Miss Mom
寻汉计
China, 2021, colour, 2.35:1, 104 mins.
Director: Tang Danian 唐大年.
Rating: 7/10.
Likeable black comedy centred on a Beijing woman who finds herself pregnant by her ex-husband.
STORY
Beijing, 1 Jan 2016. At the New Year party of the PR company she works for, Wang Zhao (Ren Suxi), nicknamed Wang Zhaojun by her colleagues, wins the main raffle prize once again – this time, a one-year free lease of a luxury BMW sports car. Soon afterwards she starts having attacks of nausea, though at work she remains ever-positive despite doing several people’s jobs and being treated like a doormat by her colleagues. Wang Zhao lives with her grumpy, half-deaf grandfather He Ruimin (Li Baotian). One evening her mother (Li Qinqin) and younger half-brother Yang Lei (Dong Bo) come round to borrow a spare TV set and also borrow the sports car to take it home. Wang Zhao’s ex-husband, Hou Yingjie (Zhang Benyu), flies into Beijing for business meetings and she convinces him to stay with her rather than in a hotel. Hou Yingjie thinks it’s an invitation to have sex (as they have sometimes had since their divorce); instead, she tells him she’s pregnant by him. She says she wants to keep the child, as she’s now almost 35 and already had two abortions when they were married as he didn’t then want children. She wants him to take responsibility for the child, as if it’s born illegitimately it won’t qualify for a hukou (household registration) and thus get schooling and other essentials. He refuses, and walks out in the middle of the night. When her grandfather, who doesn’t know the pair are divorced, finds out she’s pregnant, he is delighted. Meanwhile, Wang Zhao goes on a blind date with an online friend, Du Wei (Wang Zichuan), but he turns out to be scruffy and not looking for any responsibility; Peter (Ren Long), a work colleague who’s always acted amorously towards her, also turns out not to be suitable. When her grandfather is briefly hospitalised after a fall, Du Wei turns out to be a good friend of his from the public park and pays him a visit. Then out of the blue Wang Zhao is sacked at work and her mother, when visiting He Ruimin, lets slip that Wang Zhao and Hou Yingjie divorced over a year ago. Wang Zhao later tells her grandfather who the father is and that she’s decided to get an abortion; without telling Wang Zhao, He Ruimin tries to persuade Hou Yingjie to temporarily remarry her so the child can at least get a hukou. But eventually Hou Yingjie says it’s not possible Before she starts showing signs of her pregnancy, Wang Zhao goes on a series of blind dates to find a man she can trick into believing the child is his, but she doesn’t find anyone suitable. And then her half-brother Yang Lai suggests a candidate.
REVIEW
Though she’s unquestionably – on the strength of films like Mr. Donkey 驴得水 (2016), A Cool Fish 无名之辈 (2018), A Road to Spring 通往春天的列车 (2019) and Almost a Comedy 半个喜剧 (2019) – one of the Mainland’s finest light comediennes, Shandong-born, theatre-trained Ren Suxi 任素汐, 32, still seems to have a way to go before registering with the mass public, to judge by the box-office takings of her latest movie, Miss Mom 寻汉计. Released as a May Day holiday attraction, and the first film in which she gets top billing and basically carries the movie, this likeable black comedy about a divorcee who finds herself pregnant by her ex has taken a tiny RMB4 million and proved the flop of the period, despite its many fine qualities.
With her offbeat, slightly goofy looks, the lantern-faced Ren has shown a gift for dry absurdist comedy in which her theatre training has paid dividends in delivery and timing. In a relatively short time she’s come to rank alongside other Mainland light comediennes such as Ma Li 马丽 and Yao Chen 姚晨, and has so far managed to steer clear of bad career choices. In Miss Mom she’s perfectly cast, as an ever-optimistic single woman in her mid-30s who, despite being treated like a doormat by her work colleagues and ex-husband, is relentlessly optimistic and self-effacing – even when she suddenly finds herself pregnant by her ex and he refuses to take any responsibility whatsoever. Deciding to have the child after being forced to have two abortions when she was married, the plot hangs on her need to quickly find a husband so her child can get an all-important hukou (household registration), without which it will become disenfranchised without access to schooling and other essentials.
What could have been just a comedy about desperate blind dating and its consequences turns out to be much more, partly thanks to Ren’s very human but ungooey performance (and strong supporting cast) but also to the screenplay by Beijing writer Zhao Zhao 赵赵 (aka Zhao Yunyi 赵云毅), adapting her own novella Wang Zhaojun 王招君 that was published alongside another novella, Yatou’er 丫头儿, in 2014 (see cover, left). It’s Zhao’s second collaboration with director (and husband) Tang Danian 唐大年 since youth drama Young and Clueless 青春期 (2007) and the first theatrical feature by Tang since the ensemble urban comedy Happy Birthday 生日快乐 (2011), which he also wrote. Now in his early 50s, Tang is a writer who’s been in the industry since the early 1990s (Beijing Bastards 北京杂种, 1993; Beijing Bicycle 十七岁的单车, 2001; Caught in the Web 搜索, 2012), as well as directing TVD and film along the way.
Basically a backstreets Beijing comedy – a kind of mini-version of the ensemble movies, or hutong yarns, once made by directors like An Zhanjun 安战军 that have now gone out of fashion – it’s salted with a dry, northern wit and peopled with a small cast of recognisable characters (goofy heroine, grumpy grandpa, happy-go-lucky taxi-driver, greedy relatives, career-obsessed ex). Most of all, it allows its characters to grow within the confines of the story and in unexpected ways. Though she keeps changing her mind whether to have the baby, Wang Zhao (Ren) finds to her surprise that her grandpa (played by veteran Li Baotian 李保田, last seen as the plucky old hero in Forever Love 北京时间, 2015) supports her; another member of her family, a no-good, sponging half-brother (played by Ren’s real-life partner Dong Bo 董博), also proves of help in his own way; and an online friend (likeable newcomer Wang Zichuan 王子川) who initially seems to be scruffy and self-centred turns out to be a quietly caring, straight-talking pal of her grandpa. The only flaw in the screenplay is that, when it comes to the third act, the audience is way ahead of the movie, whose resolution has been signalled from early on.
As well as dealing with recognisable Beijing types – a characteristic of Zhao’s writings – the film also deals with realities of Mainland life, like the all-important hukou and the lengths people will go to to get it. (At the end, the viewer discovers why the film is set in early 2016: the hukou law was changed for the better later that year.) There’s also the popular belief that, after winning a prize, bad luck often follows – a comic strand that runs through the film.
Hardly flashy enough to compete against some of the other May Day releases, Miss Mom is still well packaged at a technical level, with clean photography by d.p. Wang Yumeng 王育萌 (ATM 逗爱熊仁镇, 2019), tight editing by Li Dianshi 李点石 (Caught in the Web) and natural styling by Liu Qian 刘倩. It’s no surprise to find that the creative producer for the whole thing was veteran film-maker (and echt-Beijinger) Tian Zhuangzhuang 田壮壮. The film’s Chinese title literally means “Plan to Find a Man”. Wang Zhao’s sarcastic nickname by her work colleagues – Wang Zhaojun 王招君 – is a play on the identical-sounding name of a famous beauty in Ancient China, Wang Zhaojun 王昭君. It’s also the title of Zhao’s original novella.
CREDITS
Presented by Huanxi Media Group (Beijing) (CN), Huanxi Media Group (CN), Huanxi Media Group (Shanghai) (CN), Tianjin Maoyan Weiying Cultural Media (CN), Huanxi Media Group (Tianjin) (CN), Huanxi Media Group (Taizhou) (CN). Produced by Tianjin Daxitang Media (CN).
Script: Zhao Zhao. Novella: Zhan Zhao. Photography: Wang Yumeng. Editing: Li Dianshi. Music: Long Long, He Tiancheng. Art direction: Hai Rihan. Styling: Liu Qian. Sound: Hao Gang, Gao Yuguang. Visual effects: Yu Lizheng (Amazing Ray). Executive direction: Shang Jin.
Cast: Ren Suxi (Wang Zhao/Wang Zhaojun), Li Baotian (He Ruimin), Wang Zichuan (Du Wei), Zhang Benyu (Hou Yingjie), Li Qinqin (Wang Zhao’s mother), Dong Bo (Yang Lai), Ren Long (Peter), Shi Hang (first blind date), Liu Xiaohai (Zhang Yi), Liu Dan (personnel department woman), Cao Zheng (personnel department man), Xu Ge (Mavis, work colleague), Zhao Xiaosu (Alan, work colleague), Zhu Qifeng (Hou Yingjie’s wife), Xiang Zi (bar owner in Dali), Zhao Fei (company boss at party), Qiu Xinyu (angry driver), Liao Mengjia (piano girl), Wu Tao (shop assistant).
Release: China, 1 May 2021.