Hou Hsiao- Hsien, Cafe Lumiere

One of the few films i managed to catch at the cinefan this time.
What it begins, and ends, with, is Yoko's journey, her (many) journeys.
The trains are the pulse of the city. They run like clockwork, picking up commuters from one point, dropping them off at another. Round and round.
People on the train appear to traverse a closed circuit. But the tracks intersect. While commuters are transiting, they also meet other commuters, sometimes they get along. Life carries on.
Hajime-chan's self-portrait depicts a 'lonesome-eyed' baby in foetal posture, wearing a timepiece around its neck, surrounded by a circular nexus of overlapping trains. Yoko thinks Hajime wants to record train-sounds, station-sounds to capture the essence of trains. It seems more like an attempt to capture something deeper, like the sound of the mother's heartbeat that a baby hears unceasingly in the womb.
But babies have an uncertain future in this modern-day parable. In Yoko's dream, the baby is replaced by a wrinkled goblin. In Hajime's portrait, its surrounded by dark blood. While Yoko's dream appears to reflect the anxieties of motherhood ( somewhat like Mary Shelley's premonitions of her "monstrous progeny"), ultimately its significance seems to lie in its very incomprehensibility. Yoko's attempt to interpret the dream is parallel to a larger quest for meaning in her life, as in ours.
Then there's the theme of family.
Yoko is adopted, living away from her foster parents. She comes back to participate in the grave-cleansing ceremony with them.
There's the potential family in Yoko's Taiwanese boyfriend whose child she carries. But she doesnt intend to marry him, something her father is uncomfortable talking about .
Then there's Hajime-chan and Yoko's neighbour (the sake lady), who are like 'home away from home' for Y.
And finally the point from which we started, the family of the jazz pianist which Yoko tracks down. The pianist's wife shares her many happy memories of married life with Y.
The film didnt appeal to many i asked afterwards, who mostly found it slow. Which I thought was pretty unfortunate, since the pace of the movie was its beauty, true-to-life and very Ozu-like.