Opening on May 9th at the IFC Center in New York,
Ming-Liang Tsais I Dont Want To Sleep Alone
is a study of the lower depths of Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia. Focused on the migrant workers, it
shows how globalization has created a kind of
subproletariat of the sort discussed by Mike
Davis in his recently published Planet of
Slums. But the film is far less interested in
social or political analysis than it is in
psychological and spiritual dislocations of the
sort that being uprooted from ones homeland
induces. Poor workers are desperate to make any
kind of connection, even if it only amounts to
sharing a bed with someone of either sex.
Beyond its subject matter, the film is
interesting for its minimalist techniques that
admittedly wont be to everybodys taste. To
start with, there is practically no dialoguea
function of the inability of the main characters
to speak each others language. It also uses
fixed camera shots often lasting 5 minutes or so
that pan in on mundane aspects of everyday life,
such as washing dirty sheets or even of people
sleeping. Clearly, it would seem that director
Tsai has seen some Andy Warhol somewhere along the line.
full: http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2007/05/01/i-dont-want-to-sleep-alone/
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