Cape No. 7
Cape No. 7 is a 2008 Taiwanese romance comedy film written and directed by Taiwanese director Te-sheng Wei(魏德聖). Its language is Chinese but also contains significant dialogue in Japanese and Taiwanese. Before its commercial release, the film was selected as one of the opening films in the 2008 Taipei Film Festival.
The two leading actors Van Fan(范逸臣) and Chie Tanaka(田中千絵) only had minor acting experience while most of the other actors were amateurs, picked mainly for their rock band experience as needed by the plot. Van Fan's remuneration for this film was only NT$ 0.2 million [1]. Although without a strong promotional campaign, this movie attracted unexpected popularity in Taiwan after its official release on August 22, 2008. On September 8, the distributor publicly announced that this movie has grossed NT$ 40 million, surpassing Jay Chou's Secret to become the most selling Taiwanese film in the Taiwan history[2].
Plot
Back in the 1940s during the Taiwan under Japanese rule era, a Japanese teacher(Kousuke Atari) dispatched to Hengchun fell in love with a local girl who was given the Japanese name Kojima Tomoko(小島友子,acted by Rachel Liang). However, after the Surrender of Japan he was forced to return back Japan, and could only write down his passion in 7 love letters on his returning ship.
More than 60 years later, Aga(Van Fan) is a struggling young Hengchun-native rock band singer who could not secure a job in Taipei and decided to return back hometown. After returning, Aga's step father(Ju-Lung Ma) who served as Town Council Representative arranged a postman job for him, substituting the senile Uncle Mao(Lin Tsung-ren) who was on break after motorcycle accident. One day Aga came across an undeliverable mail: the Japanese teacher has been dead and his offspring decided to mail these unsent love letters to Taiwan after discovering them. Aga unlawfully opened this mail to discover the secret but the old Japanese-style address Cape No.7, Hengchun County, Takao Prefecture could no longer be found.
Meantime a local resort hotel inside Kenting National Park is organizing a beach concert featuring Japanese pop singer Kousuke Atari, but Aga's step father made use of his official identity to insist that the accompanying band be formed by locals. Tomoko(Chie Tanaka), a Chinese-speaking Japanese fashion model dispatched to Hengchun, took up the difficult task of managing this band, led by Aga along with 6 other locals of rather particular backgrounds. After a frustrating trial period Aga and Tomoko unexpectedly began a relationship. With some assistance from hotel maid Ming-chu(Shino Lin), Tomoko helped Aga find Kojima Tomoko, the rightful recipient of the 7 love letters. Aga then returned to the beach resort and performed a highly successful concert with this local band and Kousuke Atari.
Production notes
This movie was mainly filmed between September and November 2007 in Hengchun Township and its neighboring Checheng and Manjhou Township, together located in the Hengchun Peninsula of Pingtung County, with few scenes filmed in Fangliao Township of Pingtung County, Kaohsiung International Airport, and Ximending in Taipei. Before filming, Chie Tanaka had been staying in Taiwan for one year to study Chinese so she did not have problem dealing with the Chinese lines in the film. Kousuke Atari appeared as himself and acted as the 1940s Japanese teacher in this film.
Although with nice grossing, its high budget still made the director Te-sheng Wei indebted NT$ 100 million before release[3]. Wei later said this film's nice reception should be able to help him solve his debts[4].
Awards
- 2008 Taipei Film Festival: Taipei Million Grand Award, Best Audience Award, Best Cinematography.
- 2008 Asian Marine Film Festival: Grand Prize[5]
