Roger Ebert really missed this movie's point...
These are excerpts from Roger Ebert's review of this movie. I hope this isn't some kind of copyright infringement;
1. This is all done good-heartedly, you see. The cronies are warm and caring men, who, when they are not receiving massages, sit on the rafters to look down into the roofless room; they nod approvingly at "Little Wu's" happiness, and the movie argues that they practice their deception to make her happy.
2. That assumes their definition of happiness for a blind young teenage girl is to let her sit in a "hotel room" 24 hours a day, waiting for one of her newfound friends to come in for a massage. This would not be my definition of happiness, or perhaps yours, although it might fit for the hero of John Fowles' novel The Collector. To me, it sounds like a cruel deception carried out by men of marginal intelligence, with reactionary ideas about women and a total lack of empathy.(boldface added)
3. The movie seems to come from a simpler, more innocent culture. There is never a hint of sex in it, for one thing. The massages are completely chaste, the men like them that way, and it never occurs to the girl that it is creepy that she is giving massages to a bunch of anonymous men while living in a fake hotel room. Apparently, the men never, ever, look down into the room while Little Wu undresses
I usually have a lot of respect for Ebert's opinions and normally value his assessment, but I can't believe how he missed the boat here. I'm not saying that this is a great movie, but it is definitely a good one.
Roger accuses these people of having no empathy, while showing that he is the one that this applies to here. I mean, I don't really know anything about Chinese culture, but I don't think that it is needed to understand this movie, and the motivations of the characters. Roger uses the word "creepy" more than once in his review while decribing the plan regarding the fake massage room. He somehow didn't notice that these folks weren't getting anything out of this scam (other than massages from an inexperienced girl) and were only doing it to keep the girl occupied and somewhat happy. It would have been truly creepy if they had decided to make money off this girl and brought her real customers. Instead, it cost them their time and whatever money Zhao could scrape together. "Cruel deception" my eye!
Also, how could Roger totally miss the fact that Zhao had given up his apartment to the girl and was, in fact, the one living in the fake massage room? This girl was in no way being held prisoner as suggested by Roger's reference to 'The Collector'. She was more of a prisoner while living in Chunky Mama's apartment. I don't think that his friends had any desire to sneak up into the rafters and watch him undress. ;-) I assume that the fact that the massages are 'chaste' is a cultural thing. Of course, most massages in the US are 'chaste' as well and entirely professional. I mean, done by registered masseurs(sp)?, that is.
All I can say is I hope that Roger enjoyed the nap that he apparently took while he was supposed to be watching this movie. share