My Fair Son
(2008/Water Bearer DVD)
Picture: C
Sound: C Extras: D Film: C
Cui Zi’en’s My Fair Son (2008) wants to deal with a
father/son relationship where the two still live together, but the son is gay
and open about it, yet they have not really dealt with the issue directly and
that creates a passive tension that reflects Chinese society as much as it
reflects suppression of so many things that are encouraged to be suppressed by
Chinese society as much as anything. At
92 minutes, it takes the long way to deal with the issues at hand, but unless I
am missing something about Chinese culture (and I have seen my share of
releases from the country by now) fell it did not have enough to sustain this
length.
Of course, there are shades of the incest issue and in a
society without property rights, twists that issue, but this is not a character
study or much of a political piece, so it is a personal work at best with some
good acting and may be saying some things only Zi’en understands. However, by Chinese standards, it is still
taboo and that is worth something.
The 1.33 X 1 full screen, color picture was originally videotaped
and is loaded with aliasing errors and inconsistent image quality, but it is a
given that this was not an easy production to do and filming it might have been
harder with government censorship. The
Dolby Digital 2.0 sound is stereo, but also location sound, so it can be low,
awkward, inconsistent and even too low in volume, so be careful of the levels
of playback. There are no extras.
- Nicholas Sheffo
