It
is the age of the internet troll.
Abetted by the tabloid press, anonymous malcontents offer a steady
stream of bullying invective aimed at impulsively chosen targets. In this case, the locale is central China,
but it could happen here too. One woman is
tragically ensnared in a joint new media-old media feeding frenzy at the start
of Chen Kaige’s of-the-moment contemporary drama Caught in the Web (trailer here), which opens today in New York.
During
a routine check-up, Ye Lanqiu receives some devastating news: advanced
lymphatic cancer, requiring immediate treatment she cannot afford. Dazed, she returns to work on the bus, not noticing
the old man coveting her seat. When he
complains, she tells him where to get off.
Unfortunately, it was all captured on the smart-phone of Yang Jiaqi, who
is interning at a television station with her cousin’s ambitious girlfriend, Chen
Ruoxi. By the end of the day, Chen will
make Ye notorious as “Sunglasses Girl.”
However,
Ye’s problems are only getting starting.
Seeking a loan and an emergency leave from her industrialist boss, Shen
Liushu, Ye breaks down before she can fully explain her dire circumstances. At the worst possible moment, Shen’s high
maintenance wife Mo Xiaoyu walks in on them, naturally misconstruing the
intimate scene. As Ye becomes a public
pariah, Mo pours gasoline on the fire, antagonizing her husband and jeopardizing
his big deal with an American firm.
While Shen and Mo wage their cold war and Chen bottom feeds, Ye goes
into hiding, hiring her nemesis’s increasingly disillusioned boyfriend Yang
Shoucheng as her bodyguard.
Whew,
end of set-up. From there things get complicated. Chen and his co-screenwriter Tang Danian have
scripted the closest thing to a Chinese Tom Wolfe story you will find, chocked
to the brim with intertwined characters and loads of zeitgeisty angst. At times, they flirt dangerously with shameless
melodrama, but the quiet dignity of Gao Yuanyuan’s lead performance saves their
bacon every time. It is a reserved, but
deeply tragic turn, nicely matched by the restraint of the Taiwanese-Canadian
Mark Chao as her reluctant protector, Yang Shoucheng.
In
contrast, Chen’s frequent collaborator Wang Xuegi and his actress-producer-wife
Chen Hong produce some spectacular fireworks as the crafty old Shen and his impulsive
wife. Perhaps fittingly, Chen Ruoxi is
played by Yao Chen, who holds the distinction of having the most followers on
China’s micro-blogging service, Sina Weibo.
She has also “Weiboed” on behalf of journalists challenging official
state censorship, which makes her massively cool as well as popular. She really digs into the character,
portraying both her ruthless ambition and her deep-seated insecurities. It is award caliber work that truly makes the
film.
