How fortunate are those who find a best friend to share the ups and downs of life with, especially a friendship that can endure a lifetime or maybe even an eternity. Such is the story of two young girls in 19th century China, Snow Flower (Gianna Jun) and Lily (Bingbing Li) who are matched together as Laotong, a special bond that ties them together for eternity.  “Snow Flower And The Secret Fan” is based on a popular novel by Lisa See, which shows two stories unfolding. One is in ancient times with Lily and Snow Flower and another in modern day Shanghai with Nina and Sophia.

Nina and Sophia live in modern day Shanghai. Nina’s career is taking off as Sophia is a struggling novelist.  Sophia suddenly gets into an accident and winds up in a coma. Nina rushes to her side and embarks on a journey to piece together the happenings of the past months since they last spoke. Along the way, she comes across a manuscript written by Sophia about a friendship between two girls (Snow Flower and Lily) during the 19th century and some of the terrible hardships they had to endure at the hands of their families. Both also experience an absolutely horrific tradition of foot binding in order to get them the best arranged marriages possible.

As the story plays on, Nina revisits memories of her friendship with Sophia and the challenges that they have endured over the years. Throughout the process, they try to understand lessons of their ancestral connection as they are laotang descendents and how they apply to their friendship.

One of the many interesting things I’ve noticed in a number of Asian films is that some filmmakers have a great knack for capturing emotions on screen and skillfully using the “show, don’t tell” technique to get messages across to the audience in a more subtle way.
Director Wayne Wang successfully achieved this during some key emotional moments of the film. The film is also visually stunning, however it does get confusing at times with the back and forth sequences of ancient times and modern Shanghai with the two leads playing the roles of the ancient times and current times. This does have a negative effect on the build-up of the stories. In fact, this could have actually been two separate films.

Later on in the film, Hugh Jackman makes a surprising guest appearance as Sophia’s ex-boyfriend. This role seemed very small and ordinary for a big actor like him.

Aside from all the technical aspects, there are a number of societal ills that are exposed such as oppression of women by men and oppression of women by other women in the scenes from ancient times. Unfortunately, this is something which still exists in many parts of the world, including the modern world, but in more subtle ways. Arranged marriages for the benefit of family status and not for the well being of the couple being matched together…also still very much in existence.

Everyone has their own unique fate, whether good or bad. True friendships are one of the joys of life, which seems to be the true essence and message of this film.