The Way We Are: Almost Put Me To Sleep But Still A Notable Film

I finally saw Ann Hui’s “The Way We Are”. The Chinese title is “天水围的日与夜” which literally translates to “Tin Shui Wai Days and Nights”.

This film was a surprise hit at the recent Hong Kong Film Awards garnering the Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Actress (for Pau Hei-Ching), and Best Supporting Actress Awards; so I did everything I can to get a copy of the movie just because I was curious!

Pau Hei-Ching plays Kwai, a hardworking mother who works in a grocery store.

She has a teenage son Cheung Ka On, newcomer Juno Leung, who is basically a good kid and does not get into any sorts of trouble.

The two became friends with an old woman who was looking for a job in the same supermarket. Granny does not have any other family except for her married daughter who does not give a damn to her presence.

She cooks for herself. She eats by herself. Granny lead a very lonely life until she met Kwai and Ka On.

As the movie rolls, we see Ka On joining church fellowship meetings (even if he does not believe in God). He waits for his Form 6 results while Mother continually works in the grocery, buys food, cooks food, and goes about her daily life.

We see Kwai’s mother in the hospital, but she does not visit her. Now I thought, with all the normal happenings in the film, this is where the story really starts. But no, in the end, Kwai let go of her workaholic ways (in a very undramatic storytelling); and life goes on in Tin Shui Wai.

And oh yeah, Granny’s family seems to have ignored her completely. But that is about the conflict there is in “The Way We Are” unless you count the episodes where Kwai asks Ka On to buy the morning paper, and there is no free tissue paper (because he bought it at the mean guy’s newsstand instead of the convenience store).

Seriously, I almost fell asleep watching “The Way We Are”. It is so unlike the regular HK films I have grown to love (especially the ones where Stephen Chow stars!). Everyones’ lives are like the regular people’s in real life. No love story-gambling lord angle (except for Ka On’s crush with Miss Tsui and his friends’ regular mahjong meetings). No explosive revelations. From start to finish, everything just seems so normal!

But I think that is precisely what Director Ann Hui is ultimately trying to say. Tin Shui Wai is ridden with crime and violence and suicides (well, according to the media). And the picture depicts a different story. Even with the awful happenings, things does not really seem so bad. There is a side of Tin Shui Wai where it is very undramatic and well, normal.

“The Way We Are” caught me entirely. There was none of the blaming around going on. You know with the typical movies filmed in ghettos where drugs and pointing of fingers are rampant. I was half expecting Cheung Ka On to be this useless son who bums around all day. And because of the publicity the film was getting, I thought Granny would commit suicide!

None of those melodramatic events happened. It is just so regular that I find it poignant. If there is one thing I got from “The Way We Are”, it is the new perspective I have for elderly people. Ann Hui created a world where the expected becomes the unexpected. If a film that made me almost fall asleep gave me that thinking, I would say that is the power of cinema.