Lacuna

醉后一夜

China, 2012, colour, 2.35:1, 94 mins.

Directors: Zeng Guoxiang 曾国祥 [Derek Tsang], Yin Zhiwen 尹志文 [Jimmy Wan].

Rating: 8/10.

Offbeat Beijing rom-com, mixed up in a puzzle, is beautifully played by its two leads.

STORY

Beijing, the present day. After a heavy night of drinking, Shen Wei (Shawn Yue) wakes up next to Tong Xin (Zhang Jingchu) in a bed in a furniture store. Neither can remember how they got there, and quietly go their separate ways. Shen Wei, however, can’t find his car. Back in his hotel room, he finds the place full of comatose people, and at work his colleagues tease him about pictures on the web of him drinking with actress Meng Qiqi (Yan Wenxuan) and Tong Xin. Shen Wei remembers nothing. Meanwhile, Tong Xin is called by her boss, film director Shen Lei (Zhang Nan), asking her whether she delivered the RMB300,000 he gave her to quietly end his relationship with Meng Qiqi. Tong Xin can’t remember whether she handed the money over or, if she didn’t, where it is now; and in her bag is a live frog. She tries to reach Meng Qiqi but the latter doesn’t answer her phone. Shen Wei’s friends tell him they all went out to celebrate the birthday of an unattached female friend, Jin Ni (Wang Meiqian), and ended up drinking in one club after another, with Shen Wei losing his friend Baimao (Zhou Junwei) en route and somehow getting hooked up with the equally drunk Tong Xin. Meanwhile, Tong Xin meets her ex-boyfriend Zhang Lei (Zhu Yuchen) and his new girlfriend Stephy (Lin Ziluo) and hears how the three of them, plus Shen Wei, went clubbing last night. Tong Xin still remembers nothing. Then Shen Wei gets a call from Sanlitun Police Station asking him and “his girlfriend” to come and collect their pet that they reported missing last night. He meets Tong Xin and, on the way, the two collect a bag from Vic’s night club, where they’re told they spent RMB90,000 last night. Their puzzlement is doubled when they see the pet they have to collect at the police station. But even then the whole mystery of what happened last night isn’t nearly solved.

REVIEW

An offbeat rom-com set across 24 hours, in which two strangers try to piece together how they woke up in bed together after a massive bender, Lacuna 醉后一夜 is a major leap in quality by Hong Kong directors Zeng Guoxiang 曾国祥 [Derek Tsang] (son of veteran actor Zeng Zhiwei [Eric Tsang]) and Yin Zhiwen 尹志文 [Jimmy Wan] after their first feature, the thin portmanteau movie Lover’s Discourse 恋人絮语 (2010). Whereas that movie seemed to be stretching a sliver of content across each of the four stories, and with little to say, Lacuna takes a single cute idea and sustains it across an hour and a half with no sense of strain or repetitiveness. That’s partly due to the clever script by Gu Yu 谷峪 and Zhang Youyou 张优优 that just keeps springing fresh twists but also to the natural screen chemistry between Mainland actress Zhang Jingchu 张静初, who’s had trouble finding a niche after earlier successes like The Road 芳香之旅 (2006), and Hong Kong actor-singer Yu Wenle 余文乐 [Shawn Yue], too often under-exploited in cold action roles.

The film partly owes its genesis to 4+1 4夜奇谭 (2010), a series of Mainland shorts by Hong Kong director-producer Peng Haoxiang 彭浩翔 [Pang Ho-cheung] that was made for the internet; the first was directed by Zeng and Yin, and the other three by Taiwan’s Chen Zhengdao 陈正道 [Leste Chen]. Each running about 50 minutes, and in two halves, they featured some of the same actors as Lacuna and many of the same crew, including writers Gu and Zhang, d.p. Lin Zhijian 林志坚 [Charlie Lam], plus expert scoring by Li Yaoshi 李药师 and skilful editing by Hong Kong’s Li Dongquan 李栋全 [Wenders Li]. Zhang Jingchu and Yu starred separately in the best-acted ones, both directed by Chen: Yu in War of Lies 谎言大作战, about an ex-couple who pretend to be together for family reasons, and Zhang in When Love Spreads on Weibo 爱在微博蔓延时, about an ex-couple who revisit their past. Peng’s idea of bringing the two stars together for the first time pays dividends: both spark gently off each other throughout the story’s twists and turns, and then blossom in the rom part of the com in the final half-hour.

In glasses and tousled hair, Zhang, now in her early 30s, looks more relaxed and natural. A year or so her junior, Yu, who needs the right roles to bloom as a likeable screen character, finds the same easy tone he displayed under Peng as a director (Love in a Puff 志明与春娇, 2010; Love in the Buff 春娇与志明, 2012). Though their roles require them both to keep saying “I don’t remember” a lot of the time, they make the characters interesting enough to share their journey, as well as avoiding meet-cute cliches. They’re supported by a colourful cast of Mainland personalities, big and small, as well as getting a couple of good scenes with two more actors from 4+1 – Hong Kong-born singer-actor Zhou Junwei 周俊伟 as a Cantonese friend of Yu’s character and Mainland actor Zhu Yuchen 朱雨辰 as the ex-boyfriend of Zhang’s.

Though some poetic moments in the final section show their Hong Kong sensibilities, Zeng and Yin show a feel for autumnal Beijing, its night-life and gruff denizens, without seeming like cultural tourists, and Yu himself acts easily in Mandarin. The script’s MacGuffin – what happened to a missing bag of money? – keeps the movie alive as it tours the eastern part of the city and the pieces ever so slowly fall into place. Lacuna is basically a playful construct, spattered with humour that wouldn’t be out of place in one of Peng’s own movies; but it does its job with style and charm, as well as providing a tour de force for its two leads.

The Chinese title 醉后一夜 (“A Drunken Night [of Sex]”) is a play on words, sounding exactly the same in Mandarin as “The Final Night” 最后一夜 (zuìhòu yīyè). The film’s production title was a Cantonese term roughly meaning “Lost the Plot” 断了片.

CREDITS

Presented by HG Entertainment (CN), Fantasy Entertainment (CN).

Script: Gu Yu, Zhang Youyou. Photography: Lin Zhijian [Charlie Lam]. Editing: Li Dongquan [Wenders Li]. Music: Li Yaoshi. Production designer: Wen Nianzhong [Man Lim-chung]. Art direction: Jiang Hanlin [Jeffrey Kong]. Costume design: Xie Huixin.

Cast: Zhang Jingchu (Tong Xin), Yu Wenle [Shawn Yue] (Shen Wei), Zhou Junwei (Baimao), Lin Youjia (Chenjie, Tong Xin’s friend), Zhu Yuchen (Zhang Lei, Tong Xin’s ex-boyfriend), Yan Wenxuan (Meng Qiqi, actress), Wang Yi (Shen Wei’s friend), Yu Na (Feng), Wang Yunjia (passer-by), Sun Cong, Guo Meng, Hu Chen, Li Xiaozhai, Zhang Xiaoge, Teng Wenhao, Yang Yilang, Ren Guangyu (Shen Wei’s friends), Zhang Nan (Shen Lei, film director), Dou Wei (assistant director), Luan Jingjing, Gai Lun, Liu Wei, Zhang Yuming, Zhang Jiachuan, Liang Liyong, Bi Qi (Shen Wei’s work colleagues), Shuangzi (Josie), Zhang Chao (waiter), Lin Ziluo (Stephy), Wang Meiqian (Jin Ni/Jinny), Hei Yun (her black boyfriend), Guan Zhengnan (nightclub manager), Chen Yisha (Youyou), Du Minghua (Liu, police officer), Zhang Youyou (policewoman).

Release: China, 1 Jun 2012.

(Review originally published on Film Business Asia, 17 Jul 2012.)