Chong fan 20 sui

With a lot of Chinese films I get to watch these days, I caught this one on the Sichuan Film Channel - thankfully it had subtitles so I stuck with it and was very happy that I did.

A take on the original South Korean film (Miss Granny) it stars Zishan Yang and the infamous teen idol Lu Han in the lead roles - both actors lend a lot of charm to their parts and what could be seen as schmaltzy - sometimes - Chinese films of this genre are exactly that - instead - gives itself to a more comedic dimension and there are plenty of laughs galore to be hard in this film.

I also teared up at the end - I probably should hand in my man card but what can we do when the film is as good as this one? There is an outlying message throughout the film so instead of me telling what that is, I suggest you check this out for yourself.

I had no assumption and expectations when bought the ticket for this movie I only expected some easy entertainment. But this movie delivered two hours excitement, fun and melancholic tears. Very well written screenplay, great directing and acting. I will remember the story and the ending very long... When we wish more than one life we should remember how precious the one we have right now. I wish this movie would reach wider audience. I could watch it only because the Hungarian Confucius Institute organized Chinese movie week and this was one of the seven films they screened. I am more than sure there are other good movies created in Asia but we never see them here.

of course, there are still some not-so-good ingredients in this film, some over-the-top exaggerations, but all in all, this a very good film that really needs you to sit down and appreciate it with an open and peaceful mind. what i like to point out at the outset is the screenplay is nicely crafted, the cast, almost all of them, simply top notched. one actor, i mean, one actress, is especially superior. she played the younger grandmother and played it so well and so naturally lovable. the young actress is actually the soul of this film, making it so watchable. this film is also right on the money by telling the viewers about the difficulties of the three Chinese generations living under the same roof. it also shows how difficult the old and dying generation to deal with their younger generations. the age and generation gaps are just too big and too wide. similar portrayal of the older generation to deal with among themselves, carrying too much and too many from their past.

there is a very subtle thing that i have to remind the Chinese people here. remember who had cruelly ruined your parents' and your grand parents' lives, who had heartlessly and purposely destroyed their youth hood, their livelihood, their families, their homes, their parents and their grand parents. who had caused such inhuman atrocity? remember that the most bloody part of the Chinese history was done by the same people and the same group. the same group of people had also learned a lesson from what they did wrongly in that delinquent era, so right after 1970, they decided to have a different face changing strategy.

this film has told us how a young single parent struggled so hard and so stubbornly strong to have her kid growing up and didn't die miserably. she still got so many dreams and so many regrets that she needed to have a second chance to relive twice again and to restart a new life if possible when she could become young again.

if i have to point out the thing that i am not quite agree with, then i have to say that one the cast was not as good as the others: the guy who played the agent. a very bad actor without any talent at all. most of the time, he didn't actually became the person he should have duly performed. i have noticed that all he could do was to await other roles to complete their dialog and when it's time to deliver his own, he just recited it without any feeling deep from his heart. this is a very bad actor, yet he's still so popular. why, that's the question.

there's exactly the same Korean movie, 'Miss Granny 2014', which was the original adapted by the Chinese producer. the only difference between these two is: the younger Chinese grandma is more lovely and cutier than the Korean one.

Honestly I didn't really know what to expect, since I'm not too used to seeing foreign content, but I was surprised that this could actually hold my attention better than many movies I've been seeing lately. The main actress was great, although a few of the other actors I think could have done better. Nevertheless I had come to care about the different characters, and when the end finally came, I was struck by the great message. Overall, I think it was a creative way to communicate a great lesson, while also pointing out various disconnections between generations and time periods. As for the original, since I'd never seen it I don't really know how this would compare, but I can say that I don't have any regret for watching this at all.