Post Truth
#保你平安
China, 2022, colour, 2.35:1, 110 mins.
Director: Da Peng 大鹏 [Dong Chengpeng 董成鹏].
Rating: 6/10.
Typically sketch-like comedy by Da Peng, as a sleazy undertaker trying to find the source of a nasty rumour about a client who’s dead and buried.
STORY
Ji’an city, Jilin province, northeast China, Jul 2021. Wei Ping’an (Da Peng) is a former owner of a karaoke bar and an ex-convict who now works at Crouching Dragon 卧龙山 undertakers selling funeral plots. Showing off in his flashy car, he arrives an hour late for the school concert in which his daughter Wei Moli (Wang Shengdi) is playing. After forcing his way into the auditorium, he answers his mobile phone with an urgent message from manager Qi Zhifu (Wang Xun), who got him the job at Crouching Dragon as a thankyou for doing time in prison for him. Qi Zhifu says that one of Wei Ping’an’s clients, the late Han Lu (Song Qian), must be moved from her plot as an influential Crouching Dragon client – the Feng family, which actually owns the land on which the cemetery is built – no longer wants Feng Qiangqiang (Bai Yu), the younger brother of company CEO Feng (Ma Li), buried in the next plot to a woman who the family has now learned was a prostitute. Wei Ping’an protests that Han Lu wasn’t a prostitute, but Qi Zhifu says he’s under orders from Crouching Dragon’s chairman (Liu Jinshan) to solve the problem. Wei Ping’an visits pet beautician Tony (Yin Zheng), who told Feng the rumour, but Tony refuses to tell Feng he was wrong. Wei Ping’an visits the orphanage that Han Lu was raised in and by chance discovers that she chose to be buried in Plot C06 as she knew that the adjacent one was already occupied by Feng Qiangqiang, who was actually her boyfriend. Wei Ping’an confronts Feng with the information and the latter says she knew Han Lu was her younger brother’s girlfriend. She gives Wei Ping’an four days to find evidence that Han Lu was not a prostitute. Wei Ping’an again questions Tony, who says he heard the rumour from two promo actresses performing outside his shop. It turns out that one of the women is Wei Ping’an’s younger sister, Wei Ruyi (Li Xueqin), a jobbing actress currently working in a horror funfair; she says it was actually her colleague, Yang Yuting, who heard the rumour – via three other people from Jin (Jia Bing), a company chairman. Finally getting an audience with Jin, Wei Ping’an and Wei Ruyi are told he never met Han Lu; the gossip came from a woman at work who read it online at internet streamer PerfectGuy421 (Zhang Lin). Wei Ruyi tries to contact the streamer, who is in Inner Mongolia province, but without any luck. Meanwhile, at her school Wei Moli wants to help out a classmate, Zhao Yuxuan (Li Nini), who has been framed by another girl, Qi Chang (Zhang Wan’er), for stealing a pen at the concert a few days ago. Wei Moli saw the whole incident from her place in the orchestra. However, Qi Chang threatens to expose the fact that the shy Wei Moli has an unsightly birthmark on her leg, so Wei Moli contacts her father for help in doing the right thing by somebody.
REVIEW
The ever-present role of the internet in people’s lives, and its capacity for destructive rumour-mongering, forms a mildly critical background to shaggy-dog comedy Post Truth #保你平安, the fourth directorial outing by popular Mainland comic Da Peng 大鹏, aka Dong Chengpeng 董成鹏, 41, after two earlier features (Jianbing Man 煎饼侠, 2015; City of Rock 缝纫机乐队, 2017) and family documentary The Reunions 吉祥如意 (2020). Though it has some of the wackiness of Jianbing Man, as well as City of Rock’s ambition to be more character-driven, it’s a notch down on those two films overall as, despite some very funny moments, it’s basically a series of comedy routines hung on a thin plot-line, revealing Da Peng’s own background in sketches. Despite all that, and a rather gooey ending, it’s still an entertaining picture that’s packed with enough incident and (as usual for Da Peng) cameos by pals to pass the time. It took a meaty RMB700 million at the Mainland box office this spring, somewhere between City of Rock (RMB457 million) and Jianbing Man (RMB1.16 billion).
Co-written as usual with fellow north-easterner Su Biao 苏彪, and again set in Da Peng’s hometown of Ji’an, Jilin province, the film kicks off with a very funny title sequence of Flash Harry undertaker Wei Ping’an (Da Peng) careening through town in his fancy car and arriving an hour late at his daughter’s school concert, where he calmly answers a call on his mobile. Ditching his trademark black-framed glasses, and with a mop-like head of hair, Da Peng is momentarily almost unrecognisable as the seriously dubious Wei Ping’an, former boss of a karaoke bar and an ex-con who did time for a friend. Said friend (comedian Wang Xun 王迅, in a typically oily role) has got him a job selling plots in a cemetery, but a powerful local family now wants one of his plots moved, as there’s a rumour that the young woman buried there was once a prostitute.
The rest of the film is a shaggy-dog story in which Wei Ping’an tries to find the source of the rumour, which brings him into contact with a large number of colourful characters. There’s almost no critique of the power or misuse of social media, with the blame squarely assigned to human gossiping. A side plot of Wei Ping’an’s young daughter trying to help a bullied classmate at school is a rather awkward distraction from the main narrative in the early stages, though it later ties in with the theme of Wei Ping’an’s redemption as he stands up to rumour-mongering and does the right thing by a fellow human being.
Da Peng’s cocky main character allows the actor his full range of double-takes, straightfaced put-downs and empty braggadocio, bouncing off other cast members like Yin Zheng 尹正 (as a camp pet beautician), regular Qiao Shan 乔杉 (garage mechanic), Jia Bing 贾冰 (pompous company chairman), Yang Di 杨迪 (sleazy internet streamer) and actress Ma Li 马丽 (company CEO who’s causing all the trouble). In a less sketch-like way, he also forms an engaging screen pairing with comedienne Li Xueqin 李雪琴, 27, an internet and TV personality making a fine big-screen debut as his dumpy but determined younger sister, a jobbing actress in a horror funfair. The softer side of Da Peng’s comic persona starts to emerge with Li’s entrance halfway through the picture, and is underlined as his character gradually starts to bond with his young daughter (nicely played by then 11-year-old Wang Shengdi 王圣迪, A Writer’s Odyssey 刺杀小说家, 2021) and tries to redeem his dodgy past.
Overall the film could profitably lose about 10 minutes, especially during the final section that becomes too emotionally didactic (“do what you think is right” etc). Otherwise, technical credits are all smooth, from cutting by Tu Yiran 屠亦然 (Jianbing Man; City of Rock) to the always good-looking and well-composed photography by Qian Tiantian 钱添添. Qian was camera operator on My Dear Liar 受益人 (2019), which starred Da Peng, and she was co-d.p. on his latest outing as a director, One and Only 热烈, a street-dancing comedy starring Huang Bo 黄渤 and Wang Yibo 王一博, written by Da Peng and Su, to be released this summer.
The film’s Chinese title means “#KeepYouSafe”.
CREDITS
Presented by Shanghai Ruyi Production (CN), Shanghai The City Film (CN), Tianjin Maoyan Weiying Cultural Media (CN), Shanghai Taopiaopiao Movie & TV Culture (CN), China Film (CN).
Script: Su Biao, Da Peng [Dong Chengpeng]. Photography: Qian Tiantian. Editing: Tu Yiran. Music: Peng Fei. Art direction: Du Guangyu. Styling: Zhao Yige. Sound: Huang Zheng. Action: Bak Gye-cheon. Visual effects: Jiang Jun.
Cast: Da Peng [Dong Chengpeng] (Wei Ping’an), Li Xueqin (Wei Ruyi), Yin Zheng (Tony), Wang Xun (Qi Zhifu), Wang Shengdi (Wei Moli), Song Qian (Han Lu), Bai Yu (Feng Qiangqiang, Feng’s younger brother), Ma Li (Feng, company CEO), Jia Bing (Jin, Global Investment Office chairman), Yang Di (Yizhihua/Flower, internet streamer), Pan Binlong (Wang Wenxue, Li Meili’s husband), Ni Hongjie (Li Meili, Wei Ping’an’s ex-wife), Qiao Shan (Hu Liang, garage mechanic), Yu Yang (Zhang Facai), Liu Jinshan (Crouching Dragon chairman), Cao Bingkun (Ji’an policeman), Liang Chao (school head), Zhang Lin (PerfectGuy421), Lao Si [Tian Ye], Li Yinwei, Xia Zhen (Ghost House tourists), Deng Fei (Fang, Feng’s assistant), Li Nini (Zhao Yuxuan, falsely-accused schoolgirl), Zhang Wan’er (Qi Chang, schoolgirl who framed Zhao Yuxuan), Lou Naiming (orphanage head), Chen Zhixi (class teacher), Qinaritu (Inner Mongolian peasant), Lanxiya (Crouching Dragon receptionist), Fang Yuanyuan (Xiao F), Lin Ruoxi (young Han Lu), Da Neng [Zhao He] (Da Neng), Wu Haochen (wedding photographer).
Premiere: Hainan Island Film Festival (Gala Screening), 18 Dec 2022.
Release: China, 10 Mar 2023.