‘My boyfriend’s disappeared’, shouts a neighbour as Wu rattles past on her scooter through the narrow alleys. ‘Serves you right’, she snaps back without turning around. Wu is in her mid-twenties and lives with her mother in a traditional one-storey house in one of Beijing’s hutongs. Both consider themselves to be writers, but success has so far eluded them. The fact that Wu is supported by a divorced, elderly man helps the women through lean periods. Their unhealthily close relationship is characterised by reproaches and quibbling; only during meals do they appear to lay down their verbal weapons. The situation escalates when both Wu and her mother hit an emotional low.
Yang Mingming’s first feature film is a humorous psychological portrait of a fragile mother-daughter relationship. Detailed images tell of an intimacy born of despair and at the same time provide their ironic refraction. The two women’s sarcasm magnifies their personal disasters but on the other hand, time and again, it also gives rise to hope.