A young man must spend some time in prison after he and his friend cut off another person’s hand. His father says that his youngest son is dead to him. The father has another son who has a bright future ahead of him. But the son who’s in jail is not done creating problems for the family when a young woman knocks on their door.
A Sun is the best movie I have seen from 2019. This is a Taiwanese movie that seems a bit innocent at first, even though we see a person getting his hand cut off. The tone and atmosphere are mostly light and enjoyable for a little while.
But little by little, the movie changes into a crime movie when the youngest son is released from prison. A person from the past shows up and makes life miserable for the youngest son. And the son must solve this problem on his own, it seems.
A Sun isn’t a movie that feeds the viewers with a teaspoon. There are some characters here that one would expect should have been given more screen time. But you have to fill in the blanks yourself. I didn’t feel that there was anything wrong with the storytelling and that the movie forgot some characters. Had the movie focused on all the characters in the movie, the flow wouldn’t have been as good.
The movie briefly explains to us who the characters are. When that’s done, it focuses on its main story which is first and foremost about the youngest son, his former friend from the past and then we have the father who you don’t quite know where you have. He’s confused, and he needs a timeout to gather his thoughts.
At first, I hated the young son who is self-destructive and stupid. But towards the end, I cheered on him because it seems like he wants to do the right thing and leave his bad past behind him. But then a friend from his past shows up, and that’s a character you will hate! You just want him to disappear in some way. And you will also get angry at our young friend who doesn’t dare to say that he’s done with his past to his old friend, who now is a gangster! He has other things to think about!
The actors are amazing and so is the chemistry between them. It feels like this is a real family. The whole movie is so down to earth in terms of how the characters behave. I never felt or thought that they were movie characters. This feels like real people with real problems.
A Sun is a very good movie for us who like crime dramas that manage to mix warmth, drama, and crime. The movie engaged me from the first second, and I didn’t notice the long runtime of 150 minutes. The time flew away, and suddenly the movie was over. And what a movie this is!