A young dancer in the mass of the metropolis of Taipei loves to wear dark / glasses and is fascinated narcissistically with himself. / his ambition is to study choreography in New York. / in order to save enough money to implement the trip to New York, he joined / the dancing group that formed part of the fat stripteaser's show. / The handsome lad lived anticlockwise - he slept during the day and went / out at night. / He was as enticing as a moth / His girlfriend was a kindergarten teacher who wanted to be a singer / one day, after his show and an all night promiscuity / his eyes were pricked by the day-breaking light / He took his girlfriend to Yenshui for the firecracker festival / there they happened to be witnesses to a weird murder / with video recorder in hand he became the target of the mysterious killer / chased, he was the fugitive, plunging into a fit of nightmare / between the real and the fantastic / his world was being corroded and on the verge of collapsing / his dream about New York came to an end with a mysterious plague / The young fugitive made a step forward towards his dream, and another step / backward into reality / where could he go thence? / The escapade of the fugitive - was he running away from the killer only, or / from something else?

I opened my eyes / in the end-of-the-century summer night / The street lamps of Taipei turned up a sheen of yellow / every rover of the night had a pair of wings / noisy boisterous hustle-bustle / modern, like science fiction, violent, dramatized choreography / one scene after another / all had got used to the scenes / The sky of Taipei became even more orange-yellow / everyone said / I want to live a great eventful live / before the sun rises / while everything is still normal / the moth / the dancing girl of the night / Me / clothed in beautiful garments / having no focus / but only a game to play / sensitive and weird / ready to escape in no time / The moth! / Couched during the day and going out at night / playing the game of chase / excitement, possession, uttermost velocity, bawdy, dazzling, exhausted / The moth! / Chasing after the bifurcated neon / flying toward the game of death / The moth! / The dancing girl of the night / Me!/ Clothed in beautiful garments

Great is Amithaba Buddha / To the north there is no mythic bird Peng / To the west there is no Elysium / To the east there is no fairy land Penglai

How many more cups of Jesus' blood / to get the sinner drunk / How many Saint Joan of arcs to burn / in order to call the fire squad?

Flaming fire turned dead bones into ashes / A deluge ruined everything / The road to lightness was nearby / The dark country was pleasant

Angels got trapped on the roof of the chapel / Nothingness awaits the Devil / intoxicated in no time nowhere no boundary / no law no heaven no discriminating no sound no death no exterior no interior / no begging no end no reincarnation / no east no west no south no north / no east no west no south no north

Great is Amitabha Buddha / To the north there is no mythic bird Peng / To the west there is no Elysium / To the east there is no fairy land Penglai

Let us decorate our blood stained faces with flowers / There are already too many corpses and dust / Let us decorate our sad faces with flowers / the flowers will supersede your lost smile

Let us spread flowers all over this city / to cover up the stink and melancholy left by Time / Let the wind bring the fragrance to friends in the distant / even flowers need a spacious sky

Let us slaughter one another and destroy ruthlessly / Flowers are all the more precious against dirt and litter / If this world has to engrave an ugly history / Flowers can be used to decorate the eternal tombstone

Life is like an escape, from the moment man leaves his mother's womb. Human being finally will live with garbage.

'A Cha-Cha for the fugitive' / A poem by Hung Hung

On this cold night, it was so fascinating, / only falling leaves / knocked loud at the ground, a mouse / fled across the square when / the new shift of guards was not there, / when somniloquists were not up, / when someone in missing waited / for a letter, from someone who was not found. / if on this fascinating night, whose hot tears / burnt the tender grass? Whose knife / dropped underneath the single-plank bridge? Two strangers / moved close to each other / and parted again. A phone call / that could not go through. An unfinished / tower. A song / that was not sung complete / unable to reach your back window.

If on such a night / a fugitive lost his way, / could he find you? / Could you get out of bed, coughing, / to take him in? / Could you drive away the mouse / and give him the food in storage? / Could you-could you / let him sleep under the eaves of your house? / Could you refrain from getting sentimental / after hearing his song? / What a fascinating night, if-if- / you woke up at day break, the leaves in the courtyard / were still falling, you discovered that everything was but / a dream except / the blood stains under the eaves....Yes, / everything was but / a dream, if / this cold night, if this cold night / were over.

April 30, 1991 First manuscript of the screenplay

August 6, 1994 Fountain Films founded

Feb. 14,1995 Shooting started with bee-hive cracker festival of Yenshui

June 30, 1995 Night scenes taking up two-thirds of the film

July 21, 1995 First PRC missile maneuver, target area 157km away

July 28, 1995 First editing; everybody who saw the film said, "I can't understand it!"

August 15, 1995 Second PRC missile manoeuver

October 6, 1995 Second editing; same problem: "Sorry, we can't follow."

January 13, 1996 Four tickets joined the competition of the Presidency/Vice Presidency, the historic first by direct balloting of Taiwan's citizens

January 30, 1996 Third editing not in time for the festival

March 8, 1996 PRC did 3 missile maneuvers, live cartridge, target area 44km away from Taiwan

March 22, 1996 Third editing of the film O.K. Director Tsai-Sheng Wang: "That's it!" That was the eve of the first general election of Taiwan's President and Vice President.

May 20, 1996 Mr Lee Teng-hui elected President in the first general election in history.

January 21, 1997 A CHA-CHA FOR THE FUGITIVE release print

Tsai-sheng Wang, born 1952, a Leo, has produced several sensational commercial films during his 25-year career. He shocked the filmmakers of Taiwan with his masterpiece, I have got something to say, a commercial film for Stimorol Chewing Gum. It was a thorough subversion of traditional advertisement. His subsequent works have taken filmmaking in Taiwan into a new era - the precision and sensitivity of his chosen images contains also a strong humanitarian concern.

The present film is a prophetic vision as a result of Tsai-sheng's concern for the young generation and his reflections on the overall environment of Taiwan. The screenplay was begun in 1991, and then to be worked on for a period of four years.The filming started on February 14th, 1995 and ended in November 1996. The prophecies made in the film correspond to what has actually happened in Taiwan. In fact, he wanted to reveal a new film free of sentiment of old Taiwan. A CHA-CHA FOR THE FUGITIVE is director Tsai-sheng Wang's first feature film.