Reviewed by Lisa Movius
It isn't too much
of a leap to say that Ge You, star of the recent release "Mei
Wan Mei Liao" ("Endless"), is the Chinese Woody Allen. He
conveys the same sense of the "every-man", the insecure,
self-effacing loser who still always somehow manages to get
the girl, naturally to his own surprise. Ge You is equally
unattractive by popular standards, and sports a persistent
pout that gives him a wounded puppy look. He represents
in a way the "heart and soul" of Beijing, much as Woody Allen
conveys a uniquely New York mentality. Like Allen, Ge
You's movies all kind of have the same plot, but are so
enjoyable that we forgive the repetition.
Every year, Beijing releases a special film for New
Years. Last year was the riotous and wildly popular "Bu
Jian Bu San" (Be There or Be Square), also staring Ge
You. "Mei Wan Mei Liao" hasn't received the same
enthusiasm, perhaps because it wasn't filmed in Los Angeles
with plenty of jokes at the expense of those silly Americans,
but as far as plot and performance, it is the superior film.
The story of this dark comedy is relatively simple,
rotating around the interactions of its three characters. Ge
You plays tour-bus driver Han Dong, who leases out to Ruan
Dawei, a fly-by-night tight-fisted tour operater played by Fu
Biao. Dawei owes Han Dong some 90,000 RMB for services
rendered over the past year, but is reluctant to part with his
money. After repeated cold-shouldering, Han Dong, like
Mel Gibson in Payback, becomes desperate and "accidentally"
kidnaps Dawei's girlfriend. The long-suffering,
tough-talking Xiaoyun, played by Wu Qianlian, decides to help
out Han Dong in order to test Dawei: What does he love more,
his money or his girlfriend.
The romance that sprouts between odd couple Han Dong and
Xiaoyun is cutely predictable, but their vicious bickering
does provide some hilarious moments. More humorous,
however, is the giant three-way game of chicken that drives
the action through most of the film. The face-conscious
Dawei is blubberingly desperate to recover his girl without
parting with his cash, and he is understandably anxious to
take revenge for all the pranks that Xiaoyun plays on him in
Han Dong's name. Going all out with the "hell hath no
fury" thing, Xiaoyun is trying to make Dawei as miserable as
humanly possible. Meanwhile, the hapless Han Dong just
wants out of it all, but is trapped by Dawei's rampage on one
side and Xiaoyun's blackmail on the other.
Fu Biao's over-the-top performance plays well off of Ge
You's minimalism. Fu's chubby, self-righteous moron is
the stereotype of the mildly-successful Chinese businessman
who gets ahead not through intelligence but via a combination
of connections and well-placed wheedling. His favorite
refrain of "Okay! Okay-okay-okay!" will remind foreign viewers
of those Chinese who think they're cool for using, overusing,
and abusing a random favorite English word or phrase.
Also entertaining if overdone are the ongoing Viagra jokes
that Fu's character throws about in a failed attempt to assert
his machismo. Dawei very much plays the scapegoat, and
if the audience excessively disliked or excessively pitied
him, the story would fall flat. Instead, Fu's
performance ensures that we feel for the guy even while
laughing at his discomfort and thinking he has it coming.
The heady comedy fails only during the final scene, where
the fast-paced slapstick suddenly gives way to heavy-handed
sentimentality. Warm-fuzzy scenes can work in comedies, but
only when delivered with a healthy dose of irony. The
wrap-up of "Mei wan mei liao" is merely mushy, without any
redeeming humor.
"Mei Wan Mei Liao" has English subtitles, but a decent
grasp of the Beijing dialect is necessary to catch many of the
jokes, which come fast and hard. The soundtrack is
pretty good, especially a catchy rap tune for the title track.
Director Feng Xiaogang had no pretensions of making an "art"
film, thus "Mei Wan Mei Liao" doesn't deliberately target the
foreign audience, but ultimately it is better entertainment
and a better film than most of the Mainland's highbrow
productions. "Mei Wan Mei Liao" is not to be missed.
