The Third Wife (2018) User Reviews

A superb debut film on the visual and aural fronts

[JuguAbraham · 8/10 · 16 November 2018]

A very impressive debut from the director. Well deserving of the Golden Hugo. Though the end was ethically very disturbing for me, the film was consistent in its visual and aural appeal throughout, especially the end sequence. A director to watch. A very good choice of actresses.

Vietnam is presented as a heavenly tropical country in the 19th century, without insects or reptiles (a lizard is the only exception) even in bamboo groves, with washed linen hung out white as snow. One would wish more realism to match the time frame of the story.

Why was this film not Vietnam's Oscar submission for 2019 in the Foreign Language Film category? I guess there were technical reasons.

A beautiful and tragic drama from Vietnam.

[ajzeg · 8/10 · 24 January 2020]

Again, this movie premiered in 2018 at TIFF but had its wider release in 2019. This movie is slow, but it's gorgeous and very well-acted. There are so many striking visuals and tons of symbolism. This movie is also very sad and very disturbing. It's about a young teenage girl in 1800s Vietnam becoming the third wife of an older man in hopes to give him a son, and it just gets worse from there. This movie deals with some very heavy subject matter and it certainly isn't for everyone, it can be pretty uncomfortable, but I thought it was great and think it's worth a watch. It's depressing, but very good.

Beautiful but harrowing.

[christopher-underwood · 6/10 · 24 October 2020]

This is well shot and very pretty with glorious distant vistas and plant and insect close-ups. The pace is slow and although the depiction of 19th century Vietnamese rural life picturesque enough there is an awfulness here from start to finish. Unfortunately we are too familiar with tales from China and the Far East and Asia generally even today of the problems caused by favouring the birth of boys over girls to be particularly surprised by the extent of the awfulness depicted here. Yes, it is dreadful but this seems almost prurient in its constant close-ups of very young girls being displayed for very old men and that despite everything, the torture, the killing and the suicides that all is for the best. Beautiful but harrowing.

Hardly memorable

[Ladiloque · 7/10 · 13 January 2021]

A girl in 19th Century Viet Nam.

Lots of symbols to decipher and hidden lessons to be learnt here but I guess there're too many for my tastes: if I try hard and still can't make sense of something - it's the author's fault.

This said, the film is beautifully written, shot, acted and produced (while misteriously antiseptic and eerie in the music, scenography, palette and fauna depicted).

Unfortunately the value of a movie is what I get out of it and it wasn't much: women's life in a place, at a time, in specific socio-economic circumstances (something for which history books are far better); less than a dozen of artistically worthy scenes and a bit of boredom.

Beautiful and strong movie

[camilla_hogberg77 · 7/10 · 4 September 2019]

The movie was beautifully made, good actors and the music was excellent. The film was strangely both calm and intense at the same time. It clearly shows the woman's view of the traditions, which is still relevant today.

Beautiful and devastating.

[tkpatel-34452 · 10/10 · 21 December 2019]

Beautiful and devastating. In terms of Shot selection this is incredible.

Snail pace

[velvet_zoo · 16 July 2021]

Watch it with a remote in your hand, fast forward button ready to go. At 4x it is still slow, but acceptable. Did not buy the setting of 19th century. Costumes look like out of an H&M store.

Grim, grim, grim - but very good

[freydis-e · 7/10 · 15 August 2022]

The acting, direction and photography are all top quality here. I don't know much about life in 19C Vietnam, but I'm ready to believe this is a realistic portrait. It's always hard to tell about the script quality when watching with subtitles but it does the job.

Really a very strong piece of cinema, carrying its message powerfully, but... While I sympathise with everything the director is saying, it's not like any of it is new. Nor is the sheer horror of this (even most privileged stratum of) society confined to 19C Vietnam - alas there are places in the world today where millions of women still live like this (forced marriage of minors, absolute patriarchal domination, etc.). OK, if you really didn't know about this stuff, then definitely worth watching, but there's a price.

As the film goes on, things can only get worse and I was left depressed by it. There's never any hope, never any way out. That's realistic, but it means the viewer too has nothing to hope for and makes the film an entirely negative experience emotionally. The very final scene, involving the hitherto most cheery optimistic character, tells it all.

Beautiful

[mrtolero · 10/10 · 28 May 2019]

One of the most beautiful films I've ever seen. Mayfair says so much more with imagery, silences, and emotions than could ever be spoken in words.

Social commentary with extravagant cinematography

[Sexy-scientist · 7/10 · 14 October 2022]

In the opening scene of the movie, it is mentioned that the movie is based on true events, but it was not told on whom it is based. So, it is really hard to believe those claims. The cinematography is beautiful, but the story is so complicated that it is hard to believe that it could be based on true events. It feels as if all the known social taboos are depicted in one joint family. The movie comments on child marriage, multiple wives, teen pregnancy, lack of healthcare, pressure on wife for birthing male child, extra-marital affair, incest, social status, dowry, marriage consummation pressure, suicide, female infanticide, etc. Etc. There is no lack of content in the movie, yet the progression feels slow because of less dialogues and multiple scenes of inanimate objects. I liked it for this very reason.

Novice Vietnamese director's beautiful critique of patriarchal culture offset by weakly drawn antagonists

[Turfseer · 5/10 · 2 April 2019]

How can this beautifully shot, impressively crafted take on the subjugation of women in late 19th century Vietnam not be everyone's cup of tea? Certainly the film's subject matter personally meant quite a bit to debut director Ash Mayfair, who based the narrative on the experiences of her great-grandmother.

Mayfair chronicles the interior and exterior life of a 14 year old bride, May (played by 12 year old Nguyen Phoung Tra My), who becomes the third wife of a wealthy landowner, Hung May soon comes to realize that she's lower in the pecking order in relation to her predecessors: Wife #1 Ha (Tran Nu Yen Khe) and Wife #2 Xuan (Mai Thu Huong).

May soon learns that her primary objective is to produce a male child and despite enduring the unpleasant experience of losing her virginity with "Master" Hung, she remains devoted to the idea that perpetuating the Hung male line is not necessarily a bad thing.

Mayfair's plot involves various machinations among the wives including Xuan's clandestine affair with Son, Hung's adult son with first wife Ha, as well as some lesbian yearnings on May's part toward the much more experienced Xuan. There's also subplot involving Son who rejects another of his father's hand-picked brides, Lien.

Mayfair does well in depicting the constricted lives of the women and how they must cope within a system that's stacked against them. You might guess that things turn out rather tragically for May, after she gives birth to a daughter.

While normally my movie-going tastes rarely extend to such downbeat tales, Mayfair manages to highlight the quiet dignity of her protagonist in a way that partly draws you in. Nonetheless, overall there is something about the film that left me cold. It wasn't so much the film's glacial pacing but the inability of Mayfair to flesh out any of her antagonists. Simply put the men are ciphers who display no idiosyncrasies which would mark them as multi-dimensional human beings.

Without the presence of the aforementioned "fleshed-out" antagonists, The Third Wife feels more like an exercise in agitprop-content to echo the theme of women's subjugation ad infinitum. We get the whole idea early on that this is going to be a rather obvious critique of patriarchal culture. With a crucial missing "part," The Third Wife indeed may prove to be not everyone's cup of tea. Nonetheless, Mayfair still has proven to be a force to be reckoned with as she moves forward in her career as a talented and dedicated auteur.

Good

[ngochuyenalicia · 10/10 · 24 May 2019]

The movie illustrated Vietnamese women in 19th century with all ages in every character. From the children 4-6 years old Nhan with lost of dream, 11-13 y.o Lien grown as a young woman ready to marry. 14-16 y.o May arranged to get married and hope to give birth a baby boy. 30 y.o Xuan still young, beautiful, lots of experience to please husband and take care children. 40 y.o Ha is take care everything in the house and teaching all children and May to act formal and learn things. 60 y.o housemaid which is settle down and live a quite live in kitchen. Overall, the movie hidden shows a life time of a woman in 19th century born to give birth and serve husband, the live is only around the house and children. Tuyet is the poorest character which she did nothing but still blame on because of can not complete the "only duty of a wife", she has been denied by both family member and husband. The last scenes is around Tuyet's funeral which May see the butterfly came from her coffin and fly away, the women only free after she died. I cried a lot, the movie is so deep that it now attached to my mind with the character words. So thankful that Age has gone and now Vnese women is freedom and happy.

Tragic as others have said

[mrmgarnham · 7/10 · 4 July 2021]

Period Vietnamese film with little talking and loads of imagery that probably means something to oriental people. Good cinematography but it feels like a lot has been edited out, so a little disjointed.

cultural and historical setting yields ignorance

[hoahongtruong-89270 · 1/10 · 25 January 2021]

There are a lot of things go wrong in this movie, but I will go easy on it just as other critics went easy on film criticism under foreign eyes toward Vietnam as (still) a third world country.

First, casting. Actresses and actors in the movie speak Vietnamese, but imagine filming Brave taking its Medieval Scotland context while the voices contributed are in all other irrelevent accent such as: American English, Southern Australian, me trying to speak English 10 years ago... which is wrong in its first phase of cultural research, not to mention sloppy casting. I mean, you can always ask voice talents to cover for this part, which you did not, and this is offensive to Vietnamese from a linguistic aspect.

Segundas, feminism message through a bunch of symbolism and metaphor. I would not spoil anything, instead I would recommend other better performed movie speaking of this feminism topic: The Moon at the Bottom of the Well (Vietnam), Quay of the Spinsters (Vietnam), Red Sorghum (China), Raise the Red Lantern (China).

Thirdly, please do not preprint "Based on a true story" just to regard film makers perspective and dismiss the importance of cultural setting. The silk making technique in the movie neither represents Red River delta region nor Ethnic villages in Vietnam, we do not make it like that, not even Thai people from nation's Northwest region. We do not hang lanterns like that. Our great great great grandparents' funerals were not done like that! The film makers should have hired knowledgeable cultural consultants to cover those parts (and other parts as well).

It all comes down to fusion food philosophy, fusion restaurants do not brand themselves as authentic "I was born in the country, cooked for an eternity then open this place" marketing strategy; then do not use the name of Vietnam, Vietnamese language, hierachy and chauvinism as an excuse for the line "based on a true story" to bait for views and make other foreigners thinking of Vietnam as a country with such cultural aspects.

Nam mo a di da phat if I want to be mad at art I would have gone to war documentaries! Thanks to the pandemic this waste of time happen!

Mesmerizing

[pyattimac · 10/10 · 26 June 2021]

This is one of those movies that transports you far from the here and now. It has such a measured and languid pace, and just sucks you in. Despite the beauty of the cinematography, however, in the end one cannot help being left with the reminder of how women bore the burden for so many centuries of being consigned to a narrow set of expectations- their only role in life was to perform menial household duties, marry whatever man their family handed them off to, and produce an heir. Even while reveling in the lush beauty of the Vietnamese countryside, my heart ached for the women. Left me sad, but not sorry I watched it.

Females ranked as ...

[westsideschl · 8/10 · 1 October 2019]

Filmed as late 18, early 1900s Vietnam but applies throughout the world today, especially where conservative religious precepts prevail, we see three of the main suppressors of female equality. First, we have forced marriage. Second, we have family honor (usually supposed female dishonor w/consequences). Third, infant female infanticide for, well, not being a male. Are females in many family units value ranked beneath males, livestock & Trump? Several scenes toward the end were not clear, for those not sure Nightshade was suggested, but may not have been accurately presented.

Awful

[katty-jackson · 1/10 · 22 May 2021]

Absolutely disgusting. Nowhere but in Asian movies they would murder an animal for the purpose of a film. Movies like this should never be played outside counrry of an origin.

Acting and Settings Are Natural But Culture of Those Times a Real Turn-Off

[larrys3 · 5/10 · 22 September 2019]

The acting here is natural and powerful and the sets are so well constructed that you actually feel like you're in late 19th century Vietnam. But I really struggled to connect in a positive way with the culture of those times.

The film, written and directed by Ash Mayfair who is making her feature debut, contains extremely striking realism amidst very slow pacing. The thought of an innocent 14-year-old girl May (Nguyen Phuong Tra My) being subjugated into an arranged marriage with a wealthy landowner, and to fulfill his sexual desires (some quite kinky) along with two other wives was a turn-off for me.

May's main role will be to produce a male heir, as the other two wives have failed to do so thus far. She also will awaken to the fact that she is attracted to other women and try to figure out if her own desires can be fulfilled. Without writing any spoilers let's just say that the circumstances of her existence in that environment will lend itself to a possible tragic finale.

All in all, the beauty of the characters and the settings could not overcome for me the starkness and negativity of the themes here and it was just not an enjoyable watch.

Beautiful cinematography, but western mindset

[emil-resmann · 5/10 · 2 October 2021]

Movie is beautifully made, but director has western feminist mindset.

I do not know Vietnam nor Vietnamese culture, but I do know Thai culture, witch gives me a feel for Asian culture in general.

Even though the director was born in Vietnam, she has been educated in the UK and the US. This fact is very obvious as she has been strongly influenced by western feminist thought. This makes the movie feels more like a western feminist political statement than a genuine historical movie. The story feels unauthentic and fake.

After watching a few minutes my first thought was that this must be a western production!

All the nice shots can't save this movie

[johnny_lai · 3/10 · 22 May 2022]

"Mundane" would probably be the right word to sum up the movie. It is just a tad better than watching videos that are normally put on display TVs at an electrical store just because it had a little bit of a story to tell. It felt like they had a 20 mins story that was dragged out into a 90 min movie.

Sloooow

[billcr12 · 3/10 · 12 July 2021]

Yikes! I feel like I just watched a beautiful painting for an hour and a half. The 3 points are for the stunning cinematography. A fourteen year-old girl is forced to be wife number three to a wealthy landowner. With little dialogue, the story drags on as the girl prays to Buddha for a baby boy. Incense and religion are a part of this film and as a Catholic I have little understanding of the faith. If you need help falling asleep, The Third Wife might be the right remedy.