Oh My God
从天“儿”降
China, 2015, colour, 2.35:1, 97 mins.
Directors: Wei Nan 魏楠, Wei Min 魏民.
Rating: 4/10.
Produced by Guo Jingming, this shallow millennial comedy has a kind of gay-parenting subplot attached.
STORY
Beijing, the present day, April. For the past year, Le Yi (Zhang Yixing), his girlfriend of three years Lu Mijia (Li Xiaolu) and his childhood BFF Chen Mo (Chen Xuedong) have shared a large modern house in the hills outside the city. Lu Mijia is troubled that Le Yi seems to prefer Chen Mo’s company to hers, and Mo Han (Jiang Wen), a yoga instructor who fancies Chen Mo, has invited round her maternal aunt (Zhang Yao) to advise on the problem. That night a magical glowing stone silently arrives in the house from outer space. Nothing is resolved during the discussion, which ends with Lu Mijia giving Le Yi half a day to decide between her and Chen Mo. Mo Han stays on at the house to be close to Chen Mo, who still shows no interest in her. Next morning the four wake up to find a baby in the living room. Lu Mijia thinks it looks like Le Yi, and accuses him of hiding something from her. Everyone goes to a hospital for a paternity test, and the DNA result shows that Le Yi and Chen Mo are the parents. That evening Mo Han accompanies Chen Mo to a maternity hospital to get some breast milk to feed the baby, and she stays on at the house to help look after the baby, especially when Lu Mijia tells her it would be a good opportunity to spend time with Chen Mo. Meanwhile, Le Yi explains to Lu Mijia that Chen Mo was orphaned by a car crash for which he was partly to blame, and because Chen Mo has no other friends they can’t throw him out of the house. Chen Mo is told by his boss to bring the baby to his workplace as he needs pictures of a male baby for an advertising campaign. Mo Han also tells him to bring the baby to a reunion of her schoolfriends so she can pretend – especially to her bitchy pal Niu Peixin (Qin Shupei) – that she’s now successfully married and has a child. On the recommendation of Niu Peixin’s husband Ma Ke (Chen Chusheng), Chen Mo attends an exclusive parenting institute for men run by Nan (Yu Xiaowei). But after a couple of days of caring for the baby, tensions among the four build up at the house.
REVIEW
Four self-obsessed millennials find their intertwined relationships thrown into further confusion by the arrival of a baby from outer space in Oh My God 从天“儿”降, the directorial debut of brothers Wei Nan 魏楠 (one of the Mainland’s top trailer editors) and Wei Min 魏民 (a top commercials editor and director). Theirs may be the names on the can, but the crucial credit is that of the film’s creative producer 监制 Guo Jingming 郭敬明, the young Shanghai-based writer-publisher-stylista Wunderkind who was then, at the age of 32, riding high with the success of his own writing-directing debut, the Tiny Times 小时代 tetralogy (2013-15). Released five months after the final Tiny Times film, God made only a meh RMB54 million at the local box office, despite being aimed at the same kind of audience (teenage girls) and saturated in Guo’s trademarks of pretty metrosexual boys, pretty fashionista girls, and a fantasy lifestyle of unsupported luxury.
Unknown outside the Mainland, God can be seen in retrospect as the start of Guo’s fall from grace following the era-defining Tiny Times movies. His next film, the splashy motion-capture martial-arts fantasy L.O.R.D: Legend of Ravaging Dynasties 爵迹 (2016), failed to be the mega-hit expected, and a subsequent martial-arts saga, 晴雅集, has failed to materialise so far. Meanwhile, he’s kept busy writing TVDs and producing and co-scripting movies for others, notably the iffy school-bullying saga Cry Me a Sad River 悲伤逆流成河 (2018, from his own novel) and the yet-to-be-released romance The End of Endless Love 如果声音不记得 (also directed by Luo Luo 落落, pen name of Shanghai authoress Zhao Jiarong 赵佳蓉).
Underneath all the colourful visuals, vaguely scifi set-up, and sanitised, sexless goings-on, God is basically about two male BFFs fathering and bringing up a baby together – a controversial theme for a mainstream Mainland comedy and the campest of Guo’s productions to date (even including the Tiny Times films and L.O.R.D). Though the dialogue at times skirts very close to gay comedy, it’s never pushed very far and the story is clearly signed as a complete fantasy, with one character even saying, rather unwisely, “You don’t think our story is rubbish 狗血 enough already?” Despite these restrictions – or maybe because of them – the four scriptwriters have difficulty stretching the under-developed plot across 90-something minutes, with copious fart and faeces jokes and the second half padded out with song montages. The underlying theme safely resolves itself with a heterosexual finale, but the emotional conflicts up until then are laughable, as hollow as the Gen-90ers themselves.
One problem with the movie is that, though the two girls are peripheral to the central story, the female characters are much more interesting than the bland, expressionless male ones, especially as played by actor-model Chen Xuedong 陈学冬 (Tiny Times 4 小时代 灵魂尽头, 2015; L.O.R.D), 25, and actor-singer Zhang Yixing 张艺兴, 24, in his first major role after a supporting turn in Ex-Files 2: The Backup Strikes Back 前任2 备胎反击战 (2015).
In contrast, the girls wipe the floor with them in character terms. The experienced Li Xiaolu 李小璐 (Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl 天浴, 1998) looks great and does as much as possible opposite the louche playing of Zhang, but younger actress Jiang Wen 姜雯, in her big-screen debut, is sparky throughout and even manages some occasional chemistry with the blank-faced Chen. As her tattooed aunt, actress-singer Zhang Yao 张瑶, 35, is drolly amusing. Among those popping up in cameos, for no good reason, are martial artist Shi Yanneng 释延能 and, at the end, actress Zhang Ziyi 章子怡, who also takes a producer credit alongside Wei Nan. Another name, credited with “artistic supervision”, is Taiwan director Chen Zhengdao 陈正道 [Leste Chen], then on a high with the success of body-swap comedy Miss Granny 重返20岁 (2015).
Hong Kong d.p. Ke Xingpei 柯星沛 [O Sing-pui] (Gallants 打擂台, 2010) wraps the whole confection in pretty images, and the score by Ma Shangyou 马上又 (Sacrifice 赵氏孤儿, 2010; Bad Guys Always Die 坏蛋必须死, 2015) is more attentive than much of the action deserves. The film’s Chinese title means “A ‘Child’ Descended from the Heavens”.
CREDITS
Presented by Beijing Starlit Movie & TV Culture (CN), China Film (CN), Le Vision Pictures (Beijing) (CN), Youth Film Studio (CN), Beijing MaxTimes Cultural Development (CN).
Script: Li Xi, Wei Min, Yang Jun, You Sihan. Photography: Ke Xingpei [O Sing-pui]. Editing: Zheng Lvnan. Music: Ma Shangyou. Art direction: Ma Haitao. Styling: Ivan. Sound: Chen Yan. Action: Luo Lixian [Bruce Law]. Visual effects: You Tao, Wei Nan. Wei Min. Artistic supervision: Chen Zhengdao.
Cast: Chen Xuedong (Chen Mo), Jiang Wen (Mo Han), Zhang Yixing (Le Yi), Li Xiaolu (Lu Mijia), Zhang Ziyi (wedding supervisor), Huang Xiaowan (Halei/Harry), Ouyang Junwen (Yexing/OK), Zhang Yao (Mo Han’s aunt), Yu Xiaowei (Nan, manager), Chen Chusheng (Ma Ke/Mark), Qin Shupei (Niu Peixin, Mo Han’s bitchy schoolfriend), Hu Yanbin (father at parenting institute), Shi Yanneng (martial-arts instructor), Batu (father at parenting institute), Yao Miao (Mo Han’s schoolfriend), Fan Tiantian (Mo Han’s older schoolfriend), Wang Bogu (Chen Mo’s mother), Li Youwei (Chen Mo’s father), Wang Rui (Le Yi’s father).
Release: China, 4 Dec 2015.