Week5-丹麥女孩

Altering the history and gender of ‘The Danish Girl’

BY KAORI SHOJI SPECIAL TO THE JAPAN TIMES MAR 23, 2016

Are you into Scandinavian design? If you are, “The Danish Girl” will have you swooning. Even the first 10 seconds of the opening scene will provoke design envy and, for those who care about the details, Copenhagen apartment envy, circa 1926. Director Tom Hooper is clearly enthralled by Danish art and artists, and the camera lingers long and lovingly over the blue-gray shades of the Danish sky, the incredible white nights of its summers and the elusive beauty of the light that inspired so many artists. “The Danish Girl” is a fictional biopic of Lili Elbe, but Hooper’s attention often wanders from that subject, as he focuses on curating the breathtaking beauty and elegance suspended in the frame.

While Hooper’s appreciation of Danish light and art provides an intensely satisfying experience, sadly the same cannot be said for what actually takes place in the film. Based on a novel of the same name by David Ebershoff and adapted for the screen by Lucinda Coxon, “The Danish Girl” examines the bond between a wife and her husband, a man who needs to break out of his shell and is almost entirely dependent on her to do so. Hooper also directed “The King’s Speech,” the multiple Oscar winner that was also about marriage, and the bond that triggered a husband to become a greater man than he was before. But while Hooper was entirely focused on the pair in that film, the director seems to lack conviction in “The Danish Girl.” The result is a somewhat pedestrian and heavily sanitized take on an incredibly interesting, unconventional relationship.

In Copenhagen in the 1920s, married couple Gerda and Einar Wegener (Alicia Vikander and Eddie Redmayne) live happily as painters. Gerda makes striking portraits, while Einar’s specialty is landscapes inspired by childhood memories. When their best friend Ulla (Amber Heard) is late for a sitting for one of Gerda’s paintings, Gerda asks Einar to drape a ballerina’s dress over his body so she can finish up certain details. Einar obliges, and then discovers that he loves the feel of silk and chiffon against his skin.

Gerda is amused by his delight and encourages the introverted Einar to go to a party dressed up as “Lili Elbe,” whom Gerda introduces to the guests as Einar’s cousin from the country. Lili is an immediate hit, and gains an admirer in Henrik (Ben Whishaw), who declares her beautiful. Einar realizes that he had been living a lie, and confesses to Gerda he doesn’t feel like a man anymore.

Redmayne has the femininity thing down: the way Lili shyly averts her gaze when a man looks at her, the scarlet lipstick that offsets the curl of her lips, how she runs her fingers on her dresses and turns the action into a statement of sensuality. Redmayne’s skill serves as both the movie’s conceit and foil: Lili Elbe strives to be a woman, but she ends up being a flimsy caricature. Einar even stops painting, since that had been the work he had been doing as a man.

The real Lili Elbe was a pioneering transgender woman in a time when such people were viewed as perverted sociopaths, and in the film Gerda takes great effort to find a sympathetic doctor who will perform a sex change operation for Einar. In an online interview, Hooper commented that people were much more “giving” with their love in the 1920s and apparently that’s his explanation for why Gerda does what she does.

But really — is that it? The story somehow circumvents the pain and emotional conflict that must arise from this situation. You can see hints of it in Gerda’s face and eyes, though, and Vikander’s performance homes in on the core of Gerda’s devotion to Einar, and the struggle to maintain her equilibrium and own personal identity. She rightfully won an Oscar for best actress in a supporting role. Is it just me or is there a slight ring of irony in there somewhere?

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/2016/03/23/films/film-reviews/altering-history-gender-danish-girl/

Structure of the lead:

Who-The Danish Girl

When- MAR 23, 2016

What-A movie about transgender

Why-To have sympathetic to transgender

How-Serious

Keywords:

1. Scandinavian-北歐語的

2. swoon-暈倒；失去知覺；動感情

3. elusive-難以理解的；逃避的

4. biopic-傳記片

5. curate-管理；當…的館長

6. oblige-幫忙

7. chiffon-雪紡；薄綢

8. introvert-使內向

9. offset-抵銷；襯托出

10. equilibrium-均衡；平靜

Week 4-台南地震

Soil liquefaction database online March 13

By Yuan-Ming Chiao ,The China Post March 9, 2016, 12:00 am TWN

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- A national database indicating areas of potential soil liquefaction is expected to come online as early as March 13, according to preliminary reports originating from the Ministry of Economic Affairs on Tuesday.

When it comes online next week, users will be able to logon to the site, input their residential address and receive information regarding the risk of soil liquefaction in degrees of severity (from green, yellow to red zones). The issue of soil liquefaction took center stage after the magnitude 6.4 earthquake in Southern Taiwan on Feb. 6, damaging hundreds of buildings in Tainan, many of which collapsed or leaned to one side.

Officials of the ministry's Central Geological Survey (CGA, 中央地質調查所) indicated that national telecommunications carrier Chunghwa Telecom would be responsible for ensuring that the system would be able to withstand expectedly high online traffic. Visually, the online maps will be similar to Google Maps and allow users to see liquefaction zones in relation to existing roads and buildings.

Initially, eight municipalities and counties will be searchable, including: Taipei City, New Taipei, Yilan County, Hsinchu City and County, Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and Pingtung County. Online data for Taichung City, Changhua County, Yunlin County, and Chiayi City and County is expected to be available by the end of the year. Residents in Keelung, Hualien and Taitung may have to wait another two to three years.

12-Story Buildings Erected Between 1982-97 Vulnerable

Meanwhile, members of the R.O.C. National Architects' Association (NAA, 中華民國全國建築師公會) expressed the need for stricter implementation of existing building codes, especially for buildings located in quake sensitive areas. Speaking at a conference reflecting on the February quake, Deputy Director of the NAA Cheng Yi-ping (鄭宜平) stated that structural reinforcement needed to target buildings erected between the years of 1982 and 1997. Government regulations after this period included more stringent rules on construction materials and construction on geographically sensitive areas, Cheng said.

Officials of the NAA expressed willingness to work with the government to bolster existing laws to instrumentalize structural improvements.

Many of the buildings that collapsed in the massive 7.6 magnitude quake of Sept. 21, 1999 were built before the regulations took effect, with buildings 12 stories and over with only one underground level being especially vulnerable.

While more stringent building codes have been in place for close to 20 years now, it was imperative that they are implemented in the practices of contractors, architects and inspectors, he added.

Professor Lee An-hung of National Taiwan University of Science and Technology stated that soil liquefaction maps of adequate scale (1:5000) needed to be publicized in order to accurately pinpoint whether construction of disaster relief and evacuation centers were located on unstable ground.

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/national/national-news/2016/03/09/460247/Soil-liquefaction.htm

Structure of the lead:

Who- TAIPEI, Taiwan

When- March 9, 2016

What- Input their residential address and receive information regarding the risk of soil liquefaction in degrees of severity (from green, yellow to red zones)

Why- soil liquefaction

How-not given

Keywords:

1. liquefaction-液化

2. preliminary-初步的

3. severity-嚴重

4. telecommunication-電信

5. erect-建造

6. stringent-嚴格的；緊迫的

7. bolster-支撐

8. imperative-緊要的

Week3-牛津字典2015代表字

Emoji Maker Finds Muse in a Kim: Jong-un, Not Kardashian West

By HANNAH OLIVENNESFEB. 12, 2016

LONDON — Kim Kardashian West faces a new challenger from the east in the battle for online emotive supremacy: “#Kimunji — The Real Kimoji,” a set of emojis that represent the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

An app of emojis based on Ms. Kardashian West, released in December and called Kimoji, allows users to send hearts, kisses and doughnuts, but also Ms. Kardashian West with blond hair, crying, in a bra, and even her famous derrière.

The app proved to be highly popular and is in second place in the United States paid app chart on iTunes.

“The content is pretty crass — I don’t even want to mention some of the images that are on there,” said the American designer of the Kimunji set, Ben Gillin, 32, referring to Kimoji. “Lots of kids look up to the Kardashians. As far as I gather, most of the people using these are under the age of 20.”

The Kimunji set uses imagery based on the North Korean ruler, who most recently antagonized the United States and its allies with a rocket launch on Sunday, a development that was followed by reports that another senior official had been executed.

The set, released on Monday, allows people to send one another pictures of Mr. Kim smiling, crying and walking, as well as rockets, North Korean flags, and a nuclear mushroom cloud.

There is also an emoji of Dennis Rodman, the eccentric former N.B.A. star who visited North Korea in 2013 and 2014. Mr. Rodman described himself as Mr. Kim’s “friend” and he sang “Happy Birthday” to the authoritarian leader before an exhibition basketball game in Pyongyang. But he later said, “If you don’t want me to go back there ever again, I won’t go back.”

Mr. Gillin’s creation received in three days nearly as many votes as the Kimoji app on the website Product Hunt, an online community that allows designers to post their products and get feedback from other developers.

“The reaction has been great, over all,” Mr. Gillin said. “There are people who are angry, who think it’s honoring Kim Jong-un, which is in no way the intent.”

While the Kimunji icons mock Ms. Kardashian West’s emojis, Mr. Gillin conceived them with the more serious goal of drawing attention to the influence that comes with the Kardashians’ omnipresence in pop culture.

“She has 60 million followers on Instagram” said Mr. Gillin, who noted that the figure dwarfs the population of North Korea. “The point of my product was to show how silly the Kim Kardashian emojis are, like holding up a mirror at the other Kimojis.”

This is not the first time that Kim Jong-un has inspired pop culture: There is a Tumblr page dedicated to photographs of him “looking at things.” He has become an Internet meme, and he was the basis for the movie “The Interview,” a comedy about a fictional C.I.A. plot to assassinate him.

The North Korean leader apparently didn’t approve and declared “war” on the film (maybe next time he can send rocket emojis).

With the small icons increasingly being used to communicate, the emoji menu is ever expanding.

The Unicode Consortium, the agency that regulates emojis, announced on Thursday that it was thinking of developing a new set of icons, for dumplings, chopsticks and fortune cookies. An online campaign has raised $12,478 to push the dumpling emoji.

In April, the consortium released racially diverse emojis, giving users the option to choose from five different skin tones, and updated its international flags database to 257 flags.

Emojis started appearing on cellphones in Japan in the mid-1990s and were integrated into Apple’s operating system in 2011.

The Oxford Dictionary named the crying-out-laughing emoji its word of the year in 2015. In October, the Australian foreign minister, Julie Bishop, came under question in her country’s Senate for her liberal use of emojis.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/13/world/asia/kimoji-kimunji-app.html

Structure of the lead:

Who- The Oxford Dictionary

When- in 12, 2016

What- emoji icon

Why- not given

Where- the Internet

How- not given

Keywords:

1. emotive-感情的

2. supremacy-主權；優勢

3. doughnut-甜甜圈

4. crass-愚鈍的；粗魯的

5. antagonize-引起反抗；反對

6. eccentric-反常的；古怪的

7. conceive-構思

8. omnipresence-無所不在

9. assassinate-詆毀

10. consortium-聯合

Week2-看見台灣

Documentary ‘Beyond Beauty’ Captures Taiwan From Above

By JENNY W. HSU

It has been said that when the early Portuguese explorers first laid eyes on Taiwan in the 1500s, they were so impressed with the island’s lush green mountains and pristine turquoise shorelines that they decided to name the place “Ilha Formosa” — beautiful island — on the spot.

More than 500 years later, as Taiwan transforms from an agrarian society to a high-tech-dominated economy, many of the majestic peaks that took the settlers’ breath away have been sullied by residential blocks, tea plantations, and high-end hotels. The once clear waters off its beaches are also discolored by the massive amount of chemical waste discharged by factories each year.

“In a way, what happened in Taiwan is a reflection of what’s happening in many parts of the world,” said Chi Po-lin, the director of this year’s Golden Horse Awards winner for best documentary, “Beyond Beauty, Taiwan from Above.”

The 48-year-old aerial photographer-turned-filmmaker used to work for the government’s National Highway Engineering Bureau, taking tens of thousands images of the island during helicopter trips over the past two decades.

Sitting in his small Taipei office, lined with books on Taiwan’s landscape and geography, he said he had long wanted to make a movie based on his photographs, but for years it seemed like a far-fetched dream. That changed in 2009, when French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand released his aerial documentary “Home” on climate change and global warming.

Mr. Chi said his motivation for making “Beyond” was not to point a finger at a certain industry or even the government, but to present a realistic view of Taiwan’s growing environmental problems. His hope is to make people think twice the next time they throw out the garbage or turn on the faucet.

In his 93-minute film, audiences are taken on a bird’s-eye journey by helicopter across Taiwan’s various landscapes, with background music by award-winning composer Ricky Ho. While the movie documents Taiwan’s rich biodiversity, it also bears witness to the worsening devastation wrought by humans.

http://blogs.wsj.com/scene/2013/11/27/documentary-beyond-beauty-captures-taiwan-from-above/

Structure of the lead:

Who- Mr. Chi

When- 2009

What-  to show Taiwan's beauty to everyone

Why- Taiwan's natural beauty is decreasing

Where- Taiwan

How- he made a film

Keywords:

1. pristine-清新的；原始的；未開發的

2. turquoise-藍綠色的

3. agrarian-耕地的；農業的

4. peak-山峰；頂峰

5. plantation-種植園；人造林；殖民地

6. sully-使丟臉；玷汙

7. discolor-使褪色；汙染

8. aerial-航空的

9. biodiversity-生物多樣性