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The Abject, Murder, and Sex in The Great Buddha+

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Abstract

Instead of the telescope in Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window, director Hsin-yao Huang in this black-and-white film The Great Buddha+ (10) uses the car dashcam videos to present the voyeurism of the abject in this digital era. Unlike the two maids who make a sadomasochistic ritual attempt to murder their madam in Jean Genet’s play The Maids, the two nobodies Belly Bottom (played by Chen Chu-Sheng) and Prickle (played by Chuang Yi-Zeng) discover the murder by Prickle’s rich boss Huang Chi-Wen (played by Deon Dai). Visual pleasure, scopophilia, and representation of women are all explored. Film techniques present the oppression of the rich the powerful, the huge gap between the rich and the poor, and the farce and absurdity of life.

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Tuan, I.H. (2018). The Abject, Murder, and Sex in The Great Buddha+. In: Translocal Performance in Asian Theatre and Film. Palgrave Pivot, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8609-0_10

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