The Hole (1998)

This dystopian musical is a typically deadpan elaboration of Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-Liang's trademark obsessions. Set in a grim, dilapidated apartment complex in a rainy, not-too-distant future, The Hole pushes Tsai's absurdist cinema to its loopiest extreme. Starring Yang Kuei-Mei and Tsai regular Lee Kang Sheng as zombified neighbors, the movie imagines a dreary world where urban anomie and existential loneliness have seemingly ground life to a halt. Barely acknowledging the other's existence, the two drift purposelessly through their bleak landscape, taking in apathetic stride their apocalyptic limbo. The only respite comes in the form of song. Using a device commonly associated with British writer Dennis Potter (Pennies From Heaven, The Singing Detective), Tsai punctuates his minimalist action with lip-synched renditions of popular radio standards (the songs here are from Hong Kong musicals of the 1950s). Stupefied and glum one minute, his characters burst into delirious musical numbers the next, unexpectedly -- and joyfully -- interrupting the monotony of their listless lives. As in Potter's works, the pop interludes express subliminal desires, as well as underscore the characters' profound loneliness. Placed side by side with his rigorously inert mise-en-scéne, the wonderfully choreographed numbers almost create an effect of visual vertigo; they're that much more delirious because they spring from such a constricted source. A true oddity, The Hole is as pleasurable as millennial angst gets. ~ Elbert Ventura, All Movie Guide