Reviews: Let’s Talk About Chu 愛愛內含光

National identity and popular culture classrooms

Reviews. Let’s Talk About Chu 愛愛內含光 – National identity and popular culture classrooms. Netflix. A refreshing thing about Taiwan versus America is how difficult it is to get Taiwanese to mass panic about sexual or moral-ethical issues. It's not that they are necessarily "progressive" or enlightened, but that in Taiwan you are more likely to get a shrug. As I watched this problematic show, I imagined what the tiresome “what about the children” reactions might have been on the east side of the Pacific. There are many things about Taiwan’s peculiar colonial history – colonized by the Chinese invaders since 1945 – and the impact on its educational-cultural means of production, that I am highly suspicious of. The politics of languages. How come the east side of Taipei gazillioaires never speak Taiwanese in these tee vee shows? For a show premised on the idea that its frankness about sex and sexuality is supposed to shock-provoke, that’s actually the most boring part of the show – but then I generally find film and tee-vee portrayal of sex either boring and/or unintentionally funny. So maybe that’s me and not them. Most of the sub-threads of this eight-episode show are contrived – the professor and his ex-student; the gay couple with the problematic portrayal of a descendant of a 1949er becoming a street hoodlum speaking not very good Taiwanese (my experience is that kids and grandkids of 1949ers who grew up in rural Taiwan speak more fluent Taiwanese than me and my cousins in Taipei ….) and so on. What made the show work for me are the superb lead actress Chan Tzu Hsuan (xoxo) and lead actor Kai Ko (oxox). Beyond their ability to keep my attention, ironically this relationship is the opposite of the shock-and-awe sex premise of the show. It’s a predictable, conventional love story. It’s about companionship, about genuine concern for one another, an ordinary, boring kind of love. And that’s OK by me. Love and relationships are predictable and boring because life is boring too. Like many recent Taiwan for Netflix shows this is a beautifully shot product – with a conventional but well-done soundtrack. Although in this mass media age, one inevitably notices copy-catting – lead actor with a motorcycle. Taiwanese directors now seem to love a particular bridge scene with the motorcycles at dusk. Rooftops, Taiwanese directors in the 2020s love rooftops for some reason. Maybe because at street level Taipei is such a mess. As contrived and silly as the show overall is, there were several moments during the eight episodes when lead actress Chan Tzu Hsuan’s facial expressions – when she thought she saw her father and his mistress in particular – that are super-duper. Minimal, heartbreaking, less is more. In all though, a broader issue not only for Taiwanese but for global artists to ponder. This is not the first time when a Taiwanese show launched bravely and then ended up with the socially acceptable happy endings – and maybe some of this is a human trait, but one wonders what part market pressure plays a role? These shows can be art, but they are primarily products – conventional capitalist markets are conventional – making unconventional products unprofitable. 18.2.2024

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