PARKING (TING CHE)
Taiwan, 2008, 110 minutes, Colour.
Chen Chang, Lunmei Kwai.
Directed by Mong Hung Chunc.
Have you ever had the frustrating experience of being hemmed in by someone who has double parked and is now nowhere to be found? This is the premise of this humane drama (which also has touches of Chinese criminality and some violence).
The central character has gone from work to buy his wife, a model, some cakes for dinner after their difficult previous day when they received information from their doctor about their infertility and their only option of in vitro fertilization.
When he experiences his parking situation, our hero makes enquiries of a friendly one-armed barber who directs him to the third floor of the building where he is greeted by an old man as his long lost son and the father of the little girl they care for. This becomes an important theme of the film, especially after we learn about the difficulties in having a child.
But that is not all. We have some flashbacks of a young woman suddenly receiving severance money from a Chinese factory and her journey to Taipei where she is trapped in prostitution. This will be important also, especially as the man is hemmed in again by double parking. It is Mother’s Day and the tow trucks are all out and unavailable. When in frustration he bangs on what he thinks is the empty double-parked car, he ends up witnessing a beating and being hit himself, only to be saved by the barber, a former gangster. And so on…
Further adventures include his inadvertently sitting on his cakes and having to clean his trousers, going to buy more cakes, a fish head soaking in the basin in the toilet, having a meal with the family upstairs, being bashed by the prostitute’s pimp and dumped and …
A wryly humorous long night’s journey into day.
1.A Taiwan story, the Chinese perspective? The different worlds?
2.The city of Taipei, the streets, highways, the cars, the buildings, the barber shop, his bathroom, the apartments? The musical score?
3.The contrast with the factory, the world of prostitution? The structure: May 2007, the celebration of Mother’s Day? The returning to the girl’s severance in the factory, interspersing her work as a prostitute? Going back to the previous day and the husband and wife and their wanting a child? The effect of this on the culmination?
4.The man’s story: Sunday and his work, his being delayed? Ringing his wife, going to buy the cakes, the difficulty with the shopkeeper and his talk about chocolate and energy, parking, leaving the car, the double-parking? Asking the barber for advice? Going to the third floor, meeting Nina, the parents, their saying he was Little Ma? The story of Little Ma’s crime and the reasons, his pregnant wife, her death in the hospital, his abduction, execution? The man returning, giving the cake to Nina, sharing the meal? Reading Little Ma’s letter to his blind mother, changing the details? The promise to return? Phoning the tow-truck company? Sitting on the cake? Going to the bathroom, the fish head in the basin, falling in the toilet, his cleaning it? His talking to the barber, the barber and the customer? The playing of the game – and his genial losing? His exasperation at the double-parking, hitting the car, the gangsters coming out and attacking him? The man bashed and covered in white paint? The barber saving him? Going back inside, the invitation to the meal – and the fish-head soup? His return to the street, the double-parking, his being bashed, taken in the car, his being dumped? His continued calls, the taxi, going back to buy another cake, the woman giving him the cakes – and the barber and the friend taking them as gifts and eating them? Going up to see Nina, talking with the parents, the grandmother knowing the truth, entrusting Nina to him? His going back with the tailor and bashing the prostitute’s pimp? The tailor driving him, going home with Nina – and presenting her to his wife?
5.His wife, in the light of her work, the model, four years trying for a child, the in vitro explanations, the negative reaction, the clash, the apology?
6.The girl, at work in the factory, the severance pay, supporting her mother, going to Taipei, the promises, the work and the rough clients, the boss, the bashing and the dumping, her running away?
7.The contrast of the two worlds? The humanity of the film overall – with some touches of brutality?
