Set in Taipei, against the backdrop of the economic bubble of 1989, the Taiwanese international feature Oscar submission “Old Fox” is a relatively engaging popular melodrama about altruism vs. self-interest and inequality of all sorts. In his fourth feature, director Hsiao Ya-Chuan follows the unsentimental education of a motherless 11-year-old boy, Liao Jie (Bai Run-yin), raised in poverty by his kindly father, Liao Tai-lai (Liu Kuan-Ting), a waiter at a busy banqueting hall. One rainy day, the bullied lad comes to the attention of his landlord, the wealthy Boss Xie (Akio Chen), nicknamed Old Fox for his cunning. Recognizing his younger self in the small boy, Old Fox tries to teach
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