Reviews

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  ★★★★½ review by Wendy on Letterboxd

  This film was really eye-opening to the child abduction issue in China. Did you know that buying children is not illegal in China?! Peter Chan relayed this to the audience at TIFF at its first screening, and the audience was completely surprised by this fact. (His entire Q&A was rather informative actually. He answered questions very thoroughly, connecting his film to the original documentary and to the current issue in China.)

  Of course, the film may have overused the soundtrack, overloading it with epic symphony pieces to bring on the tears, and the first half of the movie might have been a little typical for a child abduction film, but these two points don't take away to how amazing the overall movie was.

  Zhao Wei's performance is the highlight of this film. Her scene at the police station - I've never seen her this raw. She completely sheds her celebrity in the scene, collapsing on the police floor as she weeps for her son. Had another actress been in this role, I don't think you would have been able to emotionally understand this mother's desperateness to get her child back. This, I think, is the most pivotal scene in the movie as it bridges the two halves of the film together, the story from the birth father's point of view, and now the the story from the adoptive mother's point of view.

  I also love how the film presented China's child abduction issue from various characters: The birth parents, the adoptive mother, the group tour leader (the friends), the adoption centre, the lawyer, the court, and even the law. China's one-child policy opens up a wide range of opinions and stories, and this film does really well in showcasing one of them.

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  ★★★★ review by Sean Gilman on Letterboxd

  SIFF 2015

  The wrenching true story of two parents who search for years for their abducted child, kidnapped out from under them on the streets of Shenzhen. Only a lunatic like Hong Kong director Peter Chan would make that story the only first half of his movie, while devoting the second to the desperation of the mother who was raising said abducted child to get her other kid back after she's sent to an orphanage. Only a genius like Peter Chan could actually make it work. Dominated by three brilliant performances from the involved parents (Zhao Wei and Hao Lei as the two mothers, Huang Bo as the father), Chan opens the film up from a standard ripped-from-the-headlines melodrama to something more expansive, a portrait of a Chinese society breaking apart as the class divide grows between rich and poor, urban and rural, those who know how to navigate the country's bureaucracy and those who do not. Hao and Huang lead a thoroughly modern middle class existence in Shenzhen, the scenes could be set in any city in the world, dominated by cars and wires, divorce and the internet. Zhao lives in a small farming village, doesn't speak proper Mandarin and believes everything her (now-deceased) husband told her. As much as the first half of the film is about the precariousness of our lives (especially as parents), the second is about opening Zhao's eyes to the modern world, to just how alien she is from it, and just how much she does not understand. She's already racked up a handful of Best Actress awards for her performance, make-up free with bad hair and lots of anguished tears, but Hao (familiar from Lou Ye films like Summer Palace and Mystery) and Huang (who played The Monkey King in Stephen Chow's Journey to the West) are just as good.

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  ★★★★ review by Rus Ekkel on Letterboxd

  Well made drama from the always-reliable Peter Chan. Watched on Tubi TV

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  ★★★★ review by Veronica Chiu on Letterboxd

  4/5 - Chen's return to heartfelt film. For some reason, I completely missed this one during TIFF 2014. Story is based on a true story and highlights the reality in China with kids being abducted, and couples tied by not knowing the fate of their missing child & whether the can have another child (single child policy). All actors/actresses were amazing in this film. It is no wonder the main female lead (Zhao Wei) won best actress for her portrayal of 'mother' of the missing child.

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  ★★★★½ review by Ledi on Letterboxd

  Fantastic acting from Zhao Wei of Pearl Princess fame. Lovely, touching, and heartrending movie that touches on issues Chinese society has with the desire to have heirs under the one-child and now two-child policy, versus a parent's genuine love regardless of social status or tradition. Population control is necessary, but people aren't handling the sharp transitions well. Hard issue with hard consequences.

  I can't find any flaws except that besides the parents, Zhao Wei carried the entire film and the other characters weren't that sympathetic or compelling. I think I also don't condone Zhao Wei that much.

  "Dearest" is a good portrait of the impoverished parts of China, from the wire-filled tech alleys of Guangzhou to the lonely, beautiful countryside.

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