Ripped from the headlines / Conjured from the colonizers

Today: Brian Hioe, Taipei-based editor, translator, activist, DJ, and co-founder of New Bloom; and Jídé Salawu, writer and editor at Olongo Africa.

Issue No. 115

Taiwanese Movies Get Too Familiar
Brian Hioe

Google's Algorithm Is a Dark Continent
Jídé Salawu

Taiwanese Movies Get Too Familiar

by Brian Hioe

The art of filmmaking requires a mind-boggling aggregation of effort and resources. Me? To write something, I just sit in front of a computer. I don’t need to hire actors or staff, or make-up artists, or colleagues to do long and arduous rewrites; there’s no fancy lighting or expensive cameras or editing machines, or PR junkets to pay for or arrange. 

I’ve worked on films a few times, in various roles—as a consultant for accuracy, as a translator and writer of subtitles, and as an interpreter. But most often, my relation to the film industry has been as a critic of new films on the festival circuit. 

That’s a thankless job, sometimes. As fascinating as I find films and filmmaking in general, considering the immense resources that are squandered, year after year, on making and promoting an endless cascade of terrible movies is appalling. I can’t help thinking: “Could that money not have been better spent on social resources? Could the people who worked on that horrible film have spent their time better elsewhere?”