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.
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.