Tsai Ming-liang

Abiding Nowhere (2024)

The walker with the shaved head and dressed in a red robe is barefoot. He walks slowly but determinedly through the forest, over stones and grassland. He also makes his way through the shadows of trees and houses. He sets foot in the train station, the chu ...

Xining Public Housing (2024)

The Xining Public Housing complex in Taipei, built in 1983, houses more than 1,000 residents. Tsai Ming-liang filmed his first television drama and his feature The Hole (1998) here. Tsai Ming-liang quietly observes the complex, set to be demolished soon, a ...

Yilan (2023)

According to Tsai, "I chose to film Yilan's Nanguan Market, the breakfast store next to the city god temple, the clay oven roll shop on Fuxing Road, and the mountains, water and paddy fields. To me, these are part of the architects' everyday life. What mak ...

Strolling Around (2023)

At that time, we sat on the first floor of the Social Welfare Hall, eating the Lao Wu charcoal grilled salty crispy cakes brought by Wenrui from Fuxing Road, Yilan, and looking at the sparse crowds of people on Tongqing Street, the trees swaying in the win ...

Where (2022)

The ninth opus of his Walker Films series, which was shot at Centre Pompidou. ...

Where Do You Stand, Tsai Ming-liang? (2022)

"For reasons of health, Lee Kang-sheng and I moved to the mountains. We don't have any neighbors. Our house is part of a row of dilapidated houses. I love these abandoned houses. I often walk around in them casually. I think they are beautiful. I said to L ...

Wandering (2021)

This short by Tsai Ming-liang, completed in 2021, was filmed at "the Dune" in Yilan, Taiwan, where the eight films in his Walker series were being shown. ...

The Moon and the Tree (2021)

Follows the lives of two big stars in Taiwan. Since a failed spine surgery 40 years ago, Lee Pei-jing, known as the "Moon singer", has been confined to a wheelchair. Actor Chang Feng is reaching one hundred years old. Tsai describes Chang as a tree, which ...

Days (2021)

Kang lives alone in a big house, Non in a small apartment in town. They meet, and then part, their days flowing on as before. ...

Light (2018)

"The very first Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival was held here at Zhongshan Hall. During my university days, I volunteered as a ticket seller in order to watch films for free. Many years later, I received the top award at the Taipei Film Festival in an aw ...

Your Face (2018)

Composed of a series of portrait shots of mostly anonymous individuals, filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang's digital experiment turns the human face into a subject of dramatic intrigue. ...

Sand (2018)

In 2018, Tsai Ming-Liang was invited by the Northeast and Yilan Coast National Scenic Area Administration to make this film, his eighth in the "Walker" series. In the constant passage of time, the Zen-like footsteps of the Walker has finally allowed us to ...

The Deserted (2018)

Tsai Ming-Liang, the artisan of cinematography approaches virtual reality, pushing the boundaries of VR film. The Deserted stripped away traditional film techniques and is presented in 360 degrees, like a theatre. The viewer is placed in the scene and is a ...

Single Belief (2016)

Ximending was once the trendiest area in Taipei, and it's also where Kang-sheng Lee's first film was shot. Twenty years ago, director Ming-liang Tsai asked Lee if he wanted to be in his film, and Lee's answer changed the course of his own life forever. Now ...

One & Zero (2016)

Tsai Ming-liang has been living in an abandoned house in the mountains since 2014. Around the same time, his persona, actor Lee Kang-sheng, wanted to quit acting due to severe spinal pains. Tsai decided to capture Lee Kang-sheng's face as well as the home, ...

Autumn Days (2016)

A documentary about Nogami Teruyo, who for nearly half a century stood by Akira Kurosawa as a screenwriting collaborator, a script supervisor, and a companion. ...

Xiao Kang (2015)

Viennale-Trailer 2015: Two-minute homage to Lee Kang-sheng, Xiao Kang. ...

Afternoon (2015)

Lush jungle and a building in ruins are the ideal stage for a film-confession that defies storytelling and goes beyond conversation on cinema. Tsai Ming-Liang and his actor Lee Kang-sheng confess and put on stage a pièce in which attention and slowness ar ...

No No Sleep (2015)

In 2015, Tsai Ming-Liang was once again invited by the Hong Kong International Film Festival to make the opening short film. This time, he selected Shibuya station in Tokyo as his main filming location and invited the famous Japanese actor Masanobu Ando to ...

Journey to the West (2014)

In 2014, Tsai Ming-Liang was invited to make a film for the MarseilleFID, Marseille International Film Festival. Since he was not familiar with Marseille, he decided to make a film as tourist, capturing the beautiful Mediterranean sunshine in the late summ ...

Le voyage en Occident (2014)

Stray Dogs (2014)

An alcoholic man and his two young children barely survive in Taipei. They cross paths with a lonely grocery clerk who might help them make a better life. ...

Letters from the South (2013)

Six filmmakers present six short films about the experiences of Chinese immigrants. Shot across Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Myanmar, the anthology depicts the crisis of identity that accompanies international migration. ...

Walking on Water (2013)

In 2013, Tsai Ming-Liang was invited by Malaysian filmmaker Tan Chui Mui to make a short film for an anthology film, "Letters from the South". Tsai Ming-Liang returned to his hometown in Kuching, Malaysia and made a "Walker" film at his childhood home, "Wa ...

Walker (2012)

In 2012, the Hong Kong International Film Festival invited Tsai Ming-Ling to make the opening short film. Having grown up with Hong Kong's popular culture, Tsai Ming-Liang decided to pay homage by making a "Walker" film, contrasting the Walker's slowness w ...

Diamond Sutra (2012)

In 2012, Taiwanese architects Michael Lin and Liao Wei-li invited Tsai Ming-Liang to create moving visuals for their exhibit at the Venise Architecture Biennale. Using the space at their preview exhibition in Taiwan, Tsai Ming-Liang made two short films, " ...

Sleepwalk (2012)

A continuation of Tsai Ming-Liang's Walker series, featuring Lee Kang-Sheng as a barefoot monk who walks very slowly. ...

No Form (2012)

In 2011, Tsai Ming-Liang staged a play, "Only You", for Taiwan's National Theater and Concert Hall. In it, there was a powerfully moving scene where monk Xuanzang walked at an extremely slow pace for half an hour. Lamenting the transient nature of theater, ...

Beautiful 2012 (2012)

A collection of shorts by four East Asian directors: Ann Hui on a male-to-female sex change, Kim Tae-yong on an emotional imposture, Gu Changwei on pregnancy in China and Tsai Ming-Liang on time and the city of Hong Kong. ...

Transformation (2012)

In order to recreate a photograph, two actors undergo a transformation. ...

The Hole (2011)

Experimental short film directed by Tsai-Ming Liang for fashion designer Johan Ku's 2011-2012 collection, where a woman wanders through the underground corridors and underworld of Taipei. ...

Visage (2009)

Hsiao-Kang, a Taiwanese film director, travels to the Louvre in Paris, France, to shoot a film that explores the Salomé myth. ...

Madame Butterfly (2009)

Free interpretation of the myth. Tsai Ming-liang propels a woman neglected by her lover in the mob of the bus station of Kuala Lumpur. ...

Sleeping on Dark Waters (2008)

A behind-the-scenes documentary on the making of Ming-liang Tsai's I Don't Want to Sleep Alone. ...

To Each His Own Cinema (2007)

Commissioned to mark the 60th anniversary of the Cannes Film Festival, "To Each His Own Cinema" brought together 33 of the world's pre-eminent filmmakers to produce short pieces exploring the multifarious facets of cinema and their perspective on the state ...

Help Me, Eros (2007)

Having lost all his money in the stock market, a depressed man falls in love with a woman over a suicide helpline. ...

I Don't Want to Sleep Alone (2006)

Rawang, an immigrant from Bangladesh living in awful conditions, takes pity on a Chinese man, Hsiao-kang, who is beaten up and left in the street. Rawang lovingly nurses him on a mattress he found. When he is almost healed, Hsiao-kang meets the waitress Ch ...

The Wayward Cloud (2005)

Hsiao-Kang, now working as an adult movie actor, meets Shiang-chyi once again. Meanwhile, the city of Taipei faces a water shortage that makes the sales of watermelons skyrocket. ...

Welcome to São Paulo (2004)

All the feature is given prestige to by the narration in Caetano Veloso's voice, that also signs one of the segments of the project. São Paulo is the largest city of the Southern Hemisphere, with an incessant dynamics of cultural mixtures, with immigrants ...

Aquarium (2004)

Segment of the feature Welcome to São Paulo (2004), produced by São Paulo International Film Festival. ...

My Stinking Kid (2004)

Drama about a young boy who suffers from a rare deficiency disease. The medicine he has to take every day has the side effect of making him reek of ammonia. The consequent bullying and ostracism by schoolmates exacerbates the boy's sense of victimhood. His ...

Goodbye, Dragon Inn (2003)

On a dark, wet night in Taipei City, a cavernous old picture palace is about to close its doors forever. A meager audience, the remaining few staff, and perhaps even a ghost or two, watch King Hu's wuxia classic "Dragon Inn", each haunted by memories and d ...

Moonlight in the River (2003)

Tsai Ming-liang designed this short film as a farewell to his friend Simon Field, who was about to leave his position as director of the Rotterdam Festival after eight years in office. The piece follows two dogs roaming the Tamshui River in Taipei, accompa ...

The Skywalk Is Gone (2002)

A young woman wandering around meets a young man going to a casting call for a pornographic film. ...

What Time Is It There? (2001)

A street vendor with a grim home-life forges a connection with a young woman on her way to Paris. ...

A Conversation with God (2001)

The original subject intended for this film was a spiritual medium who was unbelievably accurate. Tsai Ming-liang jumped on his 50cc motorbike, equipped with a DV camera ready to shoot her, to see whether the god would speak to his camera. But on the way, ...

The Moon Is Gone (2001)

Tsai Ming-liang directed in 2001 this episode of the popular Taiwanese TV children show Fruit Pie (《水果冰淇淋》), although it rarely appears on Tsai's filmographies and the director himself is not particularly proud of it - it was a command by the ...

The Hole (1999)

In the final days of the year 1999, almost everyone in Taiwan has died from a strange plague that ravished the island. As rain pours down relentlessly, a single man is stuck with an unfinished plumbing job and a hole in his floor. This results in a very od ...

The River (1997)

A young man develops severe neck pain after swimming in a polluted river for a movie shoot, but nobody can provide him any relief. ...

Vive L'Amour (1995)

Three lonely young denizens of Taipei unknowingly share an apartment: May, a real estate agent who uses it for her sexual affairs; Ah-jung, her current lover; and Hsiao-kang, who's stolen the key and uses the apartment as a retreat. ...

My New Friends (1995)

Tsai interrupted his pre-production for The River to make this pioneering documentary for Taiwan's nascent AIDS-awareness campaign. Ignoring instructions to 'play down the gay angle', he centres the film on his own very candid conversations with two HIV+ y ...

Rebels of the Neon God (1994)

In Taipei, four youths face alienation, loneliness, and moments of existential crisis amidst a series of minor crimes. ...

Boys (1991)

A junior-high student bullies and blackmails a younger boy, then receives the same treatment at the hands of some older students. ...

Give Me a Home (1991)

This sociological drama focuses on a construction worker's family who cannot afford a house of their own, even though the head of the family builds houses. ...

Li-hsiang’s Love Line (1990)

A quiet story that follows the development of a love affair between an unmarried factory worker and the widowed factory manager. ...

All the Corners of the World (1989)

Mr and Mrs Chang live in Taipei's Hsi-Men-Ding (the city's entertainment/red light/nightlife district) with their teenaged kids. The parents work as cleaners in a "love hotel" and send the kids out to work as ticket scalpers, block-buying seats for hit mov ...

The Game They Call Sex (1987)

The whole story revolves around a woman from marriage, marriage to divorce encounter sexual problems as the main axis, reflecting the Taiwan society in this regard subjective and objective taboos. The first paragraph of the description of the actress Xiao ...

Spring Daddy (1985)

Zang Guang-xing is a veteran soldier from Mainland China who married a young Taiwanese woman. He has been working as a supervisor in a construction company for seven years. Everyday he rides the same motorbike to work. He suffers enough misery from riding ...

Run Away (1984)

Kidnapped by a group of bandits and raped by their chief, Dan Zhu slowly develops feelings for the perpetrator. Echoing the social realism of Taiwanese new wave filmmaking, director Wang Tung revisits the wuxia genre, with the emphasis on psychology rather ...

Teenage Fugitive (1984)

Three siblings idle their time while their parents are away. Youngest son, Hsiao-hung, finds a young fugitive taking refuge in their empty home, and hides him. Later, his mother finds the murderer sleeping in a cupboard – and a night of horror takes hold ...

Jean-Pierre Léaud: The Child of Cinema (2024)

A portrait of the legendary actor Jean-Pierre Léaud, icon of the French New Wave and closely linked to the work of François Truffaut and Jean-Luc Goddard. ...

Making-of du tournage de Tsai Ming-Liang au Centre Pompidou (2022)

Where Do You Stand, Tsai Ming-liang? (2022)

"For reasons of health, Lee Kang-sheng and I moved to the mountains. We don't have any neighbors. Our house is part of a row of dilapidated houses. I love these abandoned houses. I often walk around in them casually. I think they are beautiful. I said to L ...

The Pursuit of a Cinematic Dream - Tsai Ming-Liang (2022)

A leading figure of the "Second New Wave" of Taiwanese cinema, award-winning Director Tsai Ming-Liang has left his mark on the art world with his minimalist dialogues, contemplative fixed shots, and unmistakable depictions of urban settings. But what's lef ...

Wandering (2021)

This short by Tsai Ming-liang, completed in 2021, was filmed at "the Dune" in Yilan, Taiwan, where the eight films in his Walker series were being shown. ...

Missing Pictures (2021)

For every film completed, dozens of potential films fall by the wayside and never make it onto the big screen. In the VR experience Missing Pictures, Abel Ferrara, Tsai Ming-liang, Catherine Hardwicke, Naomi Kawase, and Lee Myung-Se give us a guided tour o ...

Your Face (2018)

Composed of a series of portrait shots of mostly anonymous individuals, filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang's digital experiment turns the human face into a subject of dramatic intrigue. ...

Wiara (2018)

Six authorities of cinema describe their approach to transcendence, mysticism, spirituality and life after dead. ...

Afternoon (2015)

Lush jungle and a building in ruins are the ideal stage for a film-confession that defies storytelling and goes beyond conversation on cinema. Tsai Ming-Liang and his actor Lee Kang-sheng confess and put on stage a pièce in which attention and slowness ar ...

French Cinema Mon Amour (2015)

French Cinema Mon Amour is an ensemble film in which each contributor brings their own voice, their own particular approach, their culture, and their language to produce a portrait of French cinema. ...

Flowers of Taipei: Taiwan New Cinema (2014)

With Taiwan remaining in the grip of martial law in 1982, a group of filmmakers from that country set out to establish a cultural identity through cinema and to share it with the world. This engaging documentary looks at the movement's legacy. ...

Past Present (2013)

A contemplative trip down memory lane with one of the leading voices of the Second New Wave of Taiwanese Cinema. Saw Tiong Guan clearly established a very personal bond with his subject, and also found many of Tsai Ming-liang's colleagues prepared to compl ...

Taipei 24H (2009)

Taipei 24H divides 24 hours in Taipei into 8 shorts. It opens with Cheng Fen-fen's upbeat and comedic "Share the Morning", and ends with Lee Kang-sheng running the final leg of this relay with "Remembrance" at 4am. Well-known director Tsai Ming-liang makes ...

Visage (2009)

Hsiao-Kang, a Taiwanese film director, travels to the Louvre in Paris, France, to shoot a film that explores the Salomé myth. ...

Flowers in the Mirror, Moon in the Water (2009)

The title of the François Lunel film is the Buddhist proverb concluding by: "all is but illusion". His movie draws the Tsai Ming-Liang's face during the shooting of his movie Visage, which itself is also a movie within a movie. ...

Sleeping on Dark Waters (2008)

A behind-the-scenes documentary on the making of Ming-liang Tsai's I Don't Want to Sleep Alone. ...

Moonlight in the River (2003)

Tsai Ming-liang designed this short film as a farewell to his friend Simon Field, who was about to leave his position as director of the Rotterdam Festival after eight years in office. The piece follows two dogs roaming the Tamshui River in Taipei, accompa ...

Our Time, Our Story (2002)

Richly illustrated with film clips and interviews, OUR TIME, OUR STORY tells the still-evolving story of the Taiwanese "new wave," from its rise in the early 1980s, as the island was democratizing after decades under martial law, through growing internatio ...

Looking for Tsai (2002)

Human shortcomings in the pursuit of an idol. Two film school students travel to interview Taiwanese film director Tsai Ming-liang and actor Lee Kang-sheng in Oslo. ...

Léaud l'unique (2001)

Documentary about the work of Nouvelle Vague actor Jean-Pierre Léaud, with interview clips, film clips and contributions from directors and actors he has worked with. ...

Yang ± Yin: Gender in Chinese Cinema (1998)

An exploration of Chinese cinema and its relationships with gender and sexuality, which the film argues has been more frankly and provocatively explored than in any other national cinema. Utilizing both film excerpts and interviews with many leading direct ...

My New Friends (1995)

Tsai interrupted his pre-production for The River to make this pioneering documentary for Taiwan's nascent AIDS-awareness campaign. Ignoring instructions to 'play down the gay angle', he centres the film on his own very candid conversations with two HIV+ y ...