Bald New World

Starred review from April 21, 2014
Perhaps a century in the future, all humans suddenly go bald, putting wig factory owners like filmmaker and womanizer Larry Chao in the spotlight. Larry’s best friend, cameraman Nicholas Guan, fights for his own identity in this thought-provoking story where fakery is preferred over the real. Liu (Dr. 2) crafts a vivid, imaginative setting with lush descriptive phrases: “Beijing had become a city of vapors, a metropolis of neon calligraphy... Store names floated in mid-air, Mandarin phrases wandered the alleys like unforgiven spirits, and a sentence cried for redemption, crucified in mist.” What begins as a broad farce with spy girls and gadgets gradually becomes a serious commentary on the nature of self. Nick struggles against those who would reform, use, or manipulate him, trying to find himself in a world strewn with literal false faces. Gorgeous language choices combine with Nick’s philosophical journey of personal discovery to create a deceptively deep story.