James Ball

I had high hopes for A Sun and was excited to watch this award winning Taiwanese film. However, I was left disappointed by a movie filled with big plot points, but which rarely explores any of them in the depth that you desire. Whilst the film is billed as being a gritty look into a family struggle with the repercussions of a wayward son, it often dips into strange moments of comedy. At one point, a man blackmails another by hijacking a toilet waste removal van and sprays faeces all over his place of work. This is underscored appropriated with a lighthearted score. These moments jar rather than offers light relief and adds to the list of big narrative ideas that don’t quite go anywhere. Without giving away any major spoilers, A Sun is filled with big moments - lives lost, babies born, incarceration, blackmail, gang violence, family politics, suicide - all without exploring them much at all. There are also moments that are totally underplayed and therefore offer nothing despite potentially being of interest. For example, a woman decides to open her own salon business and use the families insurance money to fund it. There is no dispute and then we never see or hear the salon mentioned again. A character befriends one of the family’s sons, but she never appears in the second half of the film and her character never develops. The father decides to stay away from home for several weeks, but is reintegrated seamlessly without any fanfare at all. You are constantly left unsatisfied despite some excellent performances from a talented cast. What’s more, I watched the vast majority of the film at speed 1.25 in order to whizz through the content having found the first hour tirelessly slow. The dialogue is sparse and the film moves very slowly despite some major events happening to the protagonists. I wouldn’t recommend.