Sei mong se jun

Films about art and artists are of great interest to me, delvings into the relationship of image and imaginer, into the imagining itself and what change it wreaks on the two parties. Abnormal Beauty is then a film of interest to me and though it has little new or especially intelligent to say, it speaks with elegance and it speaks from the heart. Its central artist is the troubled Jin (Race Wong) who comes across a car crash and feels compelled to photograph it, in doing so reopening cracks of childhood trauma, widening them to deathly obsession, morbid sensuality and danger. Much of the film is dark psychological drama rather than horror, the whole visual scheme mirroring Jin's descent. Shots are still, sparsely composed and sometimes richly tinted, an imagery of bleak yearning, of the cameras power to make beauty from from death, to bring something from nothing and yet in the freezing of image eternally condemn, forever sequester from reality. All this perhaps the highlight of the film, its thoughts internalised speaking with so much more eloquence than the occasional fragments of exposition. Its powerfully acted stuff too, Race Wong subtly moving, quietly pained, she does well in suggesting character shadows. Her real life sister Rosanne plays (in a slightly perverse bit of casting), her girlfriend Jas, though the lesbian currents are pretty restrained. Another fine turn, possessive and emotionally fraught, the extrovert half of the two. Anson Leung is good too as a classmate of Jin innocently drawn to her. All cylinders fire pretty well it must be said, things reaching an emotional climax around two thirds of the way through as Jin heads towards her precipice. Then the film switches gears to head for real horror in its climax, a move that works thematically but not so much dramatically. Quite simply it's a lop sided film, what should be a thought out second half becomes a climax instead and ends up feeling more of an undernourished epilogue than the savage gut punch it aims for. In more general terms the film suffers from being somewhat restrained as well, some will no doubt praise its subtlety but the story is a bit too lurid for restraint to really work. There's too little actual threat, the menace being predictably largely of the mind, and too little pointed exploration, for a film too restrained to go mad it doesn't help itself by being intellectually undercooked. In a film so concerned with dark aesthetics and the break from normality there's comically little treatment of the related moral issues and the general psychological fall out follows standard plotting lines rather than great insight. Still, this is a pretty fine film despite its ills. Its a film to submit to and swim around in, to abandon oneself to the leads and drink in their sights, sorrow to their sorrows. Truth be told it was only after viewing that the films flaws started to fall into place, its such a well oiled beast (and more to the point, looks so goddarned pretty) that I was almost captivated for most of the run time. As such I recommend it if you like your Asian horror slow and artful, some I'm sure may like it more than me. But it certainly isn't the latter day underrated classic some have hailed it as. 7/10

Only 2 comments as I'm writing this, and this movie definitely deserves better.

I saw it at a little horror festival in France in January.

This movie is about being lost when you're supposed to become an adult, being lost in the harsh, individualistic world we live in... (that sounds very common, but the movie isn't.) It also takes on voyeurism in a quite original way, even questions photography and "beauty"...

There is a perpetual and nameless menace surrounding the young girl we follow. She feels alone, misunderstood. But she's got strength and will and talent...

Her obsession with death will ultimately be an opportunity for her to face herself, although she really seems to loose it as the story unfolds.

I really find this movie appealing and quite outstanding, and I want to recommend it... ...but there is that finale!!! I can't talk about the ending without destroying what is certainly an intended impression...

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but I feel this movie should warn audiences about its extreme violence.

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That said, there are a lot of reasons to watch this if you have the opportunity.

This is either brilliant Asian horror or total claptrap. I'm leaning toward the latter.

Hmm. I'm split. The first half is totally compelling as we watch a brilliant young Chinese lesbian art student veer off into a fascination with photographing death after witnessing a fatal traffic accident. She's obsessed with capturing the moment of death on her Nikon, be it chicken or fish or a suicide jumper from a tall building. We watch lovely young Jin as she follows her muse into dangerous places.

There may be a reason in her past for this obsession. Her lesbian partner is really worried about her. And -- whoa! -- now there's a boy in her life who has obviously fallen in love with her.

A lot of interesting elements have come into play. And the Pang brothers are brilliant cinematographers and editors. Sheer beauty on the screen. I cannot stress how magnificently this is filmed.

Then comes the last half hour. It is total gibberish. And it's filmed in such deep darkness you cannot see what's going on (I am talking about the DVD version). All you can tell is that it involves bondage and sadomasochism. A woman bound to a chair is screaming her lungs out. Someone unseen is tormenting her.

If some truth came out, I totally missed it. Maybe it's a western thing. I like Asian horror movies. But this left me baffled.

"Jiney" (Race Wong) is an art student who specializes in both painting and photography. One day she happens to hear a car accident not too far from where she is standing and rushes out to take a photograph of the dead man. After exposing the film she begins to have hallucinations which she then incorporates in her artwork. Soon she becomes fixated with blood and death and incorporates these two elements in all of her pictures. And the further she goes the more it scares her girlfriend "Jasmine" (Rosanne Wong)and her new friend "Anson" (Anson Leung). To further complicate the situation, Jiney has a childhood issue she still hasn't quite recovered from and somebody close to her has even worse psychological problems. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this movie had an interesting plot but the director (Oxide Chun Pang) was much too deliberate in his technique which caused the film to drag on much too long in some cases. Be that as it may, I thought that the presence of both Race Wong and Rosanne Wong definitely enhanced the scenery which certainly helped to some degree. In short, it wasn't a great movie by any means but it wasn't that bad either. Average.

A very weird tale about a lesbian girl, semi-losing her mind from a combination of past events, and her present preferences. She is an artist, with an emphasis on photography. She suddenly starts becoming obsessed with taking pictures of death.

Her friends don't really take that very well. They think it's psycho, and so do other people that you wouldn't really call her "friends"...

All in all a very good movie. If you're into Asian films, especially those with a chilling twist... This ones for you! The director portrayed losing your mind very well in my opinion, which I didn't really expect because the main character was very good looking. Making her lesbian made me think that it was going to try and make her looks sell the picture... I was very wrong. This film was written very well, and the character development was nothing short of amazing.