The highest-grossing Chinese comedy

A few months ago, I wrote about Jia Ling’s (贾玲) 2024 box-office comedy YOLO (热辣滚烫), which I found to be a very entertaining movie. So today, let me recommend her first film as a director from 2021, Hi, Mom (你好，李焕英), which currently ranks as the No. 4 highest-grossing Chinese movie of all time, and the No. 1 highest-grossing Chinese comedy. It is especially impressive because it’s a sentimental, female-led comedy rather than a massive effects blockbuster.

And I have to admit, I’m cheating a little here calling this a comedy, because although the movie has many comedic elements, I don’t think that’s where it truly shines.

If you only watched the first half of the film and haven’t finished it yet, you might think it’s just another typical Chinese comedy and probably wouldn’t give it much thought. But in the second half, the story comes full circle, and especially during the last thirty minutes, it turns into a deeply emotional, heart-warming experience that leaves many viewers reaching for tissues.

Just like with her second film, in Hi, Mom Jia Ling truly excels in portraying human drama. She weaves the story in a way that keeps you emotionally invested until the end, even if some of the comedic moments fall a little flat.

The story centers on a mother-daughter relationship, where the daughter (played by Jia Ling herself) travels back in time and becomes part of her young mother’s life, leading to many unexpected consequences. You can watch the trailer below, but you can also find the whole movie with English and Chinese subtitles on YouTube.

On my Quizlet page, I’ve created a vocabulary list you can use to learn some of the most interesting and important words and phrases from the movie.

As for Jia Ling, she has already finished filming her third movie titled 转念花开 (The War of Light), and I’m really looking forward to watching it when it comes out. There’s still no official release date yet, though it might appear at film festivals first.

Happy watching,
Sandy