Cherry Lane Film and Filmmakers series
2008, 115 minutes, Mandarin with English subtitles
Guest: Director Ma Liwen
A quintet of modern Chinese love stories told from the female perspective follows each woman’s attempts, successes and failures at love in China’s rapidly changing urban landscape.
The female point-of-view is established immediately as the main characters introduce themselves. Smooth, succinct inter-cutting among the stories and charming performances from the leads infuse the romantic predicaments with fresh energy that propels the film forward: a shy twenty-eight year old virgin Zhang Ying’s (Mei Ting) touching romance with an old classmate (Geng Le), the gold-digger Xiaomei’s (Li Xiaolu) pursuit of a banker’s son (Duan Yihong), the heiress Lin Cong (Song Jia) going incognito to win over the nice-guy chef (Li Chen), the single mother Ye Shengying’s (Vivian Wu) courtship by long haired charmer (Ge You in a ridiculous toupee), and the fifty-something divorcee Gao Yajuan (Yuen Chau) second chance with a guy (Guo Tao) who seems almost too good to be true.
Matching the strong cast is an equally strong script, making for an entertaining, well-written romantic comedy. Following the recent mainland trend toward multi-character stories, this fourth feature by Ma Liwen is further proof she’s emerging as one of China’s most talented writer-directors. One month after its release it grossed a very respectable 28 million yuan ($4.5 million) in China.
- Start: 20:00
- Tickets: Rmb 40/20 (students)
