Lan Yu

Story:
Chan Handong (Han for short), a successful businessman of a trading company, has met nothing but successes all his life. He was in his late twenties, and was enjoying life whatever dished out to him. His sexual endeavours are usually one night stands, and doesn't discriminate his sexual partners.

One day, an employee of his introduced Lan Yu (Lan for short) to him. A young boy of 16, coming from the rural countryside had arrived in Beijing for his tertiary studies in architecture. Bewildered and broke, he has no choice but to turn to such means to earn money Ð selling himself. Through this encounter with Liu Zheng, (the employee of Han's) he met Han who gave him what turns out to be a life changing sexual initiation.

Set in the 80s in the beautiful Beijing city of China, Lan soon fell in love with Han, and was very secure in his love for the man. Han, on the other hand, wanted to keep the relationship strictly a casual one, warning Lan that they will eventually break up if the relationship gets too intimate. Yet, he was unable to stop his desire for Lan, and keeps coming to meet him. Though he'd tried to deny his feelings for Lan by keeping the relationship on a monetary basis through showering Lan with expensive gifts, he could not stop himself from the desire for Lan, and the wish to be with him as often as he could.

Lan, on the other side, had fallen in love with Han, from the very first time they'd met. Despite Han's efforts to deflect his ever-growing feelings by engaging in sexual endeavours with other men, Lan tolerated it time and time again.

Review:
There is always a lot of hype whenever a gay film is released and the film's burden only gets heavier when awards and accolades come its way. Lan Yu is a fine example of such a film, as well as a victim of it. Based on an anonymous online novel, The Beijing Story, this Chinese film, winner of 4 Golden Horse Awards was, perhaps viewed by many as a disappointment. Indeed, with the stereotypical story plot and characters, the film has no justification for winning the awards (Best Actor: Ye Liu, Best Director, Best Editing and Best Screenplay). With the shallow treatment of gay relationships portrayed in the film, touching just lightly of society's perspectives on such relationships, frowned upon and viewed as taboos, and with the melodramatic and contrived ending, the film breaks no new ground; neither creating a new genre altogether, nor setting a milestone in its story telling technique, original plot settings and direction.

Indeed, the characters are typical characters, with Lan (Liu Ye) as the young idealistic architectural undergraduate who was a novice in his search of love/relationship, and Han (Hu Jun) as the worldly-wise businessman whose every sexual encounter is nothing more than a casual fling. Their initial encounter, a business transaction of sorts, subsequent reunions and everything else that happens in between are the common tools that have been used to propel a zillion other love stories, straight or otherwise. How different can a love story of two people whose paths cross time and again get?

That said, the plot could not be faulted. Rather, the focus that Stanley chosen was on the story of these two men, and had made no qualms about it. Focusing on the leading characters' interaction between each other, sometimes deviating to interaction between the secondary characters with them, driving the narrative forward without audience losing thread of what's going on. The action of the story was thus made tighter, without having secondary plots that had viewer's attention digressed from the scope and main theme. A wise move made by Stanley Kwan indeed, having steered clear of the pitfalls that plagued many films that attempted to be epics. I don't really want to know about Lan Yu's family background even through that one single call to his mother, showing just another facet of his life. I don't really want to know what Han Dong's illegal business dealings were even though he did go to jail for a while (confusing the story just that one moment). I don't even want to know about the three-year marriage that Han Dong had with a brainy woman called Lin Jin Ping (Su Qin), or when it was that Han Dong's family members were so comfortable with his sexuality. Very focused direction indeed.

Stanley Kwan's artistic choice in allowing the direction for this film to be simplistic in all technical aspects, opting to focus on the acting. The gem of the film lies in the extraordinarily understated strength of the two actors, both in portraying the complexities of the individual characters and in concocting the intense chemistry that resulted. Here, you could feel Hu Jun's lip-biting vulnerability and loneliness beneath the character's steely exterior as the film progressed, and this is matched emotion for emotion by Liu Ye's delicate demeanour that gradually toughened and matured as Lan Yu sacrificed himself time and time again for Han. The latter's Best Actor win was a well-deserved one. Though the film was slow moving and I found my attention sometimes waning, there were some moments in the film where I was caught off guard by the characters' emotions and actually felt sad for them. The acting was perfect in my opinion. They made the viewers feel for them, feel their emotions and most of all, both characters definitely had the on screen chemistry, something that is of rarity especially for such a role. (That is, if both are straight.)

The cinematography is seriously understated with simple shots, keeping it either the standard shots like midÐshots, long shots or just plain close ups. Little panning and tracking is used (perhaps that one long tracking shot where Lan had died and Han was in the car, and the inside POV shot of one looking out of the car window), creating the impression of one staring into space, lost to the world. After all, one has to grieve silently for the lost and this sentiment was brought out very strongly just by that one shot.

Editing was kept to the barest necessity. There was no fanciful editing at all, merely simple cuts as transitions. However, images edited together, though simplistic in its choice, create a rawness that not only heightens the tension in the film, it also makes the film more endearing. For without coming out as a polished film (like Wong Kar Wai's Happy Together), it creates an surreal sense of one being there to observe the intensity of emotions coursing through as we see and listen the interaction of these two characters.

There was not much background music, which was a surprise. There was, however, a song that was popular in the late 80s or early 90s (I think) that was used in the whole film and it was played in its entirety when Lan Yu died in a car accident and portrays appropriately the sentimentality from both characters' perspective. It was interesting to note that its first appearance in the show was played during where Chen Handong had mocked Lan Yu's love for him as they were driving down to the countryside. The lyrics really brought out how Lan Yu's love for Handong was not reciprocated in the same way. Yet in a rather ironic way, when Handong starts to feel the same way but Lan Yu tragically died in a car accident, the lyrics of the song, once again brings out the sentimentality of their love, Han's devastated state of mind when Lan had died and how truly he had regretted for not treasuring Lan.

Generally, the pace of the film is rather slow, allowing the emotions of each scene to rise to its fullest. Though at times, the editing seems not in rhythm in terms of climatic tempo and turning points, still it manages to capture the very essence of the characters' relationship, personality as well as maintaining the overall integrity of the film.

So, does Lan Yu deserve winning the awards? Personally, I would agree for the actors really acted the part and was very much in character while director Stanley Kwan, has maintained a strict focus on the intended story without losing direction. That itself speaks volume for his ability to direct. Winning the best screenplay was a well deserved one for, in my opinion, the film has managed to elicit a gamut of subjective responses from the audience, drawing us into the story. A film whose plot can touch in ways others can't deserves compliment. A film whose characters one can identify and empathise with deserves praise. To me, Lan Yu has both, and it deserves both my compliment and praise.