A Simple Life (2011)

Such a frustrating disappointment

Awesome Movie

It is not deep, but it is fun to watch. It does have a bit more of an edge to it than other similar films.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

How to write about simple movie? And how tell about simple life? How to live such life? Perhaps the answer to these questions lie exactly here. But first, it takes strength and courage to overcome yourself, your self-esteem, dreams and ambitions. It takes curiosity and thirst for life.The film comes into our minds easily and quickly shows us the power of being, of being born with the fate of being a human being in its overall appearance. Shows how quickly are changing the roles of young and old, it shows what should be the relationship between people, always. It shows where is the spring of goodness and that it is there because "You have to be at rest first with yourself before helping others"... with unabated good that enjoys anyone to whom it touches. That everyone accepts as a given, but feels the pain of its loss.How nice it is when our deepest desires are so simple. When we are truly, picky, but because we are looking for soul mates. How nice it is to experience the happiness of loving relatives, to know your place and perhaps, most importantly, not cheating in first place - not cheating yourself.http://vihrenmitevmovies.blogspot.com/

This is a simple film - two main characters with no blood relation and yet deeply connected to each other - and presumably made with a modest budget. It is slow, and arguably a tad long (but I am OK with it), but as the story evolves I begin to care about them.As a film it is a great antidote to the sex, violence, intriguing plots, and CGI (I must admit I like some of those too) that we are so used to on the big screen these days. Director Ann Hui indicated the story was inspired by true events and I believe her. What makes this story unique is we are looking at love, respect and a feeling of duty and obligation between two human beings as if they were mother and son - but they are not. Instead, what started out as a servant-master relationship transcended itself to become something more sublime when the care-giver became incapacitated and the table was turned. When this happened the roles were reversed and yet it happened in such an unforced, natural and leisurely fashion.There are tear-jerking moments, of course, but they came in such an unpretentious manner. The ending is as you would expect when age and illness took their toll on Tao Jie, played by Deannie Yip. And yet, I finished watching the film feeling uplifted, and with a strong sense of hope on humanity.

A Simple Life is a beautiful film that tugs at your heart strings not because of the story but because of the unveiling of the relationship between a family servant and her 'young master' that she has treated as her own son. It is a difficult subject to cover but the gist of the plot is that the servant, ah Tao, suffers from a stroke and goes through a massive lifestyle change from looking after others to become the one being looked after. Deanie Ip's acting is absolutely incredible in that you are not watching her go through the motions, you are actually with her throughout her journey and feel her pain and joy as the film goes on. You can sense the unrewarded joy she gets from looking after Roger to the worries that she goes through to being a burden to him and moving herself to an old people's home and giving up a life of being the carer to being cared for.Andy Lau's portrayal as Roger is very different from the other roles I have seen him in. It is played subtly and allows the character of ah Tao to really shine through and there is evidently brilliant chemistry between the two and in the film, Roger grows from being a pampered boy used to having ah Tao revolve around his life to a mature man that realises all that she has done for him.What makes this film so great is the realism in all the scenes and it was not a typical film where you think 'this does not happen in real life'. Also, the focus is not on her medical conditions and subsequent pain from her health but her story and how her life changes and the way she copes and adapts.Ann Hui captured ah Tao's story beautifully and I came out of the film feeling like I knew her and had shared her life with her from the day she had her stroke to the day that she passed. Many cameos from many HK stars but liked the way they were written into the film and that they had a part to play and not in the story for the sake of being famous.An absolute must-see.

Ann Hui's "A Simple Life" is a poignant and melancholic film about the relationship between an old servant and her companion, a successful film producer to whose family the servant had been in service with. It is a beautiful, touching, and, more importantly, human film. It lives and breathes its own life with the help of the cast and crew involved.The performances by Andy Lau as Roger the man and especially Deannie Yip as Ah Tao complement the movie's atmosphere as a whole. It is a warm, homely and crystal-clear one – subtly quiet, slightly louder when there's more people around. This film's screenplay relies more on the look on the actors' faces rather than relying on dialogue. This is a good thing. It allows the audience to focus on the performances in rapt attention. Relying on dialogue/subtitles more than often will distract from the movie. This is one movie which follows my rule for any great movie: subtlety is key. In many dramatic Chinese movies, the piano is a must for every music score, and it is overdone cheesily at many times. For this movie, however, composer Law Wing-Fai knows crucial music timing - the music is not overdone, yet not too minimal, and it knows when to appear at the right time. Correct.Hui's focused yet calm, serene direction basically drives Susan Chan's screenplay right at home. Hui seems to have learned a thing or two about human drama from greats like Yasujiro Ozu and Akira Kurosawa – it is put into terrific use here. But Yip's performance as the altruistic Ah Tao is simply wonderful; her face and body language speak more than herself, her vocal qualities ranging from sharp balking to solemn calm. She is the heart of the movie, alive, beating and like her, moving quietly along as her life goes by. Lau is also very good here, being more stoic than usual but hiding uneasiness within his eyes.There is no great story without good characters, and "A Simple Life" has two great characters that drives the movie. Roger is a successful film producer, his whole family has migrated to America, and he's seemingly living the high life with his wealthy friends (featuring many non- intrusive cameos by Chinese celebrities including humorous ones by Sammo Hung, Tsui Hark and Anthony Wong) and yet he is more concerned with Ah Tao than everyone else. Ah Tao is an orphan since World War II and has since been serving Roger's family for four generations without expecting any sort of compensation in return. Roger doesn't mind taking care of Ah Tao as everyone else progresses around him – the same way Ah Tao doesn't mind living her life on her own at an old folks' home without Roger to help her around after a stroke attack – she feels guilty if he did that. The two characters are bonded, play with, even depend on each other as if they're the only two people who understand each other. A sort of mother-son love, but more powerful. Compare with later scenes with Roger and his real mother and you'll see the difference. I'm not implying Roger's real mother is a morally bad character, far from it. The relationship between them is more real and human than I had expected.Some will call this tedious and pretentious; others will call it pointless. I'm not sure, but I'd love to see movies like this where the characters unwrap the story around them as life progresses with its ups and downs. Sure, there are a few bits and pieces that did not really relate to the main character's story – but they make up the story and the characters as a whole – shaping this narrative up. It is a thing of beauty. So is life. So is this film - one of the year's best.Overall rating: 88%