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 Eat Drink Man Woman Movie Review

Eat Drink Man Woman is a 1994 Taiwanese drama film directed by Ang Lee and starring Sihung Lung among others. It is a solid, but disappointing film from this director.

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“Raising daughters is like cooking a meal.

You lose your appetite by the time you’re finished“

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A senior chef lives with his three grown daughters; the middle one finds her future plans affected by unexpected events and the life changes of the other household members. This is another one of the earlier Taiwanese movies from Lee to tackle the subject matter of modernity versus tradition on Chinese society. Clearly, there was a changing shift in this period from the more familial to more individualistic viewpoints within China, and it is always fascinating to see the two idealisms clash against each other.

The film is at its best when it is really delving into this issue. Lee comes from this country, so he obviously knows a lot about its issues, thus his depiction of everyday life in Taiwan always feels genuine and authentic. There is a lot of mileage to be taken from the dialogue in the movie as many conversations are thought-provoking. The idea behind its title is also ingenious as eating, drinking and sex are the animalistic, but still very important goals for each human, and if one doesn’t get enough of each of these, problems arise.

This is all great and sophisticated script-wise, but character-wise, the movie really suffers by focusing so extensively on each and every family member. It is two hours long, but the focus was spread too thin on all of these people, resulting in neither one of them getting their proper due, except for the main daughter and the father of course, played so superbly by Sihung Lung in a scene-stealing role. I just wish that the movie dealt with a lesser cast myself.

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Eat Drink Man Woman is well made, but nothing particularly arresting in terms of cinematography, score and direction. Ang Lee made a better movie the previous year with ‘The Wedding Banquet’, and this one just doesn’t compare to that terrific feature, though it definitely has its strengths, and even a lesser Lee movie is still quite solid.

Eat Drink Man Woman deals with modernity versus tradition within Taiwanese society while its title is ingenious and thematically rather sophisticated. The performances are also excellent and so is the dialogue. However, there are too many characters in this movie, thus the focus was spread too thin on all of them, resulting in a bit of an overall muted effect.

My Rating – 3.5