BAD MOVIE! Should have been a great concept but the story teller/director totally screwed up on the way it is presented. The story is full of holes: it takes place in rural China at an unspecified time but assumed to be more than a hundred years ago, when social behavior and morality is very strict. The main character,
Wu Kui, is a hired hand who is sent to bring the bride back to her future rich husband's house. On the way he displays a mischievous side by teasing his companions to peek behind the bride's veiled face, for good luck, which is socially highly unacceptable.
When some bandits try to kidnap the bride he carries her on his back and run away -- for a long, long time even the bandits are on fast horses. After she is finally taken he sits around for maybe half a day(the other servants return home, report the incidence over a cup of ginger tea, then the husband accidentally kills himself, and then people set back out to look for him) that's when he suddenly decides to go after the bandits to rescue the bride. He passes through a gate of the bandits' hideout with armed guards without any questioning. When he meets the bandit leader instead of asking about the woman the first thing he asks for is to have a meal, which is granted and he sits down and eats a whole chicken, while the bride sits tied up a few feet away. Then with some lame excuse the leader set them both free.
The bride is forced to stay married to a dead husband, in the form of the wooden figure of a man, despite the kindness the mother-in-law show to both the bride and Kui. Kui, now portraited as an innocent good-hearted country boy, makes contact with the beautiful young widow numerous times, including inside her bedroom at night, which is ridiculous. He finally surrenders to her seduction and has sex in her bedroom, with the lights on and the mother-in-law and the servants still awake in the next room. But no one suspects anything.
The miserable bride tries to run away a few times but stopped by the servants. Still she's free to wander about without any restrain and surveillance, but somehow forgets about running away.
Finally while the innocent Kui tries to say goodbye to the bride due to his guilt the mother comes out of her room and sees them. Right away a mob with torches suddenly appear from nowhere. Although the traditional punishment for adultery is by drowning both parties the kind mother-in-law just breaks the bride's ankles and sets the man free without even a slap on the wrist from the mob.
Kui decides to join the bandits and finds the whole den burned down and every bandit killed. He breaks down and cries hysterically...I don't know why.
Then a year later this innocent crying baby suddenly becomes the leader of a group of 100 bandits, with no explanation on how, and returns to get his lover. She is now chained to her bed, even when she's crippled, unlike during her few attempts to run away while she was very healthy. Then Kui orders the mother-in-law to kill herself by hanging, despite after her continuous kindness to both himself and the bride for all this time.
The acting of the 2 main characters is poor, although the mother-in-law and the housekeeper have done a passable job. The lighting control is substandard, and the pace of the movie is dreadful.
It totally fails when compare to other excellent movies about cultural frustration in past China, e.g. The Old Well, The Story of Qiu Ju, Raise the Red Lantern, etc.
I give it a 2 out of 10.
March 27, 2010
