Reviews

No doubt this is definitely not the best movie adopted from Sarah Waters' works, as far as I'm concerned. However, it's also not at the bottom of the list. I kind of like this dramatic plot but strongly detest the false ending.

Similar to Fingersmith, Affinity is a story of skin game. A woman plans to acquire her own freedom or even happy life on the sacrifice of another miserable woman. The swindler commits her scheme successfully through all the lies and deceptions. But there's no winner in Sarah Waters' stories. Huge price is paid. The conspiracy costs too much, purity, clear conscience, and maybe more.

The victim of Affinity, Margaret, was at the tragic focus. Living in a traditional society and a high-brow community, she found herself homosexual. Her secret lesbian lover, Helen, betrayed her and it made things even worse that Helen married her brother and made herself Margaret's sister-in-all. The only consolation left to Margaret was a strand of hair in her necklace lock. She kept all her secrets there and in her diary. Six months after her father's death, she was offered a job in Milbank Jail as a lady-visitor. There, she ran into her destiny, Celina.

Celina was sentenced to a four-year imprisonment. But the movie generously provides scenes to support her claim of innocence. Margaret devoted her curiosity, compassion, and finally her affection to this so-called affinity, which turns out to be beguilement in disguise.

Celina fled away with her real partner Vigers in a ship while Margaret committed suicide by drowning herself in the river. The ending would be prefect if it just stopped here or at most with Celina's inexplicable tear drops. The illusionary intimacy in water and Celina unquenchable grief which aroused Vigers' strong reproof "Remember whose girl you are" are really too much.

Is the affinity between them real or just a lie? I would like to make it unknown if I were the film director, because it is unknown. Who could tell for sure that Margaret killed herself out of nothing else but losing her one love of lifetime? She was desperate, when she was cheated for the second time, when she was given the last straw and taken away immediately after, when she lost everything she had, her money, her wooer, her hope for a brand new life. I cannot deny that she had a crush on Celina, but was it true love without any impurity? And as to the adorable puppet and great performer, Celina, who knows who her real affinity was? They were far away from affinity, not even close.

I haven't read this original novel yet so that I don't know whose idea it is to fake or at least exaggerate their love in the end. Sarah Waters, probably. She's too merciful. Maybe that's true that she worked out Fingersmith years later to compensate the sadness of this tragedy. It's a much better work.

Most of Sarah Waters' protagonists are lesbians. But I think she's intended to tell more than homoerotism. She writes about people. Women, especially the homosexual ones, are the most sensitive and sophisticated group of all. Sarah Waters makes her novels a stage, to reveal their, or to be more accurately, our life, love, desire, solitude, and the darkness in the deepest of our hearts. Lesbians are the representatives rather than all her subjects.

As one of the woman audience, I've seen myself mirrored in her work, more or less. And I've been seeking for the solution of life from her masterpieces. Have I found the answer? No, I haven't. I don't know if I can or if anyone else can. I even cannot tell for sure whether there's something like that in her creations or in this world. But one thing is certain that Sarah Waters tells us through her stories: Affinity may not find us some way out. But deception absolutely leads to destruction and corruption.

Ang Lee is one of my favorite movie directors while Aileen Chuang is one of the most famous Chinese woman writers. However, the movie Lust Caution, a product with their joint efforts, is unfortunately not a master piece at all, not even close.

The film scheme and the novel plot seemed to be alike in the main line but quite different in details. I could have appreciated it if it is not adopted from a master piece of Aileen Chuang. I don't know whether Ang Lee misunderstands what Aileen Chuang tried to express via this story or he plays the love card on purpose. Mr. Yee seemed to love JiaZhi back in the film, which totally betrayed the original work and almost makes me sick.

I think one can hardly apprehend her point without any background knowledge of the author's own life experiences. In the story, JiaZhi was abandoned by her father. He took his son to UK with him and left JiaZhi after the death of their mother on the concern of the deeply-rooted preference of boys over girls in China. Aileen Chuang herself was once mistreated by her own father and step mother and even mu-red up in a small room for quite a few years. Her mother was a self-centered woman so that she never really took good care of her children especially after the divorce with Aileen's father. Since having escaped from her father, Ailleen Chuang had lived with her auntie without the warmth of a healthy family until she met LanCheng Hu and fell in love. She's so crazy about him and provided him all she had regardless of his political status of a traitor, his marriage with another woman, his incompetence of making a living on his own, and even his frequent love affairs with other women. Even when she was finally fed up with him, she sent him a mount of money with the broke-up letter as she used to afford his living expenses no matter how financially stressed herself.

That's why she depicted JiaZhi in the way as she was. She was one of JiaZhi Wongs herself. They were smart, incisive, penetrating to the toughness of life and all the tricks men played on them. The only weak point they were unable to get rid of was that they longed for care and love so much. They endeavored to find little trace of true love and warm care in this extremely cruel and freezing men-dominant world. They paid all their love and passion in return though they knew their male partners were not really the one for them.

Therefore, under Miss Aileen Chuang's pen, Mr. Yee would never give JiaZhi the ring in such a romantic way as the movie presents. He bought JiaZhi the diamond just because of the lust satisfaction she offered him, as slight as the payment for prostitution. After giving order to kill JiaZhi, he would not sob as Tony Leung did in the movie. The only emotion in his mind was pride, for acquiring the true love of such a young beauty at his mid-age. From Aileen Chuang's view, he didn't even care about whether she hated him at her last moment of life.

Ang Lee seems to be more moderate and merciful. He arranged true feelings from Mr. Yee and YuMin Kuang. Did he intend to console the soul of JiaZhi and the hearts of female audience with a slight beam of hope? Or did he just aim to defend for the brutality of men? When seeing YuMin Kuang mildly holding JiaZhi's shoulders and hearing his hollow promise that "I would not get you hurt", it's really disgusting to me and nearly aroused my anger. He and his peers built up their dreams of devoting to the country on the sacrifice of an innocent young woman's virginity, dignity, and safety of life. They were all bastards and trashes, according to my judgment. If this is love, what is worth expecting from life to us? Movie-goers keep asking did he ever love JiaZhi? Did Mr. Yee love her? Did anyone else ever love her? No, not really. I can tell without any hesitation. It's cruel but it's true. How pathetic that Ang Lee has made great efforts in disguising the fact that those guys never loved anyone except themselves in a couple of tear drops from Mr. Yee and the detestable smile from YuMin Kuang. Well, Ang Lee's a man himself anyway. I fully respect his talents in film-making. But talking about love between Mr. Yee and JiaZhi? It blurs the sanctity of the word LOVE.

Totally opposite to those lousy guys, JiaZhi was beautiful, mild, and smart. With the bad luck in that dreary era, she doomed to be destroyed and end up in the tragic destiny of this kind or another. She was disappointed by everyone around her, undutiful father, utilitarian and spineless schoolmates. I have mentioned above that both Aileen Chuang and JiaZhi Wong were wise enough to see through the slyness and the cruelty of men. Of course she knew clearly about a man like Mr. Yee from the very beginning. She was absolutely aware of the fact that she's no more than a sex object. However, she still devoted her heart to him besides her body, because as least Mr. Yee made her feel that she's still alive. He awoke her vitality with lust and the diamond ring, which meant only a piece of jewelry or an expensive gift to men but more than that to a woman. A ring on finger is symbol of something beyond itself. As to the title of this work "Se, Jie", I prefer the translation version of "Lust, Ring" to "Lust, Caution". The ring is apparently the key of the whole story.

It is a dog movie. But I think it is not a story about dogs, but a story about human.

Inspired by a true story happened in a Japanese Antarctic scientific expedition in 1957, EIGHT BELOW is an action-adventure about loyalty and the bonds of friendship set in the extreme wilderness of Antarctica. The film tells the story of a member of a scientific expedition: Jerry Shepard, who was forced to leave behind their team of beloved sled dogs due to a sudden accident and perilous weather conditions in Antarctica. During the harsh, Antarctic winter, the dogs had to struggle for survival alone in the intense frozen wilderness for about 6 months. Jerry finally found the way to go back for the dogs. 6 out of 8 dogs survived.

It is heart-warming that Jerry kept his promise and returned for his dog friends. It is also understandable that the scientist, who had been saved with the crucial help of the sled dogs, didn't want to spend his sponsor funds in finding the dogs that might have already been killed in the fierce conditions in Antarctica. Besides, the son of the scientist, Erics, threw a picture of 8 dogs and noted "My hero is…the dogs who saved my Daddy.", which is also impressive and moving.

If life's just so easy, we can simply indulge us in the self-deceiving warmth of the movie. But things are not so simple. Shucked off all the disguise of morals and ethics, people are quite emotionless sometimes.

Despite of the ingrate scientist, let's just have a look on Jerry, who seems to be the most sensational and emotional for the dogs. Jerry did try hard but ran into dozens of obstacles. He gave up the idea of returning to the Antarctic base to save the dogs and would have quited forever if the Indian sled dog raiser inspired him by saying "It isn't a story about dogs. It's about my father." while the dogs were struggling alone for survival and remained around the scientific base waiting for Jerry to come back. Jerry delayed his plan of returning due to some facts and drew the dogs into extreme peril of death from frost or starvation. Thinking the dogs might have all been killed, Jerry went back just to make for sure with his own eyes, which could re-acquire his easy conscience and set him free from inerasable sense of guilt. The rescue action was actually for his own sake due to my observations and considerations. Then what we can expect from others.

EIGHT BELOW gives the audience a good ending that Maya came to consciousness. And it drove me into tears when Jerry drew out the empty iron chain for thick snow and exclaimed with immense concussion "They've escaped" though I'd already known that ahead. However, that is the movie, not the real world. Before EIGHT BELOW, another film was made sticking to the true story, Antarctica, leading acted by Ken Takakura in 1983, in which the story was more cruel and realistic as well. 15 dogs in all but only 2 of them were still alive when the expedition members returned. No Maya, No Max, No Truman, No Shorty, No… That's the fact and reality.

Dogs are human's best friends. Dogs are human's best friends?