When Love Comes
当爱来的时候
Taiwan, 2010, colour, 1.85:1, 107 mins.
Director: Zhang Zuoji 张作骥.
Rating: 6/10.
Over-long but finally rewarding drama centred on a teenage daughter in a dysfunctional family.
STORY
Taibei, the present day. In an oldstyle multi-level house in the city, Lv Laichun (Li Yijie), 16, lives a claustrophobic existence with her extended family, originally from Jinmen. The family is made up of her father Dark Face (Lin Yushun), his wife Xuefeng (Lv Xuefeng) and “second wife” Zihua (He Zihua), Xuefeng’s aged father (Wei Renqing), Lv Lai-chun’s younger sister Lv Lairi (Li Pinyi), and Dark Face’s retarded younger brother Jie (Gao Mengjie). They run a small restaurant in a shopping arcade, where Zihua, the mother of both Lv Laichun and Lv Lairi, one day gives birth to a boy. Remote from her dysfunctional family, which is ruled over by the barren Xuefeng, Lv Laichun lives in her own world of dreams, boys and easy relationships. When she finds she’s already four months’ pregnant by her latest boyfriend, Mou Zongfu (Wu Kangren) – who promptly abandons her – she’s unable to have an abortion. Upset and needing to get away from Taibei, Lv Laichun goes with her family to Jinmen, where events start to mould her future.
REVIEW
Whether When Love Comes 当爱来的时候 marks a new stage in the arty career of Taiwan director Zhang Zuoji 张作骥 remains to be seen, but there’s an emotional warmth to the film that’s certainly light-years away from the dead-end world of his recent Soul of a Demon 蝴蝶 (2007). Working-class family conflicts and social alienation have been common elements in all his movies since he drew international attention with Ah Chung 忠仔 (1996), and there’s certainly heaps of conflict to get through in Love before the movie (and its main female character, self-obsessed teenager Lv Laichun) finally blooms near the end. But unlike his earlier films such as Darkness and Light 黑暗时光 (1999) and The Best of Times 美丽时光 (2002), Love at least has hope at the end of its tunnel, and Zhang, now approaching 50, shows signs of going with the emotional flow rather than always imposing a rigidly auteurist stance on his material.
The film benefits a lot from the casting in the lead role of newcomer Li Yijie 李亦捷, who manages to move between teenage sulkiness, self-absorption and bloody-mindedness without alienating the audience, and to carry the viewer into her butterfly-like transformation near the end, where the film seems to become bathed in Lv Laichun’s growing oestrogen. With a tighter ending at this point, and some trimming of the repetitive earlier quarreling, Love would have been even better. As it stands, it’s still Zhang’s most approachable movie, with a script that doesn’t unnecessarily confuse the audience and has a clear emotional arc. His more fluid direction – with short scenes building a tapestry of dysfunctional but basically loving family life – and the saturated colours of the cinematography by Zhang Zhan 张展 are further enhanced by the copious score of Wu Ruiran 吴睿然. Its softly plangent character takes on a Philippe Sarde-like, flowing quality near the end that’s genuinely liberating.
In the showiest role, Lv Xuefeng 吕雪凤 rules the roost as the loud-mouthed first wife, though it’s He Zihua 何子华 who gives the most sympathetic one as the quieter second wife. The film is dedicated to actress Qiu Xiumin 邱秀敏 (Ah Chung), who died this year [2010] and can be seen in a brief role as the mother of Lv Laichun’s errant boyfriend.
CREDITS
Presented by Chang Tso Chi Film Studio (TW). Produced by Chang Tso Chi Film Studio (TW).
Script: Zhang Zuoji, Xie Huiqing. Photography: Zhang Zhan. Editing: Zhang Zuoji. Music: Wu Ruiran. Song: Lin Shengde. Art direction: Peng Weimin. Costumes: Pan Lunlin. Sound: Mou Zongfu, Zhang Zhaomin.
Cast: Li Yijie (Lv Laichun), He Zihua (Zihua, father’s second wife), Lin Yushun (Dark Face, father), Wei Renqing (grandfather), Lv Xuefeng (Xuefeng, father’s first wife), Gao Mengjie (Jie, Dark Face’s mentally retarded younger brother), Li Pinyi (Lv Lairi, Lv Laichun’s younger sister), Wu Kangren (Mou Zongfu, Lv Laichun’s boyfriend), Fan Zhiwei (mortician), Tseng Yizhe (Yizhe), Cai Jiede (Chen), Qiu Xiumin (Mou Zongfu’s mother).
Premiere: Pusan Film Festival (Gala Presentation), 9 Oct 2010.
Release: Taiwan, 29 Oct 2010.
(Review originally published on Film Business Asia, 29 Oct 2010.)