7 of the best gender-bending Chinese movies to see – from The Love Eterne to Farewell My Concubine
Directors have not shied away from putting homosexual relationships on the screen – there are gun-toting lesbian assassins, men pretending to be women and women pretending to be men
Despite coming from a city with a socially conservative reputation, Hong Kong cinema can be surprisingly progressive. From Wong Kar-wai’s award-winning gay drama Happy Together to Wong Jing’s sleazy cult classic Naked Killer, with its gun-toting lesbian assassins, directors have not shied away from putting homosexual relationships up on screen.
So it is with notions of gender fluidity. During Hong Kong cinema’s golden age, from the mid-80s to the mid-90s, a number of films were notable for the gender-bending antics of its stars. Guys would pretend to be girls and, more often, girls pretended to be guys. It wasn’t only Hong Kong films, though. Certain mainland and Taiwanese productions featured the same elements.
In time, these films may be viewed as pioneering works of cinema. If you’re curious now, however, here are seven of the best gender-bending Chinese films to watch.
The Love Eterne (1963)
Considered the Gone With the Wind of its day in East Asia, The Love Eterne was a massive critical and commercial success throughout the region. The Taiwanese film starred Hong Kong actresses Ivy Ling Po and “classic beauty” Betty Loh Ti. The latter plays a girl who disguises herself as a boy to attend school. There she befriends Ling’s character, a boy. The pair are soon best friends. Eventually Loh reveals her identity and the two agree to marry. However, Loh’s father has other plans. Ling’s performance as a man was so convincing the judges of Taiwan’s Golden Horse Awards created a special award for her, for outstanding performance, since they couldn’t decided whether to award her best actor or best actress.
The Swordsman II (1992)
One of the most famous of Hong Kong’s gender-bending films, The Swordsman II delivers one of Hong Kong cinemas most iconic characters. Brigitte Lin, playing Invincible Asia, is the reason. The leader of the Sun Moon Holy Cult, Asia castrates himself to acquire the tremendous powers promised by the Sunflower Manual. However, the process causes him to become increasingly feminine. Despite rising to fame with the help of her feminine good looks, Lin is thoroughly convincing as Asia, and her tragic romance with Jet Li’s Linghu Chong adds pathos.
Farewell My Concubine (1993)