Backed up by Shaw Brothers, and featuring Chow Yun-fat in one of the protagonist roles, Stanley Kwan‘s feature debut was a crowning success, both in the box office and in the Hong Kong Film Awards, where, despite its failure to win any, it was nominated for nine awards.
As the story begins, Bao-er, fed up with her Derek, her husband’s cheating, decides to divorce him. To adapt to her new life as a single woman and mother of young boy Dang Dang, she seeks solace with a group of friends in similar situations, who call themselves the ‘Happy Spinsters Club’. Despite the seemingly happy front that her “sisters” put on, underneath it all each of them secretly yearns for a man in their lives, with them frequently arranging (group) dates. In the meanwhile, Derek moves in with his new girlfriend, Sha Niu, who is much younger that Bao-er but much more immature also. The interactions between the three continue, despite the divorce, occasionally with comical, occasionally with dramatic consequences. Derek eventually starts getting fed up with Sha Niu shenanigans.
Stanley Kwan directs a movie that portrays women through a rather unusual for the era approach, with sensitivity and avoiding both the male perspective on their lives and their exotification as Chinese women. At the same time, however, he also shows that the setting his protagonists inhabit is “a man’s world” and that the omnipresent conflict of deciding between the heart and the mind usually finds the former as the winner.
This element is what gives the narrative a melodramatic essence for the most part, particularly deriving from the ways of the members of the club, all of which try to present an image of happiness that shouts ‘we don’t need men” but failing on hiding the truth. Luo Shan is the prime example of this approach, with her suicide attempt revealing her true mentality in the most shocking manner, and in intense contrast with the behaviour she exhibited before. Bao-er on the other hand, differs on that regard, since she never pretends to feel comfortable in her single mother life, with her constant inner conflict and sense of discomfort being subtly but palpably presented, in a great performance by Cora Miao.
Another element Bao-er presents greatly is the sense of insecurity women feel about their body and appearance in general, with the scene in the gym where she stumbles upon Sha Niu highlighting this element in a rather amusing fashion. Sha Niu gets naked immediately and starts picking on older Bao-Er who feels she cannot compete with her much younger “adversary”, even hiding behind the shower curtain to avoid showing her body.
This approach, of portraying realistic and essentially dramatic comments through a playful, occasionally humorous approach is actually the one that permeates the narrative, and the one that deems “Women” rather entertaining. One of the main mediums of this approach is Cherie Chung’s acting, who presents Sha Niu as completely immature, essentially acting like a frustrated little girl all the time, with her antithesis with Bao-er’s ways being one of the best assets of the movie. Particularly the scene when the three of them confront each other for a taxi, ending up with a broken shop window, is one of the most impressively shot in the film, highlighting both Kwan’s direction and DP Bill Wong’s way of capturing the sudden event, in the fashion.
At the time the film came out, homosexuality was still criminalized in Hong Kong (something that lasted until 1991) and Stanley Kwan had not yet come out. However, he still manages to induce a subtle element of homosexuality in the film, by having a lesbian among the group of women, Terry, who even asks from Bao-er if she would like to be with her. Another brief scene, during a drunken night of the girls at an art exhibition, has Terry asking the artist if he is gay, with him answering that he likes 90% women and 10% men, which seems like the number presenting how much about the concept Kwan could show on screen.
The difference between the levels of maturity also includes Bao-er and Derek, with the latter also acting frequently as a child, with the scenes he antagonizes Chang, a boy that became his son’s friend upon his absence, highlighting his pedantic jealousy. Chow Yun-fat depicts this aspect of his character quite convincingly, although on a secondary level. On the other hand, Bao-er is frequently shown taking the high road, not bad mouthing Derek to her son, even when the latter accuses her of being the one responsible of ruining their family.
Kwan’s approach may include much comedy (the clumsy mover is hilarious) and drama on occasion, but the main element here is realism, a concept that is mirrored in the fact that none of the protagonists are without faults, an approach that is actually cemented in the ending titles of the movie, which essentially tear down the happy ending premises. This element, however, is a bit off, since presenting such a significant plot twist just in writing is not exactly the ideal way to do it, even more so since it includes two rather significant comments: that people do not change, and that balance within a relationship can be achieved in ways other than the “proper” ones.
Lastly, Siu Sum Chew and Fang Bao-hua’s editing emerges as one of the best assets of the movie, with the fast pace they implement suiting the episodic nature of the narrative, while allowing Kwan much time to both analyze his characters and present his comments.
“Women” is an impressive debut, both entertaining and contextually intriguing, showcasing many of the elements that brought Stanley Kwan on the pantheon of independent Hong Kong cinema.
