Hu Tai-Li is currently a research fellow and documentary filmmaker at the Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica in Taiwan; a concurrent professor at National Chin-Hua University, and the president of Taiwan International Ethnographic Film Festival. After graduating from the History Department of the National Taiwan University, she entered the Graduate School and University Center of the City University of New York, and obtained her Ph.D. degree in anthropology. She has directed and produced eight documentary films (The Return of Gods and Ancestors, Songs of Pasta’ay, Voices of Orchid Island, Passing Through My Mother-in-law’s Village, Sounds of Love and Sorrow, Encountering Jean Rouch, Stone Dream, After Passing, and Returning Souls).
As the film begins, one Orchid Islander says, “I often feel that the more research anthropologists do on this island, the worse the island is harmed…” This work is the visual anthropologist’s recorded answer to this question.
The film director tries to use the camera to explore the disillusionment and frustration of the Tao people. She moves between the islanders…
This film touches on the sensitive issues of national and ethnic identity in Taiwan. In 1965, Chen Yao-Chi directed the first objective Taiwanese documentary, Liu Pi-Chia. The main character, Liu Pi-Chia, was press-ganged into the Nationalist army in the 1940s in China, and came over to Taiwan with President Chiang Kai-Shek. After several decades, we unexpectedly met Liu in a…
The Pasta’ay, which means the festival of the legendary little people, is a significant ritual held every other year in the Saisiat aborigine group in Taiwan.
Every ten years, they hold the Great Ritual. This film focuses on the Great Ritual in 1986. It tries to convey the Saisiat people’s affection for and belief in the legendary little people.…
In the historically most famous ancestral house of the matrilineal Amis tribe in Taiwan, the carved pillars tell legends. After a strong typhoon toppled the house 40 years ago, the pillars were moved to the Institute of Ethnology Museum. Recently young villagers, with assistance from female shamans, pushed the descendants and village representatives to communicate with ancestors in the pillars.…