a compilation of 13 expressive faces all training their gazes at the camera. Across a series of unbroken shots, Your Face roves over a revealing gallery of people, including ordinary Taipei residents and his regular collaborator Lee Kang-sheng. Combined with Sakamoto’s score – the acclaimed director’s first use of music in more than two decades – the film peers intimately at twinkling eyes, crinkled noses and awkward smiles to examine the world of stories, thoughts and feelings contained in each and every face.’ Melbourne International Film Festival