Fantôme, où es-tu?
酷马
Taiwan, 2010, colour, 1.85:1, 104 mins.
Director: Wang Xiaodi 王小棣.
Rating: 2/10.
Lame ghost-cum-gender mishmash that squanders its potential.
STORY
Taibei, the present day. While training in a park one night, high-school student and talented marathon runner Ma Jun’an, nicknamed Cool Ma (Huang Yuan), is viciously wounded by androgynous punkette Wang Yutang (Zheng Jingxin) when she mistakes his attempts to save her in a confused teenage brawl as an attack on her. To the grief of his working-class mother (Gu Mingshen), who raised him alone after his father’s early death, Ma Jun’an subsequently dies in hospital and discovers he has turned into a wraith who can only be seen and heard by Wang Yutang. Truculent, and confused over her gender, tomboy Wang Yutang constantly argues with her wealthy, conventional parents (Ai Wei, Fu Juan), who had always wanted a son, and only reluctantly agrees to help Ma Jun’an communicate with the outside world. But as the two get to know each other, and to help atone for her mistake, she finally agrees to train as a marathon runner under Ma Jun’an’s coach Liu Quanyi (Lan Zhenglong), despite the fact she’s dropped out of school. Liu Quanyi is under pressure at the high school for allowing juvenile offenders to train in his team, and has to make a good showing at a forthcoming marathon race. And Ma Jun’an’s mother, still full of hatred for Wang Yutang and her family, has hired a private detective agency to follow her, hoping to influence her probation process.
REVIEW
How the original script by Chen Yaoqi 陈耀圻 [Richard Chen], on which Fantôme, où es-tu? 酷马 is based, would have turned out under his own direction will never be known. But it can safely be said that Chen (The Diary of Di-Di 蒂蒂日记, 1977; Spring Swallow 晚春情事, 1989), a craftsman of the 1970s and 1980s who effectively retired after the impressive Autumn Moon 明月几时圆 (1990) and whose name is now unfortunately lost to history, would have come up with something more impressive than this adaptation by writer-director Wang Xiaodi 王小棣. Chen turned the script (Road-Runner Cool Ma 路跑酷马) over to Wang when he decided not to direct, and from its new, posey French title (meaning “Ghost, Where Are You?”), through its clunky gender politics, to its stilted dialogue and weak lead performances, Fantôme deserves to be quietly laid to rest.
Chen’s original script was inspired by the real-life accidental killing in 2001 of a 17-year-old boy by an under-age youth, and how the dead boy’s mother initially vowed revenge but later ended up seeing the killer put through further education. The adaptation by Wang and her partner Huang Liming 黄黎明 appears to have spliced in a lot of discussion by the killer (here, an androgynous teenager) about her sexual identity (she thinks she’s a boy) that’s either soupy or embarrassingly simplistic (“I won’t wear a skirt!”). They also let the plot wander this way and that prior to a finale based round a marathon race in which everyone ends up hugging and tearful. The more interesting story of the mother’s forgiveness hardly makes an appearance, and thanks to the stilted direction the film doesn’t even work as a mainstream heart-tugger.
Newcomer Zheng Jingxin 郑靓歆, discovered on the internet, looks the part of a truculent tomboy but largely uses one set facial expression (clenched jaw) rather than any inherent acting ability. As her rather wimpy victim, singer Huang Yuan 黄远 is weak, and TV star Lan Zhenglong 蓝正龙 makes little impression as his former marathon trainer. Veteran Gu Mingshen 古名伸 is okay as the boy’s grief-stricken mother but like the other actors is left high-and-dry by the thin script. Wang’s exaggerated reputation in some quarters of Taiwan’s film industry is unjustified by her relatively small body of four previous features, among which only her first, China-set rural drama Accidental Legend 飞天 (1995), is of some interest. As in that film (shot by ace d.p. Li Pingbin 李屏宾 [Mark Lee]), she shows a good eye for visual composition, here nicely executed by Zhou Yiwen 周以文 (What on Earth Have I Done Wrong?! 情非得已之生存之道, 2007; Orz Boyz! 囧男孩, 2008), but not much else.
CREDITS
Presented by Rice Film International (TW), Lumiere (TW). Produced by Rice Film International (TW).
Script: Huang Liming, Wang Xiaodi. Original script: Chen Yaoqi [Richard Chen]. Photography: Zhou Yiwen. Editing: Lei Zhenqing. Music: Shi Xieyong. Art direction: Chen Yongzhi. Styling: Pan Lunlin. Costumes: Qiu Shiyu. Sound: Luo Songce, Chen Dequan.
Cast: Lan Zhenglong (Liu Quanyi, trainer), Gu Mingshen (Ma Jun’an’s mother), Huang Yuan (Ma Jun’an/Cool Ma), Zheng Jingxin (Wang Yutang/Tang Guo), Fu Juan (Wang Yutang’s mother), Ai Wei (Wang Yutang’s father), Lin Fangwei (Zhang Shaozhen, probation officer).
Premiere: Taipei Film Festival (Closing Film), 15 July 2010.
Release: Taiwan, 17 Sep 2010.
(Review originally published on Film Business Asia, 31 Jan 2011.)