Starring: Fay Bai Baihe, Joseph Chang Hsiao-chuan
Director: Barbara Wong Chun-chun
Category: IIA (Putonghua)
Pretend, if you like, that you didn't see it coming: there are scenes in Barbara Wong Chun-chun's latest film in which its star-crossed protagonists go for their medical appointments.
Such is the inevitable force of misfortune hovering over much of the director's uneven oeuvre - one that includes the insufferable terminal illness dramas Wonder Women (2007) and The Allure of Tears (2011) - that viewers should brace themselves for the worst with The Stolen Years, a bittersweet romantic comedy that is undone by a train wreck of a third act.
In a pair of performances so genuinely charming they almost redeem the folly, mainland actress Fay Bai Baihe ( Love is Not Blind) and Taiwanese actor Joseph Chang Hsiao-chuan ( GF*BF) provide the much-needed emotional anchor for a story that starts well before its subsequent and rather unnatural turn into tear-jerking territory.
Made with mainland money and set predominantly in Taipei, the film opens with a few honeymoon scenes that may recall the emotional intimacy of Break Up Club, Wong's largely satisfying youth romance from 2010.