"
we are grateful that we have the songs of grace chan to comfort us .
" starring lee kang - sheng , yang kuei - mei directed by tsai ming - liang written by tsai and yang ping - ying cinematography by liao peng - jung taiwan , 24/12/99 .
the millenium approaches .
an incessant downpour batters an unnamed city .
sectors of the city are being sealed , quarantined due to the onset of a mysterious virus .
the virus causes people to act like insects : they crawl about on all fours , hide from bright lights , huddle in damp corners .
the water supply to the quarantined zones will be cut off in a week 's time .
residents are advised to evacuate the area , asap .
this premise -- kafka by way of cronenberg -- is the background for the hole , which could have been a great movie , but , sadly , ends up as a waste of good ideas .
the quick sketch above suggests a dark , absurd , hallucinatory near - future parable of life in the late 20th century ; in execution , however , it is nothing like that .
the virus , the evacuation , the visual possiblities of the deluge : these are all relegated to the background .
instead , the hole focuses on the lives -- for want of a better word -- of a man ( lee kang - sheng ) and a woman ( yang kuei - mei ) who live in the same apartment building , and who have no personalities .
the entire movie taks place in settings that are uniformly ugly and sterile : the charmless rooms and corridors of a post - industrial apartment complex , photographed to look as dim and dingy as possible .
it 's a vivid setting , but an unappealing
one , especially with the monotonous hiss of falling rain and the gurgle of drainage pipes in the background .
the man lives in the apartment directly above the woman 's .
one day , a repairman investigating a leak leaves a small hole in the floor of the man 's living room , opening into the ceiling of the woman 's living room .
this hole -- symbol of the solitary opening in the character 's lonely , compartmented lives -- allows them to interact in unusual ( and mostly non - verbal ) ways .
example : the man , suffering from the onset of the virus (
or so i assume -- everything is obscure in this movie ) vomits through the hole .
the woman , wandering around in the dark , accidentally puts her hand on his vomit , and then cleans it up .
this is what passes for meaningful communication .
and they say romance is dead .
much of the film does not even focus on their interactions , such as they are .
there is almost no dialogue and we learn next to nothing about these people .
they are ciphers .
instead , we are treated to long takes in which we witness their miserable lives ; we watch , for instance , as the woman boils some water , pours it onto some noodles , then eats the noodles .
( this is as fascinating as it sounds . )
offered as counterpoint -- or perhaps relief -- to these dreary sequences are a series of musical numbers , fantasies in which the woman lip - synchs to pop songs by grace chan ( popular , so
i 'm told , in 1950s ' china ) .
she prances around in grimy hallways and grungy stairwells , incronguously lit by cheerfully bright spotlights .
sometimes , in these fantasies , she is joined by the man .
these scenes are presumably intended to be bright and fanciful , sharply contrasting the dreariness of reality , but they fail .
when the man and the woman dance , it seems half - hearted and listless .
astaire and rogers
this is not .
even in imagination , these people are numb , weary , boring .
the hole is part of the ' collection 2000 ' series , a group of films commissioned by french tv station la sept arte on the subject of the millenium .
others include canada 's last night , brazil 's midnight , and american hal hartley 's the book of life .
the book of life is the only other one that i have seen , and it is infinitely superior to the taiwanese entry .
witty , energetic , humane , it makes the the hole seem ( ahem ) empty .
american movies with nothing to say try to disguise their lack of content with flashy movements , quick cuts , superficial emotions .
foreign movies with nothing to say do what the hole does : they point the camera at something of minimal interest for unbelievably long periods of time , and call it art .
the hole is self - evidently a film about alienation , and perhaps director tsai ming - liang wants the audience to share in his characters ' alienation .
if so , he succeeds .
perhaps it is a challenge : he dares us to enjoy this movie , despite his best attempts to ensure that we do n't .
if it was a challenge , i was n't up for it .
numb , weary , boring they fail there is almost no dialogue and we learn next to nothing about these people unappealing ends up as a waste of good ideas point the camera at something of minimal interest for unbelievably long periods of time