In Tsai's The River, for example, his observation and depiction of Taiwanese society is chillingly trenchant, bringing post-modern terms such as "alienation," "marginalization" and "desocialization" to life in the day-to-day experience of the characters, with an emphasis that is cruelly apparent when the story reaches its point of conflict.
以蔡明亮的《河流》為例，它對今日台灣社會的觀察與刻畫有著令人毛骨悚然的犀利，許多後現代的名詞「疏離」、「邊際化」、「去社會聯繫」在幾個劇中人的日常生活中被具體的呈現出來，並在劇情的衝突點上殘酷地展示它們的沉重。