BIG SCREEN: Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (PG-13)

It would be so much easier to review this movie had I not read the book. I’d probably call it a rather bleak, Asian version of that old Bette Midler/Barbara Hershey sobfest, Beaches. Sort of lovely, but mostly just a manipulative little melodrama, designed to reduce women to tears. (Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.) But after reading Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See, it becomes clear that the filmmakers sucked all the beauty out of the original story. What a rotten shame!

The movie begins in modern day Shanghai, where a young executive named Nina (Li Bingbing) rushes to the bedside of her estranged childhood best friend, Sophia (Gianna Gun), who’s been critically injured in a traffic accident. While Sophia lies in a coma, Nina comes across a manuscript Sophia has been writing, which tells the story of an ancestor, named Snow Flower, and Lily, her laotong (a sort of arranged female friendship in which little girls pledge their love and fidelity to each other for all time). Lily marries up, Snow Flower marries down, and it creates a major problem in their relationship. Similarly, Nina’s star is on the rise, while she finds Sophia has fallen on hard times. The movie jumps back and forth from past to present, showing a parallel between the two relationships, while giving the audience a snapshot of the ancient Chinese traditions women once had to endure, including foot binding, arranged marriages, total submission, and countless other horrors.

Why the filmmakers chose to create this whole modern story line, which does not exist in the book, is truly baffling. It adds nothing to the overall tale, and it doesn’t really allow the audience to develop an intimate relationship with either pair of friends. Sadly, the movie completely missed out on most of the book’s vivid, detailed descriptions of the sights, the sounds, the smells, the emotions, and everything involved in the beautiful and horrible customs of ancient China. Why would they do that?! No idea.

This is definitely one of those cases where reading the book actually ruins the movie. If you’re unaware that it’s a cheap adaptation, it could serve as an excellent catharsis, should you need a good cry. Having said all that, I was grateful for the movie's cutting of corners in one instance... it took me two nights to get through the book’s description of the foot binding process. OMG! So much worse than I ever imagined. It was almost more than I could bear to read about the breaking of bones and bleeding and oozing and other horrific elements of the repugnant process that was forced upon little girls! I vowed that if they were as detailed in the movie, I’d probably have to leave. Luckily, I just had to close my eyes and plug my ears for a scant minute or so.

So, there’s that.