Eat Drink Man Woman (1994) [Film Review]

Eat Drink Man Woman; or, Family Desires

     Eat, drink, man, woman. Basic human desires. Can’t avoid them! All my life, every day, that’s all I’ve done. It pisses me off. Is that all there is to life?

Finishing my review series of “Father Knows Best” Trilogy, I am now turning to the final, and my personal favourite, movie of the set, Eat Drink Man Woman, shot entirely by Ang Lee on location in Taiwan.

Release Info

Directed by: Ang Lee Starring: Sihung Lung, Chien-lien Wu, Kuei-Mei Yang, Yu-Wen Wang

Language: Mandarin Original Title: 饮食男女 Runtime: 119 min

 

Synopsis

Mr Chu (Sihung Lung) is a widower and a master-chef living in Taipei together with his three unmarried daughters: Chu Jia-Chien (Chien-lien Wu), an executive working in an airline industry; Chu Jia-Jen (Kuei-Mei Yang), a school teacher who has issues with relationships and seeks consolation in Christianity; Chu Jia-Ning (Yu-Wen Wang), a college student who accidentally gets involved with her friend’s ex-boyfriend. The family lives through everyday existence while ritually eating every night large portions of elaborate dishes prepared by Chu.

 

A Confucian Father and Modern Children

Even though Eat Drink Man Woman refers to the Chinese idiom about human desires and provides exactly what the title says, I would not call it a “food picture”. This is not the film about the celebration of eating like, for example, Juzo Itami’s Tampopo (1985), but rather, it’s about the food playing the role of a communicator between distanced family members. In all three films of the trilogy, there are Ang Lee’s autobiographical elements and the issue of father-child conflict is the most predominant here. Mr Chu by no means is a bad father, but he is very traditional and rigid in his relations; yet, similarly to his daughters, he too has some desires which he wants to fulfil.

 

With regard to the three daughters, they all are very colourful characters who undergo a certain degree of change as the story moves on. Although they vary in age, the daughters become more independent in life due to men they encounter. Thankfully, it’s not all about the liberating power of sex, but a true connection which expresses itself as either love or friendship, all that with food placed in the background.

 

In Eat Drink Man Woman, Ang Lee beautifully dissects the fabric of modern-day family in the face of rapid globalisation and fading tradition. As in the case of The Wedding Banquet, the viewer finds himself rooting for all the characters but the outcome is very much an unexpected one. The third act of the film is especially important in this regard because the house grows to be the central figure of the story which stands in-between of Mr Chu and Chu Jia-Chien.

 

Speaking about performances, Sihung Lung is just brilliant as the father. If it hadn’t been for him, the whole trilogy would have looked totally different. The performances of Chien-lien Wu, Kuei-Mei Yang, and Yu-Wen Wang are also wonderful. In addition, it’s great to see Winston Chao and Gua Ah-leh (both from The Wedding Banquet) in the supporting roles. Also, Jong Lin’s cinematography and a memorable music score by Mader deserve praise.

 

Recommendations

I safely recommend Eat Drink Man Woman to anyone looking for a peaceful two-hour story set in Taiwan. In my opinion, this is a spiritual companion piece to Edward Yang’s Yi Yi (2000). To think that Ang Lee’s career was launched by a random Taiwanese screenplay contest still boggles my mind. This guy is a marvellous director and I love his three earliest films the most. He really should come back to Taiwan and make one more Asian slice-of-life movie. In the meantime, we should all enjoy the "Father Knows Best" Trilogy.

Overall score: 10/10