All Shall Be Well: A Heart-Wrenching Drama that Highlights a Tragic Legal Loophole

Image: A still from the movie All Shall Be Well

In the latest film from acclaimed director Ray Yeung, an elderly lesbian loses her life partner unexpectedly, only to see her once-cordial relationship with the partner’s relatives disintegrate over inheritance issues. This quietly heart-wrenching drama, titled All Shall Be Well, highlights a loophole in same-sex couples’ legal rights in Hong Kong.

The film, which won the prestigious Teddy Award at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival, proves a worthy follow-up to Yeung’s Suk Suk, another acclaimed drama focusing on the distressing situations faced by older gay people in Chinese society.

A Tender Glimpse into a Loving Relationship

The film opens with a tender glimpse into the loving, 40-plus-year relationship between Angie Wang (Patra Au Ga-man) and Pat Wu (Maggie Li Lin-lin) as they prepare to welcome Pat’s older brother, Shing (Tai Bo), and his extended family to a cozy Mid-Autumn Festival dinner in their apartment.

Angie and Pat are an affluent couple, thanks to Pat’s business acumen, and the wealth gap between them and the working-class Shing, his wife Mei (Hui So-ying), and their two adult children, Victor (Leung Chung-hang) and Fanny (Fish Liew Chi-yu), is very clear.

While always generous with money with their relatives, Angie and Pat are inevitably the subject of much envy behind their backs – a situation they appear to be painfully oblivious to.

A Sudden Death and a Family in Disarray

When Pat dies suddenly in her sleep at age 69 without leaving a will, the affection between Angie and the Wu family begins to fade, starting with the Wu’s denying Pat’s wish for a sea burial, despite Angie’s insistence, in favor of a fortune-teller’s plea to put her ashes in a columbarium based on feng shui reasons.

While their disagreements never degenerate into histrionics, Angie soon faces the prospect of being removed from her residence of over 30 years, as her unofficial in-laws take advantage of the fact her name is not on the property deed – something that would be impossible with a heterosexual marriage.

A Widow Besieged by Grief and Human Greed

As he did in Suk Suk, Yeung is at pains to maintain that there are no bad people in his world, only those with wildly different perspectives. The Wu’s may be politely ruining Angie’s life, but they are only doing so because of how badly they’re struggling with their own financial situations, as the film takes time to show us.

A former teacher who made her film debut in her 60s with Suk Suk, Au provides the beating heart of this understated drama as a widow besieged by grief and human greed. Around her, the uniformly excellent ensemble cast playing the Wu family also render their characters’ subtle changes in attitude all the more unwatchable.

Image: Patra Au, the star of All Shall Be Well