Footprints of Change (足迹): A Nuanced Portrait of Shanghai Across Three Eras

After finishing Footprints of Change (足迹), I found myself so engrossed that what began as a simple review quickly morphed into a detailed commentary. Three weeks later, I decided to pause and reframe my thoughts into a more condensed response to the series.

With Love With You 有你的时光里 Review: A Quiet, Female-Led Healing Drama

A spoiler-light review and overview of With Love With You, with reflections on its themes of sisterhood, resilience, and healing.

With Love With You centres around Wang Yan (Tong Yao) and Wang Lingjun (Zhou Yiran), two sisters with starkly different personalities. Wang Yan is a highly successful account director in a creative agency who is independent, efficient, and fearless. Lingjun, on the other hand, is aimless, resentful, and wilful. Despite Wang Yan's considerable influence within the family and her insistence that the 30-year-old Lingjun obtain her medical practitioner's certificate before even considering leaving their hometown of Leshan, Lingjun defies everyone's wishes and relocates to Shenzhen, determined to be near her sister. This upheaval disrupts Wang Yan's carefully managed life, sparking conflict between the sisters and within their family.

Breaking the Shadows 乌云之上: A Review (Sort Of)

This isn’t a full-series review—I stopped at episode five, and frankly, that’s all I could manage. Honestly, I was looking forward to this series; I like Sun Li and generally enjoy crime dramas. With a cast full of notable actors and its connection to the Light On anthology, it should have guaranteed some level of quality—or at least been enjoyable.

Cesium Fallout Review: Disaster with a Touch of Tong Yao

#TongYao #童瑶 #HongKongCinema #FilmReview #CesiumFallout #焚城 #AndyLau #劉德華 #BaiYu #白宇 #KarenMok #莫文蔚

I’ll admit, my main reason for watching Cesium Fallout was Tong Yao—I’m working through her entire filmography. A friend who reviewed the movie warned me that her screen time would be limited. Even before his warning, I suspected as much when I saw her credited as a guest star in a disaster film. That usually signals a brief but pivotal role.

Review: A Heartfelt Masterpiece: 'Tender Light' Shines Bright

#TongYao #童瑶 #微暗之火 #TenderLight #ZhangXincheng #张新成​​​ #cdrama
(SPOILER FREE)

Tender Light defies conventions as a bold and daring Chinese drama series that takes risks, potentially alienating some viewers—but undoubtedly rewarding those willing to invest time and effort to understand its narrative. This series demands a mature and dedicated audience, losing some fans of the starring actors who sought a more straightforward experience. However, for those who appreciate complex storytelling and innovative techniques, Tender Light shines as a rare gem. Despite some missteps in the final 15 minutes of Episode 28, the overall brilliance of this 28-episode series far outweighs its flaws. The 'tender light' it emanates may be subtle, but its impact is profound and lasting. 

Onyx Boox Poke 4 Lite eBook reader - review

 #onyxboox #onyx #boox #poke4lite #eBookreader #shopee #review #iluho

I've not been blogging much lately because I've been busy working, learning Blender and getting back to reading again.  After much deliberation and research, I finally got an eBook reader instead of reading off my trusty 7-inch tablet.  So instead of spending the money I had been saving to get a new tablet to replace my ageing tablet, I decided to get a device from Onyx Boox. Since I have never owned an eBook reader before this I decided to get one of the more budget models to try out first and the model I decided on was the Poke 4 Lite.

Stepmother Xu Duoduo - Short Review

#StepmotherXuDuoduo #后妈许多多 #TheBlendedFamily #重组家庭 #TongYao #童瑶 #WangZhifei #王志飞

Stepmother Xu Duoduo aka The Blended Family is a contemporary series that was shot and set in Xiamen, China. The story centres around Xu Duoduo (Tong Yao), a young television drama screenplay writer who meets plastic surgeon Wen Shuping (Wang Zhifei) in a series of amusing encounters before eventually falling in love and marrying the much older man.

Life Is A Long Quiet River #心居 - short review

#TongYao #童瑶 #HaiQing #海清 #ZhangSongwen #张颂文 #FengShaofeng #冯绍峰 #JieBing #节冰 #SunAnke #孙安可 #DongQing #董晴 #LuSiyu #陆思宇 #TengHuatao #滕华涛

A SHORT SPOILER FREE REVIEW

Life is a Long Quiet River is a contemporary series set in Shanghai in the Autumn of 2017. The series is centred around two protagonists played superbly by Tong Yao and Hai Qing, They play a pair of sisters-in-law who are superficially cordial but who actually dislike and mistrust each other privately.

Tong Yao plays Gu Qingyu, a very successful executive in a multinational investment bank. She owns her own apartment and pretty much everything she wears is from luxury brands like Giorgio Armani, Dior, Chanel etc just to name a few and she looks effortlessly elegant in them. (Aside: Tong Yao looks stunning in this series.) She's independent, forthright, practical and rational but can also be dispassionate, acerbic and sarcastic.

#TongYao #童瑶 #ZhangXincheng #张新成 #WeWillGrowOldTogether #爱情回想 - review

I finally got around to doing this one too.  This approximately 10 minute short film was released as part of a series of short films by #VogueFilm China near the end of 2021.  Titled We Will Grow Old Together, it's scripted and directed by Wen Ye. 

It's a nice short film.  It won't be winning any awards but then it wasn't made for that.  If you're a fan of either star or if you like films and/or short films, you won't be wasting ten minutes of your time to watch this.  Happily Vogue China has made this available on their YouTube channel and they have provided English subtitles too.  So now you have no excuse not to watch it. :)

#TongYao #童瑶 #TheNewYearEveofOldLee #过年好 - Film - short review

The New Year's Eve of Old Lee - 过年好

I finally got around to watching this in part to see if it's any good and in part to check out Tong Yao's cameo in this film.  It's not bad but it's also not great.  It's merely a relatively generic story about an elderly man, Mr. Lee, who's suffering from Alzheimer's disease.  His daughter Yang Duo just found out about it and returns immediately with her daughter Julie in tow to celebrate the Spring Festival.  Several simmering grievances surface during this short visit leading to several tense moment but given that this is a Lunar New Year film, you can expect a happy ending.  Which means, in a film like this, the journey is more important than the conclusion.

AULA K2 - one handed gaming keyboard

#AULA #AULAK2 #GamingKeybooard #Unboxing #Review

 

Am taking a break from writing long reviews / comments about Asian dramas and have decided to do a quick and short review of the AULA K2 gaming keyboard.  Although this is a gaming keyboard, I actually got this for a different purpose since I don't PC game much at all.  The only PC game I own is Civilization VI which I got for free from a game giveaway but I don't actually play it on the PC, I actually play that on my Nintendo Switch.  My two desktops and my Surface Pro 7 are all meant for work and I don't game on them, not even Minesweeper. 😅

I own a Surface Pro 7 with the Surface Pen and sometimes I like to use it like a cheap version of the Cintiq but when I lay it almost flat on the kickstand, the Surface Pro Type Cover gets in the way.  However, I can't really remove it because I want to use keyboard hotkeys in Photoshop and other programmes.  So I started looking for cheap solutions.  Some people recommended using a programmable keyboard or a number keypad and software like HID Macros and someone else recommended a programmable one handed gaming keyboard in the video below.

The 1byone single hand keyboard that I could not find. :(

Review / Comments ~ The Rebel (叛逆者) 2021

 #review #TheRebel #叛逆者 #ZhuYilong #朱一龙 #TongYao #童瑶 #WangYang #WangZhiwen # ZhuZhu #LiQiang

(For capsule reviews and links to other reviews of Tong Yao's work, please CLICK ME)

(For Additional Comments 1 ~ USE OF MISE-EN-SCENE AND NARRATIVE ELEMENTS TO CREATE MEANING - Lin Nansheng + Zhu Yizhen, please CLICK ME) 

(For Additional Comments 2 on  The Rebel, please CLICK ME -- currently WIP, will update this post when the link is ready)

The Rebel is an espionage series set in China during the Republican Era.  The story centres on a young cadet, Lin Nansheng 林楠笙 (actor: Zhu Yilong 朱一龙) who was plucked out of military school even before graduating by the head of the Shanghai Branch of the Fuxing Society to help flush out the Communists spies in the city.  Chen Moqun 陈默群 (actor: Wang Yang 王阳) is mostly concerned about trying to capture a mole within the Shanghai Branch.  He decided to recruit a new face into his team because he knew that there was a mole in his branch and had begun to suspect everyone there.  He chose Lin Nansheng because he noticed the young man's intelligence and powers of observation.

Review ~ Happiness as Flowers (2005) #幸福像花儿一样 (#孙俪 #SunLi)

This is the first time real life couple #SunLi (#孫儷) and #DengChao (#邓超) have worked together.  When they made this drama, they were only a reel life couple and only became a real life couple some time after this series and before the 2008 series Tian Mi Mi (甜蜜蜜).

I actually finished most of this review in Dec 2018 and hoped to publish it before the year turned because last year happened to be the 30th anniversary of China's Reform and Opening Up which would be kind of fitting since this series has something to do with it.  However, lots and lots of things got in the way and, in the end, I can only call this just one of many missed opportunities.

This is part of my ongoing effort to watch all of Sun Li's work and honestly, when I first decided to try this series, I was a little worried that it might be a difficult watch.  I don't particularly like idol type dramas, nor do l like generic sappy love stories that are designed to draw as many tears out of the viewer as possible.  As I was under the impression that this was a generic teary romance, I approached the series with a little caution.  However, it turned out to be a surprisingly interesting series, albeit with some caveats.

Review ~ Fearless (2006) #霍元甲 (#孙俪 #SunLi)

This is #SunLi 's debut film, although by the time she did this film, she's already had a few drama series under her belt.

I actually watched Fearless back in 2006 when it first screened which is why my memory of Fearless was a little hazy till I recently re-watched this for Sun Li's sake.  I thought that I liked this film enough but after watching it a second time, I realized that I probably didn't like it as much as I remembered which is why it's one of the few Jet Li films I have never watched again till recently.  This has nothing to do with Sun Li or even Jet Li.  I think I just didn't like the story that much.

I get what this pretty inaccurate biopic of Huo Yuanjia (霍元甲) is trying to do and say but I don't know if it really works that well.  The fighting scenes were cool but maybe I'm tired of the "man makes massive error → falls into depression and self destructs → only to have his soul saved after he is physically saved by native tribe / simple kindhearted girl / simpler way of living etc → thus finds redemption by the end of the film" type of story-line.  I think the story is pretty simple and kind of cliche to the point that I'm not really bothered about possibly giving any spoilers away because I don't think it's that hard to guess what would happen next. 

Review ~ One Metre Sunshine (2003) #一米阳光 (#孙俪)

One Metre Sunshine (一米阳光 ) is the fourth series that Sun Li (孙俪) has acted in if we don't count the one where she was an extra with no lines.  This is also the second time she's acted opposite Peter HO Rundong (何润东).  The first was in Goddess of Mercy (玉观音) which I also wrote a review of (click me).

Like a lot of Sun Li's older series, there is little information in English so I will write a synopsis of this 29 episode series.

SPOILER FREE SYPNOSIS

The story begins with a chance meeting between Yi Chuan Xia (Sun Li) and Jin Zheng Wu (Peter Ho) in Shanghai. Chuan Xia has been sent from the Nian Corporation's head office in Canada to be the manager of their Shanghai branch.  Chuan Xia is having an affair with her superior Nian Liang Xiu (Ai Wei) who is also the younger brother of the Chairman of the Nian Corporation.  Nian Liang Xiu sent a bottle of wine to Chuan Xia and the delivery man happens to be Jin Zheng Wu aka Xiao Wu and that is how they first met.  Xiao Wu also works as a talented bartender in a bar that Chuan Xia happens to frequent.  He quickly takes a liking to her and begins to woo this mysterious woman who is happy to check out the city with him but not happy to answer any personal questions about herself.

Review ~ Goddess of Mercy (2003 drama) #玉观音 (#孙俪)

Goddess of Mercy (玉观音) is Sun Li's debut drama.  Well, technically she's been in at least one previous series before but that's as an extra and it's a non-speaking part.  This is the fourth series starring Sun Li that I have ever watched.  By this time I am already a huge admirer of this excellent actress.  It only took one series and that's Nothing Gold Can Stay (那年花開月正圓).  I still hope to do a post on that series but that might take quite a bit of some time and so I thought I would do something that I think I might find easier.

I am trying to watch everything Sun Li has ever done to get a full understanding of her evolution into the exceptional actress that she is today.  So there's no place better to start than by watching her award winning debut performance.  This is the performance that heralded the arrival of a star-in-the-making which by default makes it an important series for anyone who is interested in Sun Li's progress as an actress.