My dad really wanted to watch “The Woman Knight of Mirror Lake” for some weird reason. Oh wait. I do know the reason. It’s because he thinks that it’s some action film. Anyway, the Chinese title of the movie is 競雄女俠•秋瑾 which I would’ve translated as “The Heroic Lady Warrior/ Knight – Qiu Jin”. It IS about Qiu Jin, a revolutionist and a feminist who grew up in the 1900’s. You can read up more about her via wikipedia.
Back to the movie.
This is another movie celebrating the 100th year of the 1911 revolution where the Sun Yat Sen-led group managed to overthrow the Qing Dynasty. The flow of the movie was a little odd because it starts off with the scene where a wealthy lady is carried in a sedan in the rain and she is accompanied by a younger woman who is crying. The wealthy lady comes out of the sedan, sees something and then collapses in tears.
The whole movie then jumps from one time space to another and the audience has to fix all of them up like a jigsaw puzzle. It’s not a confusing jigsaw but it definitely does not build up the tension nor made you really feel for the characters. The storyline is so rich but the story-telling failed it. Worst part is, you can’t blame the actors and actresses who really did their very best in emoting and you can’t fault them.
I feel that the movie “The Woman Knight of Mirror Lake” is good to watch for historical value but then, you might gain more insight into Qiu Jin and the revolution from reading her poems and books on her.
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