Anita Mui had 20 years of film career, mastering all kinds of movies including melodramas, comedies and action motives, she topped the list of female actresses of 80s and 90s.  The roles she played illustrated the tradition and transition of female images in the HK films.  Indirectly she reflected the status of HK females which had been elevated during her 20 years in the period of economic improvement, and broke the rather mechanical impressionism. 

Anita Mui has left us for almost for one year.

During the past year, review and comment about Anita Mui by media can be classified into 2 major categories:  1)  She was a singer with ever changing images, outstanding stage styles and talent of performing all kinds of songs.  Anita Mui created a culture of pop music.  2)  She was a classic role model of Hong Kong.  The course of transforming from a child singer to a super star was the testimonial  history of struggle in Hong Kong for the past decades.  But, there has never been any elaboration of Anita Mui about her films.

Is Anita Mui in her films not worth to be mentioned?  Let's put aside the fact that Anita Mui had got the Best Actress Award from China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, and not to mention that Anita Mui was once the  highest paid actress, just from the films of Anita Mui, we can see the change of female role in the Hong Kong films.  By her special status and image, she re-wrote the female history in  Hong Kong films within 20 years.  At the same time it indirectly reflected the change of t the female status in the 80s and 90s of Hong Kong.  In the male dominated world of HK films, she played many diversified roles of female character.  Looking around China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, for the past 20 years, there hasn't be any female actress who can successfully surmount all types of films, and surmount the boundary between sexes.

Anita Mui in Melodramas

A Tradition of Gender Superiority

Fleur, Anita Mui's role in [Rouge], was the most traditional female character; she was weak, irrationally passionate, and shy, she was a prostitute.  This kind of female, was pitiful, attracted to be loved, with a rough destiny, was a model female for male to gaze.

But under the camera of Stenley Kwan, the role of Fleur was not that flat.  The first appearance of Fleur was in male disguise, exchanging eye contacts with Master 12th, a "male with male" contact.  From this, it was understood as the imagination of sex orientation of love created by the director, Stenley Kwan, who is gay;  besides, versatility could be seen in the gender role of Fleur.  In this love story, though Fleur was said to be a prostitute of weak character, the leadership of her in the whole story was apparent:  after Master 12th left his home, by her connection she found a job for him;   she suggested suicide for their love, and she demonstrated bravery without fear during the process of committing suicide; finally, she threw away the token of faith resolutely, seemingly looked forward to her rebirth, while Mater 12th, on the contrary, was a disappointment.  The movie showed that female was more tenacious and positive than male - though this tenacity only limited to the area of passion, this type of sad and strong female role could be compared to another actress Yuan Lin Yuk who portrayed a prostitute in the movie [Goddess] with poor destiny.

In many melodramas Anita Mui played the roles that steered or led the actors with tenacity.  In [Kawashima Yoshiko], she,  being barbarous with authority and power for passion,  charmed and abused a man emotionally (played by Andy Lau ), that scene was  rare in HK films;  in [Midnight Fly], she, all by herself,  got rid of her husband  and risked her life,  in order to rescue her friend.  She, on the one hand, reversed the tendency of HK films in which males were usually taken as the focus point in the story, at the same time she played female roles of special characteristics of different kinds.

Anita Mui in Comedies

A Rebelliousness of Gender Preference

Comedy has always been a very important category of Hong Kong films.  In the past 20 years, from ghost films, funny kung-fu films, to those about wooing girls, from Stephen Chow to Ronald Cheng, comedy is always a main category of HK films.  From the view of researches of gender role, actually comedy is an important field, because, jokes flooded our society are usually about sex, and females,  who are often being taken advantage of as a sex object with crude jokes,   

Female role in the comedy is usually of no importance:  in the 80s, films about wooing girls were very popular,  all those Miss Hong Kong supposed to be full of wisdom and beauty  were described as low IQ animal with big bust but with no brain, their body became extremely obscene under the camera.  This has been recognized as a kind of disaster during the movement of equality of the sexes.  Female stars of that time such as 李美鳳, 李嘉欣, 利智 and etc in the films by 王晶 were being played with and peered at.  In the comedies of Stephen Chow, there are 2 kinds of female, one is rotten stirring jokes as he is, Sandra Ng stands for this kind;  another kind is his imaginary sex object, Cheung Mun is for this kind.  Both types of female have a very low position in his film.

Anita Mui in comedy was very different from those types of female stars just mentioned above.  First of all, she was not a beauty, so she would be exempted from being "played with"; besides, her aroma of being a big sister made her comedian role different from others.  [Justice my Foot] was the most representative example, in this HK comedy of 90s, that role of Anita Mui had 2 breakthroughs:  1)  She and Stephen Chow created laughter together, but she didn't have to act rotten as Sandra Ng;  2)  The film molded her as a madame excelled with kung fu, as the movie even started with a scene where she rescued Stephen Chow.  To make the contrast between "big woman, small man" more outstanding,  the film purposely differentiated the height between the two, making Anita Mui to be taller than Stephen Chow.  Among so many films of Stephen Chow, we can  hardly find another female leading role as in [Justice my Foot], in which Anita Mui and Stephen Chow were treated equal.

Anita Mui in Heroic Movies　

A Reversal of Gender Priority

The heroic movies we are talking about here are about the topics of police force against thieves or triads.  During the 80s, the heroic films became popular, in this world of males, the weak position of females had been established;   their part in the film was not important, their performance was in the way, just waited to be saved by the heroes;  for even worse ones, it was very normal for them to be raped or killed during the fight between good and the bad.  In the 90s,  the series of [young and dangerous], the triad type was getting very metropolitan, but the roles played by females basically remained the same, looking at the fate of Gigi Lai Chi in [Young & Dangerous], we  would know the fate of all.  No matter it was triad or police, it was actually a miniature of the male world, the fighting, the righteousness, the revenge, all were exclusive rights of the males, female roles were naturally excluded.

Therefore, in this type of movies, it is very meaningful for any change in the female role.  In the films of past 20 years, besides Michelle Yeoh , Anita Mui was the only other one who also played female fighter.  The heroic film,  [A Better Tomorrow III], bravely reversed the role of sexes, from the title of the film (the title of the song of Anita Mui was used for the film), poster (the part of Anita Mui was larger and more outstanding then Chow Yun Fat) to the script (Anita Mui was playing the major role), unexpectedly female played the leading part.  The name of the character Anita Mui played was "Chow Yin Kit" that meant heroine;  in the movie, Chow Yun Fat and Leung Kai Fai were men of no importance, while Anita Mui was an important figure with high authority in the triad world.  From the beginning till the end, she was loyal and righteous, brave and resourceful, knowing the whole situation, the real hero in this film was actually Anita Mui.  This role was nearly the most important female in the history of HK film of the triad.

It is not difficult for us to realize that all the films that Anita Mui played had strong female characters.  The other example was the film [My Father is a Hero].  This film was about the relationship between two males and one female:  the relation between Anita Mui and Damian Lau Chung Yan, female was stronger here and acted more beautifully; for the relation between Anita Mui and Jet Li, the former even appeared unexpectedly to rescue the latter from danger.  The status and image of Anita Mui reversed the part played by 2 different sexes and role molded in many films.

The existence of Anita Mui without Anita Mui

Interesting writing of gender roles

Anita Mui originally had a role in [The House of Flying Daggers] as a big sister of the House of Flying Daggers.  Though she could not perform in that film, from the film we saw very interesting writing about sexes.

There was a scene:  Andy Lau when facing Zhang Zi Yi, who no longer loved him, he pressed himself against her and wanted to rape her.  Then a dagger flying over and pierced through his back, the big sister of the House of Flying Daggers said calmly:  [Don't force a woman to do anything which she doesn't like to do.]  This scene, maybe is the very unique rape scene in Chinese films.  In the normal films, when a woman is being raped, there will be 2 possible outcomes:  one is the rapist gets what he wants, the other one is  the beauty is saved by a hero.  In [The House of Flying Daggers], a female of prominent status was allowed to stop this rape, at the same time  she gave a warning, it was handled in a very exceptional way.  Also Zhang Yi Mou insisted that this role must be played by Anita Mui.  Even after she passed away, this role wasn't given to anyone else.  So an actress with her face covered by a big hat acted for her for that scene.  Reviewing many works of Zhang Yi Mou,  we found that he often emphasized the independence of the passion of female (such as [Red Shoghum]) and sovereignty of female (such as [ Story of Qiu Ju ]), we can see to let Anita Mui  play the role of big sister was the intention for the writing of sexes.

Anita Mui had 20 years of film career, mastering all kinds of movies including melodramas, comedies and action motives, she topped the list of female actresses of 80s and 90s.  The roles she played illustrated the tradition and transition of female images in the HK films.  Indirectly reflected that the status of HK females which had been elevated during her 20 years in the period of economic improvement, and broke the rather mechanical impressionism.  Because of Anita Mui, we know that the 1st class movie stars don't have to sell their appearance and their figure; because of Anita Mui, we know a female role, whether working for the police or the triad can be stronger than a male role.  Anita Mui provides an origin for research of gender equalities, gender role criticism and review of culture, the meaning and value are still to be discovered by the researchers.