A well crafted movie using various filtering, angles and editing methods to carry messages. The pacing is definitely not commercial and that is a strong feature in it this movie's favour. It wants you to think and it allows you the space to do it.The message of having to suppress but finally come to terms with one's inner self is explored from various angles in the character Flavia and also in her friend Jin. However, using the parallel vehicles of homosexuality and politics to do it is old hat and unoriginal. Some have suggested that in Hong Kong that comes across as daring but I don't buy that for a second in 2004-5. For me, the film gets away with it by the way it weaves them together with the various subplots, along with the different time tracks. This succeeds in making the themes come across as more original than they are.The film needed to be longer. The dual time tracks and the subplots create a need for about 5 more carefully chosen minutes to fill them out in a more satisfying and well rounded way.+++ minor spoilers below +++ I also don't agree that Flavia has a "bad" marriage unless one is going to claim that a very large proportion of Hong Kong marriages are bad. She could have been doing far, far worse! But ultimately for Flavia, it just wasn't really something that could make her deeply happy and satisfied.Some of the kissing and lovemaking was not realistic at all (there must have been some heavy discussions among the actresses and the director around that, those discussions would make for a great out-take) but the passion nonetheless believable.

Butterfly is a brave try in the contemporary Hong Kong film industry, which has been highly commercialised. In contrast to most of the HK films, which are targeted at the mass audience, this film is definitely catering to viewers with open minds and willing to accept new story-telling styles. The two interesting features of this film, to me, who grew up with Chinese (including HK & Taiwan) films, are: first, parallel story-telling and second, the integration of political messages into a homosexual love story. Let me go more in-depth into these. In this film, there are two main stories, both happened on Ah-Die (acted by Josie Ho), but at two time segments: she at 30 something, married with a daughter; and she during her teens, in love with her schoolmate. The editing skill enhances the stories a lot, by segmenting each story and mixing them together so that the two stories are developing in a parallel manner. Only towards the ending, the audiences know that how the teen lesbian couple parted 15 years ago; and how, in the present world, the triangle relationship between Ah-Die, Yip (acted by Yuan Tian) and Ah-Die's husband was resolved. It is not easy not to confuse the audiences when telling two stories in this way, but the director had done a good job. Excellent! The second interesting feature of this film is that it was able to blend two sensitive issues (at least sensitive in the Chinese world)in one film: politics and homosexuality. In the story of teen Ah-Die 15 years ago, her girlfriend was actively involved in political activities. Though it was not said directly by the main actors, the film had sent the pro-democratic messages by touching on the Tiananmen incidence took place in 1989 in Beijing. A girl said to the public: 'I am not really interested in politics, but I can't deny that we all live in it...'; an old woman also said during a protest that 'we are all humans and we all need freedom and basic rights...'. Though these all happened about 15 years ago, as described in the film, the political messages of freedom and human rights are still valid in contemporary China. Or I dare say the director MEANS to say something about current political status in China. Therefore Butterfly (Wu Die) may not be the greatest art film in 2004 in China, nonetheless, it is the most daring one, which deserves the dedication of audiences' time to appreciate it.

"butterfly" (wu die) didn't disappoint me even though it's a low budget movie directed by a new indie director what i love most about the movie is that it didn't question the 2 character's sexual orientation in any way, making lesbianism as something normal (instead of "abnormal" as many other Asian films have portrayed it to be) but then i think this movie would be better if it's shorter (it's 2 hours long) and if the characters weren't clothed during some love scenes (cause it appears artificial to me), and the kissing scenes by the 2 young actresses weren't quite convincing i also agreed that the 2 lesbian students subplot were detracting from the main plot..it just annoys me really overall, i think the best thing about this movie is that it got a positive ending that signifies the slow but positive gay movement in Asia and in Hong Kong (where this movie was shot)

The second feature from Hong Kong independent director Yan Yan Mak has been one of the most talked about films of 2004. A small-scale film that sits on the border of independent and commercial film-making, Butterfly premiered at the Venice Film Festival in 2004 as the Opening Film for the International Critics' Week. It has since been invited to many film festivals around the world, including Stockholm, Pusan, Tokyo, Bangkok, India, Brazil and Australia. It also received two nominations at Taiwan's Golden Horse Awards in 2004: Best Screenplay Adaptation for Mak and Best New Performer for Tian Yuan.Butterfly is adapted from Taiwanese author Chen Hsueh's short story "The Mark of the Butterfly". Starring Josie Ho, Eric Kot, Tian Yuan, Isabel Chan and Joman Chaing, it is about a woman's struggle to come to terms with her true self, the importance to break out from her cocoon and set herself free.Like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis, Flavia finds her lesbian passion reawakened after a chance encounter with a carefree and spirited singer / songwriter. A shattering new film form award-winning director Yan Yan Mak (Gege, 2001), Butterfly alternates between the past and the present, juxtaposing a romance to a rebellious human rights activist in 1989 with her current struggles as a wife and mother. Fronted by a brave and sympathetic...