Cape No. 7

Cape No. 7 (Hái-kak chhit-ho) plays exclusively tonight and Friday at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston's Brown Auditorium. Made in Taiwan, locally one of the highest grossing films ever in that country, Cape No. 7 weaves two story lines and utilizes four languages (Mandarin, Taiwanese, Japanese, English). The film plays with the convention of a group of people putting on a show to great effect. Slightly more mawkish is the bracketing tale of unrequited love set in a dreamlike past.
Being a social wallflower translates with cross cultural significance as a disparate group of people come together to play in a rock band. The musicians range from a pre-teen piano prodigy to the young adult lead actors to an octogenarian (who strums a Chinese lute called a gekkin). The band's goal is to represent their picturesque town at a concert featuring bigger stars from bigger towns.
A theme that might waft over the heads of American audience concerns romantic letters from a Taiwan national and a person from Japan. (Japan occupied Taiwan in the WWII era, here brilliantly lit for a backstory that opens and closes the movie.) Other elements like the band's rehearsals and the various character's personal lives are alive with a rich comic atmosphere.