The Personals (1998)

I love this movie so much

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

Dr Du is a Taiwanese eye doctor who takes out a personal ad to hopefully meet a future husband.We share Du's journey as she meets an assortment of would be suitors. Some can be funny-a salesman who meets up with her because he wants to sell her self defense items, including one that shoots dye in a hilarious scene. Some are weird-a shoe fetishist just wants her to try on shoes for him. Some are sleazy-a pimp merely wants her to be part of his prostitution ring. Some are sad-a mother brings her sheltered son because he cannot cope with the outside world.Dr Du is lonely and looking for love due to a broken romance with a married man. She is only able to reveal her true feelings by leaving messages on his answering machine, though they go unanswered.This is a sometimes heart breaking film, though well worth seeking out if you are looking for something realistic and raw in emotion. Rene Liu is excellent in the lead, her big expressive eyes and shy, awkward smile tell the whole story. A little seen film that deserves to be sought out.

It's a jungle out there… The Personals is a movie for anyone who hasn't yet found what they're looking for or who remembers how tough it can be to find it. Rene Liu plays an eye doctor who's become disaffected with her present life and is craving something more— namely love and marriage. She's attractive, has a good job, and a decent apartment. Up until now she has done everything she's supposed to do, but it just hasn't worked for her. She's still alone. Now, she decides to take the extreme measure of advertising for a husband in the personals. The search leads her down the slippery slope of the modern dating scene whose universal quirkiness transcends the boundaries of all industrialized societies.As a parade of diverse characters respond to the ad from obnoxious to bizarre to tragically pathetic (old coots, odd birds, pervs, nerds, frauds, conmen and salesmen), she starts to wonder if her standards are too high? And, watching the film you have to wonder…Do you have to settle for what's there and what you may not want because of social expectations? In Hollywood's hands, this little film would have become a relentless string of crude and infantile jokes and sight gags contrived to make us groan, but instead, this Taiwanese tale serves us up a quietly understated, poignantly humorous look at the dating scene. No matter where the film might have been set, you're sure to hear a ring of truth to it. At one time or another, we've all been there— whether we like to admit it or not.Might be a little slow paced for some, but, on the whole, a solid little film with which most people will find something to identify. And, whether shy, bewildered, desperate, panicked, or outraged, Liu's performance is surprisingly sympathetic and often quite engaging.

When you compare the gulf that exists between the wretched quality of acting in the bulk of Taiwan's television dramas and that in the high proportion (but small number overall) of excellent films, you have to wonder whether there are two different worlds in this small country. "The Personals" is an example of the latter to treasure. Rene Liu is captivating in a quiet sort of way as a professional woman struggling with her well-concealed demons and subjecting herself to an endless round of meetings with various suitors. The acting is so natural and attractive that one almost feels like an eavesdropper at the table in the tea shop, but a welcome one. The overall emphasis is wry comedy, but as with so many Taiwanese films that get foreign release, there is a drifting air of sadness and dislocation. This might be partly due to the fact that the bulk of Taiwan's foreign-screened films are obsessed with the fortunes and neuroses of the "mainlander" minority in Taipei (Eat Drink Man Woman is thus far the pinnacle of this syndrome). Many "mainlanders", even their Taiwan-born children, retain an equivocal attitude toward Taiwan as a home outside of the sphere of greater China and from this I suspect comes that sadness and dislocation. Yet pro-Taiwan independence zealots might even read into this film a more troubling interpretation: Rene Liu is smart, attractive, sassy, engaging - thoroughly modern - but is stung by prior romances, and unable to find a partner in anyone, yet is desperate for affirmation and companionship.Ethnic interpretations aside, the film could have been an ugly disaster by mocking the men (and one woman) who would be her companion. Instead we get a lovely selection of real people, complex and banal, kooky and elegant. But never dull. If you walk down a Taipei street, these are the people you will meet.The writer and director deserve the highest accolades for this effort. It's one of the best contemporary Taiwanese films out there.

I find it hard to describe why I liked this film so much. Suffice to say, it takes you to a unique and very real territory about the difficulty in being truthful. I did not realize the journey it had taken me on until its perfect ending, but my sister and I left the cinema in the firm glow of mutual joyous insight. See it, and throw all expectations where they belong: on the rubbish pile.