In some places, films are constructed like poems instead of McDonald's hamburgers.

Though Hollywood blockbusters today define the standards of a successful film, a counter current has been flowing, mostly in other countries.

"American films are made for mass consumption. My films, however, are made for those few people who will watch it and get something out of it. I only care to film my own feelings about life," said Tsai Ming Liang, Taiwanese auteur, in an interview conducted in Mandarin Chinese via a translator.

"What Time is it There," Liang's new film, opens Friday to selected theaters. Unlike most filmmakers, Liang focuses on small, mundane activities, often making them comedic.

"It was naturally funny. I didn't intend it to be that way, but I knew it would be funny. When you become an observer, all the pain you see becomes absurd. The funniness of it belies the sorrow underneath. There is no need to set them up. It just occurs naturally, which is cruel since you're laughing at people in pain," Liang said.

In the film, comedic moments are found in a mother (Lu Yi-Ching) who compulsively mourns her deceased husband. To the audience, she ridiculously eschews reason for her religious fantasies of reincarnation. Similarly, her son (Lee Kang-Sheng) refuses to use the bathroom at night because he is afraid of ghosts. Instead, he must find containers in his room to relieve himself. The daily activities of the family become little dramas in themselves instead of scenes that serve overarching plot lines.

In fact, perhaps the most unique aspect of "Time" is the fact that it has no plot. Instead, it concentrates on the various emotional states of the characters.

"Unlike other filmmakers, my focus is on much smaller things, such as a person's facial expression or body language. I don't want to tell stories," Liang said. "Everyone reacts differently to my films. They use their daily experiences to interpret my film on different levels. My films don't force the audience to think a certain way. It only reminds them of their own lives. When you have a plot, you have to restrict the way an audience feels."

Continuity in "What Time" comes from mixing themes of loneliness, death and escape together in a style completely devoid of camera tricks, special effects or even music. A typical shot can last up to three minutes and the only movement comes when the camera is filming from within a moving car.

"I preserve the film's perspective in space and time so that it will look real. I don't like to move the camera or edit my shots. From the point of view of the observer, many perspectives emerge. Each of us look at things with only one perspective. Because of that, we use our imagination to fill up the emptiness," Liang said.

As if his materials weren't already sparse enough, Liang uses the same actors from his previous four films, who play the same characters living in the same home.

"If you have been watching my films, it will be interesting to you to see the changes in Hsiao Kang from two years ago and even five years ago. All the films together present segments of time that gradually reveals changes in the actors. Getting different actors for each film would eliminate that idea," Liang said.

Since most of the film consists of silence rather than dialogue, it may seem obvious that Liang's film required no script. After the general ideas crystallized in his mind, he filmed each scene spontaneously, adapting to the environments of his shots, many of which were places he knew growing up.

Unlike his other films, "What Time" takes place in Paris, France, a foreign country. Using Benoit Delhomme as cinematographer and some French actors, Liang explores the idea of escape.

"When we encounter an obstacle, whether it's psychological or physical, we have the urge the escape. That's why I put in the girl who leaves for Paris. Paris is only a symbol of a far-away place used for escape. It doesn't matter where it is. It could be London or even Los Angeles," Liang said.

Liang constructs an environment, rather than an ideology, within which one must react. Seeming to build off the work of people like John Cage, Liang turns conventional ideas about filmmaking on their heads.

"The script does not give birth to the movie. Rather, the movie gives birth to the script," Liang said.

"I keep my distance from the actors, because I am not them. I'm only an observer like the audience. I can't really know what they are thinking. I can only imagine what they are thinking."