Review of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (2011) by Smijatov — 22 Jan 2012

The theme of the film is very beautiful - lifelong, committed and loving friendship. While the theme is good, the execution of the film is not quite the best. The setting is the parallel stories of two female friends in China - one pair in the 1830s and 40s, and the other pair in modern day Hong Kong.

While it's nice that the story was laid out that way (I'm assuming that's how it was written in the book), it just did not translate very well in the film. The 19th century story was very moving and much more interesting than the modern day one.

The modern day one just seemed to twist and change for the sake of it, and for the sake of making the 19th century one more interesting and beautiful. I was expecting more from the production design also, which may be the fault of the so-far popular Chinese films with impressive production design, costumes and effects.

Snow Flower, however, is not quite up to par with those films, but still holds its ground, I guess. One of the two leads was excellent, Bingbing Li, who performed beautifully throughout the film. The story and idea behind the film are the highlights of it, but as I said, only one half was necessary.

Something like Julie/Julia, but not even quite as good as that (not to say that Julie/Julia was that good). Nonetheless, worth the time to watch.