Movie Review: A Secret Between Us/第一次不是你

Ain’t they cute?

A Secret Between Us/第一次不是你 is directed by Patrick Kong and produced by Wong Jing.

Which makes a lot of sense, since both of them make movies to make money, not art.

I love Wong Jing.

And sometimes I like Patrick Kong.

His film résumé is spottier than a teenager who works in a barbecue restaurant.

As much as I enjoyed some of his films ( Marriage With a Liar, Love is the Only Answer), others have given me what Charles Dickens once called ‘ a purple leptic fit’ ( Hong Kong Ghost Stories, Mr. & Mrs. Single).

So going into a Patrick Kong movie is a lot like having lunch with a friend who just got out of rehab.

Again.

You want to be supportive, but… well, you know better.

Your friend might finally have his sh*t in a bag, or he may have a date with a box of baking soda and a Dominican tranny.

Again.

Not that it makes you a bad person, I’m just sayin’…

I have honestly enjoyed some of Patrick Kong’s movies, if not for the usual reasons.

They’re crass, cheap, celebrations of the ugly side of love.

As someone who could be considered a property owner in that particular part of town, I find his films refreshing.

They’re not great movies, and often they’re not even good.

But they’re funny, and entertaining, and they’re a nice alternative to the thoroughly asexual movies this town usually makes.

A Secret Between Us/第一次不是你 is a story about a couple who bump into each other ten years after they break up.

The back story is the heart of the narrative, and it is told in flashbacks interspersed with events in the present.

The present is washed out and devoid of color, because symbolism and allegory really work best when employed with all the charm and subtlety of Jim Chim on a crack binge.

But hey, what do I know about movies?

The couple, played by Edward Ma and Angel Chiang, grew up in a small village where being rich seems to be something only other people do.

What did the kid in Tin Shui Wai get for Christmas?  My f@#$ing bike.

Bobo is a young woman with no real plans for the future.

Well, almost no plans.

She likes Ken, and Ken likes her, and they plan on being together forever.

Because teenagers can see the future so clearly.

Ken wants to be a hair stylist and own a salon in Central.

She seems to like it.

Which for some women would be a red light, but in Hong Kong it’s no big deal.

Oh dear! 

Bobo’s mother (Elena Kong) needs a kidney transplant.

Apparently, Bobo cannot donate one.

Neither can anyone she knows.

Including her uncle.

I say apparently because it’s not mentioned in the movie; no one seems to check their suitability as a donor.

But relatives aren’t any more likely to be a match than someschlameel off the street, right?

There’s only one thing to do: buy a kidney from the Mainland.

Because you can trust those people to be ethical and hygienic.

Oh dear.

How’s a young, innocent, fresh-faced girl supposed to come up with 60 grand?

What can she do to make a lot of money fast?

Yes, he will. So will we.

Bobo decides to sell herself whole.

So to speak.

She is led down this path by Wendy (Sharon Chan), a young woman whose mother lives in the village.

As a child, Bobo looked up to Wendy, who must have had a great job; she always had money and nice clothes, and got dropped off by men in nice cars every night.

Even though the walked a little funny. And not from the shoes.

Melodrama galore ensues, and you know where it ends up because, well, it’s in the trailer, and if you didn’t see it, the movie’s opening lets you know.

Ken isn’t happy about Bobo’s choice of work, but he knows he can’t give her the money, so he supports her as best he can.

Which, as an 18 year old man, is predictably less than perfect.

I can’t say I blame him.

“That’s the 3rd time this week I’ve seen that guy…”

Bobo’s supervisor at work is a real charmer of a human being.

Jacqueline Chong seems like a nice enough person in real life, and so her work here is deserving of special mention.

Her character, which she plays flawlessly, is an unbearable piece of smoking-while-pregnant garbage of a pimp.

She’s abrasive, crass, and wholly revolting.

She is the most realistic character in the whole film.

From what I’ve read.

My opinion of this movie is somewhat bifurcated.

Like a shark.

I really liked this story.

I just didn’t like the way it was told.

As I Tweeted after watching it,

There are a number of problems with the film, and it is unfortunate that they derail what is otherwise a good story.

Some of it isn’t really Patrick Kong’s fault.

It was rather sweetly naive (naively sweet?) that Bobo wanted to share her first experience with Ken.

What would you do for a Klondike bar?

Even though she wanted to do so the night before her first day of work.

But there’s a large dose of verisimilitude there; only a virgin could think it would be physically possible to do ‘that’ (local euphemism) thefirst time ever and then do it 6-8 more times in the next 24 hours.

Which is interesting if you got to see how wrong she turned out (!) to be .

Unfortunately, the strictures of local mores likely dictate that a very logical scene showing the aftermath of her first day of work is something that should not be included for the sake of propriety.

Leaving aside the idea that those mores make it okay to have a movie about a girl whoring herself out but not okay to show what happens when she does it. But I digress.

So that’s not really Patrick Kong’s fault.

Neither is it his fault that in order for audiences to emotionally connect with characters, they must be at least marginally acceptable.

As horrendous as Simon Yam’s character is in Ann Hui’s Night and Fog, that’s the cleaned up, leavened version of the truth. His real-life counterpart was so unlikable that Ann Hui knew if she presented him realistically, no one would be able to watch the film.

I say that because the characters here are naive but not stupid.

They are simple but not crude.

“Gee, thanks… I think.”

In other words, they’re not the kind of people who would see, much less take this option as a viable solution.

Bobo needs to be a lot more like her pimp to ring true.

But if that were the case, we couldn’t like her.

Again, that’s not really Patrick Kong’s fault.

And considering he says this story is based on events in his own life, I don’t blame him for tarting up (!) the principals.

But some of the other stuff is his fault.

A bad day in the workplace is obviously meant to evoke Leaving Las Vegas, but thanks to the poor direction comes off much more like Vegas Vacation.

What is meant to be foreboding and dreadful becomes carnivalesque, and it ruins the pathos of the scene.

To be fair, no one should watch Patrick Kong movies for the direction.

And to be more fair, he does do some things right.

The relatively new actors do a good job in their roles, and whatever dramatic shortcomings they displayed were, for me, more than offset by their newness.

It was much easier to invest and believe in characters when their faces are not completely familiar.

I assume this movie is aimed at an audience that is not as demanding as I am, and I think it will certainly succeed with them.

It’s not a bad movie, and if pressed I would concede that the good outweighs the bad.

It’s an interesting film, and although it’s not the kind of movie I can say I enjoyed watching, I will say it’s worth a look.

As a final note, I wanted to mention that it felt oddly nostalgic to see the streets lined with movie rubberneckers obviously watching a movie being made during what was supposed to be the emotional climax of the film.

I love Hong Kong.

It’s one of those oddly local touches that may take a leak on the fourth wall but still evokes a positive emotional response by recalling similar scenes from the past.