Ang Lee, collecting memories of innocence

Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal in "Brokeback Mountain" (2005).

"After the heartbreaking tragedy of Brokeback Mountain and the scorching sexual intensity of Lust, Caution, Lee needed to remind himself of what it was like to smile and laugh and experience joy.

He found it in Taking Woodstock, which opens Aug. 28.

``Even just smiling is a learning curve'' Lee says.

He cites one of his favourite characters in literature.

``Who was it who has a problem smiling? It was Malvolio in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. Every time I smile, I think of that character.''

Darkness intrudes into many of his films - The Ice Storm, Brokeback Mountain, Ride with the Devil and Lust, Caution. And it seems to have intensified in recent years to the degree of casting a shadow over quite different movies like Sense and Sensibility and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. So yes, maybe it is important ``to just chill out and lose your control-freak characteristics, and appreciate people.''He quietly concedes that happiness can be challenging to convey on film. He says it's not just a matter of ``smoke some pot, drink some beer. It's nothing like that.''

One of his toughest scenes came when the gay Elliot, who has been agonizing about his sexuality, is persuaded to take an acid trip. Lee had to use his imagination to conjure up the skewed world which Elliot witnesses.

"Everybody had done acid and I was tempted", Lee laughs. But he didn't succumb.

He did, however, come up with a hallucinatory moment which he hopes communicates the essence of Woodstock ``as the centre of the universe. The hill becomes water and then becomes sea waves. And you have this cosmic shot. That's how I envisioned it.''

What connection is there among the Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, a tragedy of gay cowboys like Brokeback Mountain, the dazzling pyrotechnics of Crouching Tiger and the nostalgia of Taking Woodstock? Lee has no real answer himself.

``I am a drifter and an outsider'', he said a few years ago. ``There's not one single environment I can totally belong to. My cultural roots are something illusive.''

All movies are in a sense illusive - yet Lee himself does want to give audiences something tangible. That's why Taking Woodstock seems so important to him. Ask him what he wants audience's to bring away from it, he's quick to answer.

``I hope happiness'', he says. ``The innocent part of hoping that things can still be changed - the innocence and hope and good feelings . . . our collected memories of innocence.'' Source: www.canada.com