We Are Forever

我们永远是我们

China, 2024, colour, 2.35:1, 100 mins.

Director: Xia Meng 夏孟.

Rating: 5/10.

Good-looking distaff road movie sports good leads but lacks emotional depth and any point.

STORY

A city in northern China, the present day. Two former schoolmates bump into each other by chance on the worst day of their lives: glamourpuss Lu Meili (Mi Mi) has just received the results of an earlier medical test and Si Tianyi (Chen Xinwei) has just been callously dumped by her boyfriend Zheng Zhou (Su Bai), who says he’s leaving the city to get married. The two young women have a combative relationship but they get drunk together and end up at Si Tianyi’s flat. Next morning Si Tianyi is told by her landlady (Sun Zhifang) that she must vacate the premises in two days’ time, though she is given a month’s rebate in cash on the rent. Lu Meili decides they should get revenge on Zheng Zhou by turning up at his wedding, so she borrows a car from a longtime admirer, radio disc jockey Meng Yiwu (Yao Chi), and they set off together into the hills around Beijing. That night Si Tianyi gets drunk at a bar and spends most of her money. Lu Meili is phoned by her doctor, who asks if she wants to have a biopsy to double-check her complaint; he adds that getting pregnant (though difficult) may help to cure the problem – but Lu Meili stresses she doesn’t want children. Next day they pick up a young hitchhiker, Yuan Bu (Hu Chunyang), who annoys Lu Meili but takes over driving when she feels car sick. When the two women wack up at 04:00 the next morning, Yuan Bu, who’s a photography addict, shows them a beautiful sunrise in the hills. They leave him there. Later, after some rain, the car gets stuck in the mud but they find a guesthouse to spend the night. The widowed owner (Wu Jun) turns out to be helpful, and next morning a group of cyclists help to get the car out of the mud. But as they drive on, Lu Meili keeps getting lower-stomach pains.

REVIEW

Two former schoolmates set out on a journey of lighthearted revenge in We Are Forever 我们永远是我们, a road movie in which the two distaff buddies spend more time bitching than anything else – leading to rather so-what conclusion. With some well-known names among the producing staff, this good-looking second feature by writer-director Xia Meng 夏孟 sports good performances by its two leads – Mainland TV actress Mi Mi 米咪 and Taiwan actress-singer Chen Xinwei 陈昕葳 – but is ultimately an empty confection. Shot in the summer of 2022 under the titles 2 Driving Girls 开车去前任婚礼 (literally, “Driving to an Ex’s Wedding”), it was finally released this summer to almost non-existent box office (RMB137,000).

Just in case the audience doesn’t get the message, a large poster of Thelma & Louise (1991) adorns the wall of one of the leads’ flat. It’s always unwise when film-makers reference other movies in this way, as comparisons are rarely kind. Xia’s is no T&L nor, alas, is it that other great distaff road movie, the wildly original Butterfly Kiss (1995, dir. Michael Winterbottom). Two former schoolmates bump into each other by chance just after each has received some disturbing news: glamourpuss Lu Meili has had the results of a medical test, while self-effacing Si Tianyi has been ditched by her boyfriend who’s off to marry another woman. After getting drunk that night, they decide to set out to disrupt the ex’s wedding by driving a car borrowed from a male admirer of Lu Meili.

Apart from meeting a handful of people en route – of whom the most interesting is a widowed guesthouse owner (dependably played by veteran Wu Jun 吴军) – not much happens on the journey, apart from Lu Meili’s illness being gradually revealed. Xia’s attempts in the script to give some depth to her self-obsessed heroines are superficial at best: they mostly spend the time bitching at each other in a kind of sisterly relationship in which Lu Meili is the elder, superior one and Si Tianyi the younger, largely compliant one. Their (and others’) dialogue has a slightly phoney, unmotivated feel, as if Xia is ticking off points to be discussed rather than letting the words emerge naturally from the characters and situations. The film’s more reflective mid-section ends up being soggy rather than revelatory.

Xia is the elder child of Fifth Generation director Xia Gang 夏钢 (After Separation 大撒把, 1993, aka Letting Go; Love at First Sight 一见钟情, 2002; Lost in the Moonlight 夜色撩人, 2017) and his regular scriptwriter (and occasional co-director) Meng Zhu 孟朱. Xia Meng studied directing at the Beijing Film Academy and previously directed the feature Little Bird 小黑鸟 (2011), a family drama centred on a Kazakh boy in China whose father opposes his obsession with the internet. She’s since directed the 24-part online micro-drama series Love at Second Glance 一见不钟情 (2024), an ultra-slick romantic drama set around an office, whose title is a play on her father’s 2002 movie. On We Are Forever her father is credited as creative producer 监制, with veteran Taiwan singer Qi Qin 齐秦 [Chyi Chin] and Mainland authoress Rao Xueman 饶雪漫 credited with “overall planning” 总策划.; Qi and Rao also collaborated on Reversed Destiny 沙漏 (2024), another story of female friendship. The film was funded by Rao and Xia Meng.

Of the two leads, favourite Rao actress Mi, 31 (All about Secrets 秘果, 2017), is the attention-grabber as the vain but unstable glamourpuss Lu Meili; but it’s Chen, 23, who provides what little emotional depth the film has, in the subtler role of the naive friend, the diametrical opposite of her performance as the school bully in Reversed Destiny. Photography by d.p. Li Zhong 黎忠 of the hilly roads in Huairou district, north of Beijing, is clean, and slickly edited by Qian Lingling 钱泠泠 (horror Someone in the Room 屋内有人, 2022); music and songs by Liu Yichao 刘一潮 are largely soupy wallpaper.

CREDITS

Presented by Jiangsu The Dream House Pictures (CN), Maozhenjialan Pictures (Beijing) (CN). Produced by Jiangsu The Dream House Pictures (CN).

Script: Xia Meng. Photography: Li Zhong. Editing: Qian Lingling. Music: Liu Yichao, Li De. Music supervision: Liu Yichao. Art direction: Huang Liang. Styling: Lei Lei. Sound: Liu Xingyuan. Visual effects: Liang Haoyi. Executive direction: Sun Jingyan.

Cast: Mi Mi (Lu Meili), Chen Xinwei (Si Tianyi), Yao Chi (Meng Yiwu), Hu Chunyang (Yuan Bu), Wu Jun (guesthouse owner), Su Bai (Zheng Zhou), Hu Zixuan (insurance manager), Shi Yunguang (wedding MC), Liu Dazhi (lorry driver), Zheng Bo (doctor), Sun Zhifang (landlady), Han Yuxi (Zheng Zhou’s bride), Liu Yuchen, Jinxianglongxireduoji, Wang Zihan, Hu Qianqian (cyclists), Sun Jingyan (street beggar).

Release: China, 3 Aug 2024.