A Talented Lady (aka A House Filled with Happiness)

Hong Kong cinema has a tradition of having a number of Lunar New Year films to celebrate the happy occasion. In the 1950s, these were principally Cantonese Opera films, but comedies on petit bourgeoisie lifestyle and gender equality became a favourable theme in the 1960s. A Talented Lady is a good example. The story is about Ling Suet-fong (Nam Hung), a virtuous, intelligent wife who not only takes her time to study foreign language but is also totally devoted to her husband Lee Wah-lui (Chow Chung). However, the conservative Lee always picks on her and insists that a woman's place should be the kitchen and nowhere else. Their neighbour Ling-ling (Lydia Sum) cannot stand Lee's behaviour. In order to prove women are as capable as men in the workplace, Ling-ling disguises Suet-fong as her cousin and sends her to apply for a job at the hotel where Lee is working for. The self-righteousness of the men pulls the women together, urging them to teach the men a lesson with good will. The script is impressively well-rounded (the screenwriter is not credited but believed to be Mok Hong-si): the "doubling" motif, a device beloved by Mok, charmingly turns Nam Hung into two separate characters; the belittled wife Suet-fong finally emerges as a competent working woman and secures her self-identity. A humourous touch that leaps outside the orthodox moral boundary can be felt when the disguised Suet-fong is in turn courted by her husband and the other colleagues.

Date	Time	Venue
1/7/2016 (Fri) #	2:00pm	Cinema, Hong Kong Film Archive

# Post-screening talk with William Yuen and Honkaz Fung

The contents of the programme do not represent the views of the presenter. The presenter reserves the right to change the programme should unavoidable circumstances make it necessary.