Ghosted 曖昧

Treut's enigmatic return to feature films after more than a decade of documentaries, “Ghosted” unfolds in a series of flashbacks that alternate between Taiwan and Germany. A German artist Sophie Schmitt (Inga Busch) falls in love with a young Taiwanese woman Ai-ling (Huan-Ru Ke) visiting Hamburg in search of information about her late father. Ai-ling mysteriously dies, leaving Sophie devastated. When the artist travels to Taipei for her lover's memorial, she meets another Taiwanese woman, a journalist Mei-li Wang (played by Ting-Ting Hu, daughter of Taichung Mayor Jason Hu), who insists on interviewing her.

Director Treut, with prior experience directing a documentary on Taiwan and her professed artistic connection to the island, tenderly depicts Taipei in a way that will inspire locals to revisit familiar sites.

Sophie appears at the opening for her multimedia installation created to honor the late Ai-ling; there, she is confronted by the Mei-li Wang. The director attempts to portray the inscrutable attraction between the two women, but the interaction between the two somehow fails to convince. While Hu is quite seductive as the attractive temptress, Busch's character seems somewhat reserved in the whole film, leaving audiences feeling distant from Sophie.

Mei-li tries eagerly to get an interview with Sophie, nearly stalking her in the process. The mourning Sophie, too distraught over her girlfriend's death, is initially unwilling to cooperate with the tenacious reporter, but eventually succumbs to Mei-li's persistence. During their conversation, Sophie shares the story of how she met Ai-ling in Hamburg and the relationship the two women shared.

Treut paints a fond portrait of the lovers, at times in their most intimate moments, through a flashback. In a meta-fictional touch, during their courtship, Sophie shoots many still and video images of Ai-ling as part of a documentary about Taiwanese people in Germany, as Ai-ling herself seeks answers about her origins.

The spirit of the murdered Ai-ling hangs over the film, and audiences are given a rich portrait of the slain character through a series of flashbacks. Compared with the stiff Busch, Ke's acting is far more natural, a bright spot of youthful innocence in the film.

With so many jumps between past and present day, audiences can easily lose track of what's real, what's memory and what is simply fantasy. The choppy multilingual dialogue doesn't help, skipping between Mandarin, English and German. And a small language complaint: it's strange that Ai-ling's mother, who's stayed in Taiwan all her life and runs a small restaurant in the mountains near Taipei, speaks far better English than Ai-ling's globe-trotting uncle.

While the film illuminates some aspects of relationships and grief, more questions are left unanswered. The director is clearly attempting to say a lot, but each theme — love, loss, the supernatural, identity — is explored only superficially. Treut's latest film at times seems to reflect the literal interpretation of the Chinese title: ambiguous and confusing.

After the recent release of “Face,” shot in both Paris and Taipei, “Ghosted” offers yet another cross-border look at Taiwanese life, this time a co-production between Taiwan and Germany. At least Treut uses her locations to fabulous effect. The movie offers beautifully crafted images of Hamburg and Taipei, plus fascinating insights into Taiwanese families, funereal customs, and rituals and attitudes toward death and afterlife.

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