Warm Hug

温暖的抱抱

China, 2020, colour, 2.35:1, 112 mins.

Director: Chang Yuan 常远.

Rating: 7/10.

Entertaining comedy about an OCD piano teacher and a very untidy singer is a de facto Ma Hua FunAge movie.

STORY

Qiming city, somewhere in China, the present day. Bao Bao (Chang Yuan) is the ultimate OCD freak, living in an all-white, hyper-sanitised flat, with his life planned and regulated to the second, and always wearing the same white clothes. A piano teacher at the Starting Point Instruments Centre 起点乐器城 music school, he’s hated by his colleagues and his pupils don’t even turn up for his lessons. Bao Bao would like to live a normal life but just can’t: he cannot even stand to be hugged, for sanitary reasons. So one day he decides to commit suicide at exactly 18:00 by jumping off the music school’s roof. All goes to plan, except that, as he jumps, a hand reaches out to him. (Two hours earlier, in his first road accident, Bao Bao had crashed his spotless white scooter into that of Song Wennuan [Li Qin], who was on her way to an audition for the King of Original Songs 原创之王, a singer-songwriters’ contest organised by the well-known Wang Weiren [Qiao Shan]. Bao Bao had followed her, as she’d taken all the documents he’d assembled for his own cremation, and she had been forced to improvise a performance as he had tried to interrupt her act. She had ended up getting through to the next round – but only if her “partner” was with her, as he had proved more popular with online voters. After following Bao Bao back to the music school and saving him, Song Wennuan had talked to him on the roof.) The two are forced to work together and, calling their act Go Back To Life 起死回生, they have 18 days to prepare an act for the next round. Song Wennuan, however, lives in an untidy flat is a bustling neighbourhood, and cannot stand Bao Bao’s endless attempts to clean it up. She takes him to the Comfort Centre 心灵疗养院, run by Jia (Shen Teng), an unconventional doctor, to cure him of his OCD. There he explains how his parents (Tian Yu, Wang Zhi), had the same disorder, and never hugged him as a child. Jia takes him on as a patient, and later, when drunk one evening, Song Wennuan reveals to Bao Bao the real reason why she must win the competition organised by Wang Weiren.

REVIEW

Chang Yuan 常远, a member of Beijing-based comedy troupe Ma Hua FunAge 开心麻花 for the past decade, makes an entertaining directing debut with Warm Hug 温暖的抱抱, an odd-couple rom-com that – though not technically a Ma Hua production – is full of his colleagues and very much crafted in the company’s vein of droll humour. Inspired by the 2014 South Korean comedy Plan Man 플랜맨, in which an OCD librarian teams up with a messy female musician in a singing contest, it’s basically a one-joke movie but finds enough variations on its single theme (and has a smooth enough cast and production values) to pretty much sustain itself for almost two hours. Helped by smooth packaging, and the presence of comic names like Ma Hua stalwart Shen Teng 沈腾 (who had a big, uncredited influence on the script) and tubby comic Qiao Shan 乔杉, it’s proved a very solid turn-of-the year hit, taking some RMB780 million in just over three weeks. [Final tally was RMB865 million.] That’s way down on Ma Hua’s major hits of over RMB2 billion but very nice all the same, especially considering that Chang himself and actress Li Qin 李沁 – neither big stars – take the main roles.

Hug follows in a line of some previous Ma Hua outings being inspired by existing classics – Hello Mr. Billionaire 西虹市首富 (2018) by the US novel Brewster’s Millions, and Hello, Mrs. Money 李茶的“姑妈” (2018) by the UK stage farce Charley’s Aunt – and takes a similarly free approach to the Korean original, written and directed by first-timer Seong Shi-heub 성시흡 | 成时翕 and starring Jeong Jae-yeong 정재영 | 郑在咏 and Han Ji-min 한지민 | 韩志旼 (see poster, left). Clearly compensating not only for the culture change but also by the fact that a comedy about OCD has more resonance in a convention-bound society like South Korea’s, Hug is much more knockabout and comically extreme, starting with a title sequence showing its protagonist, Bao Bao, living an almost robotic lifestyle in an all-white flat that’s sanitised and ordered to the minutest detail (“I’ve spent my whole life cleaning,” he says in voiceover). But beneath the pudding-basin haircut and expressionless face lurks a personality screaming to get out, a man who would love to live a normal life but just can’t. Cue a failed suicide attempt thanks to Song Wennuan, a chaotically organised songwriter-performer who’s everything he isn’t.

Though repeated several times, jokes like Bao Bao endlessly cleaning up Song Wennuan’s flat behind her back are consistently funny, thanks to the two performers’ chemistry and some inventive variations. The introduction at the half-hour mark of Shen, playing the unconventional head of a psychiatric clinic, also helps to maintain interest, with the actor’s straight-faced brand of comedy (as he tries to cure Bao Bao of his OCD) adding a touch of class to the proceedings. Other Ma Hua names like Ma Li 马丽 (as a randy foot masseuse), Ai Lun 艾伦 (a marathon presenter) and Huang Cailun 黄才伦 (a doctor-turned-patient) also pop up here and there, as well as reliable actors from earlier films like Wei Xiang 魏翔 as a hearse driver and Tian Yu 田雨 and Wang Zhi 王智 as Bao Bao’s equally-OCD parents (who just about managed to conceive him but never dared to give him a hug for sanitary reasons).

Tianjin-born Chang, 39, comes from a family of traditional cross-talk 相声 comedians and previously played character roles like the weirdo department head in Love in the Office 一路向前 (2015), the best friend on the run in crime comedy The Big Lie Bang 谎言大爆炸 (2016) and the transvestite in Ma Hua’s first hit film, Goodbye Mr. Loser 夏洛特烦恼 (2015). He partners well with Li, 30, an elegant opera performer-turned-actress, often in costume roles (Mr. & Mrs. Incredible 神奇侠侣, 2011; Jade Dynasty I 诛仙I, 2019), who motors a lot of the relationship with her utterly modern, devil-may-care attitude. Both also rise to the later challenge of showing a less comic side to their characters. Holding up the other half of the story is the experienced Qiao (so good in recent comedy Bath Buddy 沐浴之王, 2020), as a crafty, egocentric singer-presenter who turns out to be Song Wennuan’s nemesis. The talent-show finale is hardly new for Mainland cinema – and feels a bit stretched and maudlin compared with the rest of the film – but is capably enough handled. Overall, the film would benefit from tightening by about 10 minutes.

Shot in late 2019, just prior to the coronavirus outbreak, it’s technically polished, with some clever (and apposite) use of split screen near the end, interesting colour design by art director Zhang Lili 张立丽 (Almost a Comedy 半个喜剧, 2019), and versatile widescreen photography (evoking different mental moods) by Li Jian 李剑 (black comedy A Cool Fish 无名之辈, 2018).

The film’s title and some of the characters’ names contain some untranslatable jokes. The title literally means “Warm Hug” but can also mean “Wennuan’s Hug”, referring to the name of the heroine, Song Wennuan 宋温暖 (literally, “Warm Song”). The main character’s weird name, Bao Bao 鲍抱, sounds exactly like the film title’s characters for “Hug” 抱抱 but actually means “Hug Bao”, with the first Bao 鲍 a family name. The real name of the villain of the piece, Wang Weiren, was originally 枉为人 (“Useless As A Human Being”) but then changed to 王为仁 (“King of Benevolence”) when he became famous. And so on.

CREDITS

Presented by Shanghai Aim Media Pictures (CN), Huayi Brothers Pictures (CN), Shanghai Taopiaopiao Movie & TV Culture (CN), Huanxi Media Group (Tianjin) (CN), Beijing Wishart Media (CN), Beijing Sparkle Roll Media (CN).

Script: Chang Yuan, Leng Xuyang, Wang Zhijun. Photography: Li Jian. Editing: Zhu Lin. Music: Li He, Liu Le. Art direction: Zhang Lili. Styling: Tan Xiaoshi. Sound: Yin Jie.

Cast: Chang Yuan (Bao Bao), Li Qin (Song Wennuan), Shen Teng (Jia, doctor), Qiao Shan (Wang Weiren), Tian Yu (Bao Bao’s father), Wang Zhi (Bao Bao’s mother), Wei Xiang (hearse driver), Wang Chengsi (Zhadan/Bomb, patient), Zhang Zidong (Zhang Dongdong/Move Zhang, patient), Chen Haoming (An Quan/Safe Ann), Zhang Yiming (presenter), Mi Ke (young Bao Bao), Ma Li (Sister Li, foot masseuse), Ai Lun (Colour Run marathon presenter), Huang Cailun (Li Bo, patient, former psychologist), Wang Ning (stylist), Wu Mochou (herself, competition judge), Li Haiyin (TV director’s assistant), Xu Wenhe.

Release: China, 31 Dec 2020.