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During the Eastern Jin Dynasty, parents dress
a very pretty, very privileged girl (Charlie Yeung) like a boy so
she may be educated in a local boarding school. There, she falls
in love with a poor, but handsome and industrious young man (Nicky
Wu), but their short love affair ends in disaster.
Tsui Hark delivers a lavishly directed love story that follows a
well worn story but makes it come out looking fresh and new. The
first thing that strikes you about this film is the use of colour.
The entire aesthetic looks like a painting and Tsui Hark manages
to choose some wonderful, lush looking scenery to help evoke the
characters emotions. A lot of time has obviously been given to the
story and the pacing is just right as you really develop an affinity
with the lead characters. Perhaps too much time is given to to initial
section but in my opinion this helps to make the ending all the
more poignant. The film is full of little directional touches and
does by no means cop out with the ending. One particularly impressive
touch is how the lighting gets slowly darker near the end. It is
as if somebody is turning down the lights on a play as it reaches
it's conclusion. As this is a love story it is clearly not for the
action fan but it is definitely worth your time as by the end you
will feel you have not only taken in the wonderful scenery but learnt
something as well. This is because Tsui has included his usual subtle
political undertones. One minor flaw is Charlie Yeung's character
and the scenes where she is trying to pass herself off as a boy.
It should be blatantly obvious to anyone that she is in fact female
as in the similarly themed 'Fong Sai Yuk'. However, if you can overlook
this there is much to enjoy here and the film is also extremely
cute in parts.
If you are a fan of love stories this is the best of the bunch.
Marvelously shot with brilliant attention to detail this film is
truly a winner. With this film Tsui Hark concretes his reputation
as one of Hong Kong's most gifted film making talents. An overlooked
classic that deserves to be distributed in much the same way as
the more internationally recognised directors work. A subtle and
quaint masterwork.
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