Gf*Bf

女朋友  男朋友

Taiwan/Hong Kong, 2012, colour, 2.35:1, 105 mins.

Director: Yang Yazhe 杨雅喆.

Rating: 5/10.

Initially charming study of love and friendship across the years soon wears out its welcome.

STORY

Taibei, Taiwan, 2012. Chen Zhongliang (Zhang Xiaoquan) is summoned to the school of his twin daughters (Lei Selin, Lei Jiexi) when they are hawled up in front of the head for leading a demonstration for girls to wear shorts for PT. Chen Zhongliang assures a supervisor that the girls come from a happy home. 1985, Gaoxiong, summer. At high school during the martial law era, Chen Zhongliang and Wang Xinren (Feng Xiaoyue) form a tight threesome with tomboy Lin Meibao (Gui Lunmei), making fun of the KMT ideology officer (Zhou Ling), selling “underground” literature and generally larking around. Lin Meibao is fond of Chen Zhongliang, though he says he has a girlfriend in the year below (Yan Jie’an). After a student “rebellion” against the school’s political instructors, Wang Xinren, who’s always secretly liked Lin Meibao, asks her if he can be her boyfriend. 1990, Taibei, spring. Chen Zhongliang and Wang Xinren are both at university in the capital, while Lin Meibao teaches at a dance studio. The three meet during the Wild Lily pro-democracy student demonstration in mid-March. That evening, while Chen Zhongliang tries to pick up a plainclothes policeman, Wang Xinren and Lin Meibao make love, though she’s seen him earlier with another woman. 1997, Taibei, autumn. Lin Meibao turns up at the gay wedding party of college friend Xu Shenlong (Zhang Shuhao), hoping to meet Wang Xinren and Chen Zhongliang, but neither of them is there. She manages a health centre and is pregnant with twins. Wang Xinren, now married, works as a presidential spokesman. Chen Zhongliang has been having a long-term affaire with a married man, Xu Qiang (Tang Guozhong).

REVIEW

After his charming but very slight Orz Boyz! 囧男孩 (2008), Taiwan writer-director Yang Yazhe 杨雅喆 gets much more ambitious – and hits a brick wall – with Gf*Bf 女朋友  男朋友. Initially charming, but quickly wearing out its welcome as it aims higher, Yang’s second feature bundles up 25 years of Taiwan history, thoughts on love and friendship, and (especially) what it means to be gay across the years, and tries to makes these themes cohabit side by side. Well played by its lead trio within the limitations of the shallow script, Gf*Bf ends up like Eternal Summer 盛夏光年 (2006) meets You Are the Apple of My Eye 那些年，我们一起追的女孩。 (2011) with some major pretensions bolted on in the second half.

The film is at its best when it’s trying the least hardest – which basically means the first flashback, set in 1985 when the three leads are larking around as pals (and more) at high school and the country is still technically under martial law. This section comes the closest to Orz Boys, and is the most successful at catching the fluid nature of teenage friendships through looks and glances. But it’s disappointing that, for Yang (who was 14 at the time), the mid-1980s setting seems to mean only two things: having fun and remaining closeted.

Both those things form the core of the 1990 segment, set during the White Lily pro-democracy student protest 野百合学运 in Taibei, whither the trio have now moved from southern Taiwan. It’s during this section, which cements the physical attraction between two of the three and the homosexuality of the third, that the script’s shallowness first starts to show: Yang’s characters are simply surfing on events and are no more than cut-outs themselves. By the time the film reaches 1997 – when the trio are pushing 30 and either are screwed up or have sold out – the movie becomes seriously grating as it pushes for emotional significance. The dialogue in at least one scene (set in a bookshop) is seat-squirmingly arch.

Despite the fact that Yang doesn’t have anything original to say about his cut-outs nor about the periods in which their maturation is set, the three lead actors still manage to make them seem far more interesting than they are on paper. Anglo-Chinese Feng Xiaoyue 凤小岳 [Rhydian Vaughan] basically repeats his Tom Cruise impression from Monga 艋舺 (2010), though with much more charm and a looser style that helps gives the film’s first half some kind of shape. Starting slow but gradually becoming the heart of the movie, Zhang Xiaoquan 张孝全 [Joseph Chang] (Eternal Summer; Prince of Tears 泪王子, 2009) quietly gives the performance to watch, as a man who’s spent half his life suppressing a physical love for his best pal. However, it’s still a performance in a vacuum as, like the other two actors, he’s given little to work with in the script apart from copious lingering looks and a couple of it’s-so-painful-being-gay scenes.

The role of actress Gui Lunmei 桂纶镁 – tomboy-turned-woman in the middle Lin Meibao – often seems more like a script convenience than one in which director Yang is really interested, though the actress animates her as best she can and uses her eyes a lot to make up for the shortage of real dialogue. At no time is any explanation given why Lin Meibao holds such a large torch for her gay friend but is prepared to sleep with her straight one.

The photography by [Asia-based US d.p.] Jake Pollock 包轩鸣 has a progressively cooler look as the timeline advances, and is always mobile, strongly recalling his work on Yang Yang 阳阳 (2009). Period design is most notable in the 1985 section but isn’t made much of, beyond a few artifacts.

CREDITS

Presented by Atom Cinema (TW), Ocean Deep Films (TW), Central Motion Picture (TW), Huayi Brothers International Media (HK), Ko-Hiong-Lang (TW).

Script: Yang Yazhe. Photography: Jake Pollock. Editing: Chen Junhong. Editing supervision: Liao Qingsong, Zhang Jiahui [Cheung Ka-fai]. Music supervision: Zhong Xingmin. Production design: Li Donggang. Associate art direction: Li Heyan, Yang Jialin. Costume design: Wei Xiangrong. Sound: Guo Liqi, Du Duzhi. Visual effects: A Lao (Beijing Miracle Films & TV).

Cast: 2012: Zhang Xiaoquan [Joseph Chang] (Chen Zhongliang/Liam), Gui Lunmei (Lin Meibao/Mabel), Feng Xiaoyue [Rhydian Vaughan] (Wang Xinren/Aaron), Zhang Shuhao (Xu Shenlong/Ron), Fang Siyu (Xiaobao, Wang Xinren’s wife), Guan Yong (Chen Zhongliang’s father), Qiu Naihua (Chen Zhongliang’s mother), Ding Ning (Hua, Lin Meibao’s mother), Lei Selin (older twin), Lei Jiexi (younger twin), Du Yifan (military instructor), Li Peng (student affairs director). 1985: Zhou Ling (Yin, ideology officer), Liu Wenjie, Guo Yaoren (military instructors), Yan Jie’an (Chen Zhongliang’s girlfriend in year below), Cai Shugui (swimming trainer). 1990: Zhou Zicong, Liu Ying, Chen Dazong, Ken Chen (college roommates), Huang Yuting, Zhang Kaixiang (student protest speakers), Chen Zhiming (plainclothes policeman), Zhu Xianzhi (military instructor), Chen Yanting (best man). 1997: Tang Guozhong (Xu Qiang/John, Chen Zhongliang’s boyfriend), Yang Wenwen (Xu Qiang’s wife), Hu Peiyu (Xu Qiang’s daughter), Zhang Zhengjian (Wang Xinren’s father-in-law), Shirley Chien (health-centre president), Ye Huizhi (obstetrician), Sam Ho (Xu Shenlong’s husband).

Release: Taiwan, 3 Aug 2012; Hong Kong, 30 Aug 2012.

(Review originally published on Film Business Asia, 8 Oct 2012.)