Eat, Drink, Man, Woman (1994)

This film portrays a typical Chinese father who has difficulty in openly conveying his love and affection for his three grown daughters, so he shows them his love using the only method he knows how and is comfortable with - through food. Mr. Chu is an esteemed chef who is used to preparing elaborate meals in professional kitchens, and he always prepares a feast for the family's weekly Sunday dinners to communicate his love towards his daughters. The use of food to convey feelings is common in most Asian families, but in the Chu family it held a lot more significance as the Sunday dinners were the platform for family members to make life-changing announcements.

Mr. Chu also showed his love for his daughters in other subtle ways, for example, waking them up in the morning, doing their laundry for them, sorting out their clothes and placing it in their respective drawers (although he tended to get it wrong), and even scolding Jia-Chien for falling asleep at her desk, saying that it was bad for her posture.

Food is a central theme in this film, and the activities and issues surrounding it is used as an analogy for the dynamics between the characters. Another theme that I picked up on is the basic human need for love and belonging, as stated in Maslow's hierarchy of needs and Glasser's choice theory (Friedman & Schustack, 2014; Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2012). In the beginning of the film, we learn that Mr. Chu is losing his sense of taste and has to rely on his friend, Uncle Wen, to give him feedback on his dishes. His painstakingly-prepared dinners go relatively untouched because his daughters do not find the food appetising, and would prefer to be anywhere but at the dinner table with their father.

The deterioration of Mr. Chu's sense of taste can be seen to symbolise the result of being stuck in a period of his life that he would like to move on from. He is tired of the years he spent in the kitchen and wants to retire from both the professional and home kitchens, hoping that his daughters will quickly leave home so that he can start a new phase of his life with Jin-Rong. Similarly, the state of his relationship with his daughters is most likely the result of years of routine dinners, so much so that Jia-Jen and Jia-Chien feel trapped in the family home and resentful towards their father. Although Mr. Chu obviously cares for his daughters, their actions do not seem to show that the feeling is mutual, and Mr. Chu can sense their resentment. The family might live in the same house, but they all lead very separate lives, leaving Mr. Chu feeling lonely. Therefore, he turns to Jin-Rong and Shan-Shan who are happy to spend time with him and can provide him with the love and sense of belonging that he needs.

The intermittent traffic scenes symbolise the passing of time and change. There was a traffic scene just before the big dinner in which Mr. Chu announced his relationship with Jin-Rong, which was different from the first two traffic scenes shown. In this scene, there was a traffic conductor that wasn't there before, suggesting that change was taking place in Taipei, but more importantly, in the Chu family. Indeed, there was change in the dynamics of the family. The relationship between the Chu family members seemed to be less prickly since Jia-Jen and Jia-Ning left the family home. Previously, the three daughters grudgingly ate the food cooked by Mr. Chu, but now everyone was helping themselves and really tucking into the food (before the announcement was made).

Towards the end of the film, yet another scene of moving traffic was used to indicate that more time had elapsed, and with that, more change. We learn that Jia-Chien has taken up the job in Amsterdam and is home after a few months of being away. When Mr. Chu arrives for dinner he doesn't let himself in despite having the key, which I interpret as him respecting the fact that the house now belongs to Jia-Chien, and whom he now sees as an adult. At the very end of the film, Mr. Chu realised that he had regained his sense of taste when he began criticising Jia-Chien's soup. I feel that this is symbolic of the fact that he is no longer 'stuck' in life, as he now has a new life with his young wife and her daughter, in addition to an improved relationship with his daughters, particularly his second one. The last scene, though simple, was very heart-warming and shows just how much the dynamics between the father and daughter had changed over the course of the film.


References

Friedman, H. S., & Schustack, M. W. (2014). Personality: Classic theories and modern research

     (5th ed.). Essex: Pearson Education Limited.

Sommers-Flanagan, J., & Sommers-Flanagan, R. (2012). Counseling and Psychotherapy
     Theories in Context and Practice: Skills, Strategies, and Techniques (2nd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: 
     John Wiley & Sons.