Rapper MC Confusing, created by comedian Jon Lajoie, is one of the more charismatic performers to have emerged in the music industry over the past decade. Here is a typical example of his lyrics:
Other rappers are comprehensible – not me
First on the mic MC Confusing!
I took a piss on my nut sack and called it Jack Black
It’s a fact, I got more rhymes than Zack Braff taking a nap
I attack motherfuckers wearing purple backpacks
And I snack on towel racks and take a shit on your track
Yeah, you’re wack cause everybody understands what you say
But when I get on the mic, I make milk out of clay
And I play air guitar with a tube of toothpaste
And I say, “Karate pencil case” and put it on tape
MC Confusing has never been known to perform more than two verses at a time, but if he ever did a 100-minute set, it would no doubt feel similar to romantic comedy “Oh My God”: utterly bewildering but with just enough quirkiness to maintain your attention.
An article by humorist and critic Luo Beibei – who describes herself as a “public servant”, watching awful movies so her compatriots don’t have to – exploring just how unfathomably awful this film is, has become popular. With international superstar Zhang Ziyi as an executive producer and bestselling young adult author Guo Jingming as a producer along with some of the hottest young acting talent in China’s film industry, how awful can “Oh My God” be?
Why the naysayers are probably right
Lack of genre – The movie begins with Mo Han (Jiang Wen) carrying out an astrological prayer ritual on the roof of a condominium on the outskirts of Beijing, hoping that Chenmo (Cheney Chen) will stay with her forever, despite being a few years her junior. While she prays, a rock falls out of the sky and lands beside her.
The next morning, Mo Han and Chenmo wake up to discover that the rock has morphed into a baby that contains the DNA of both of them as well as the couple with whom they share their condominium, Lu Mijia (Jacqueline Li) and Leyi (Zhang Yixing)
It later emerges that the baby has superpowers that only appear at opportune moments and it is never discovered or explained what these superpowers are or what the other characters think of them. If the film wants to be considered a fantasy then it needs to be aware that fictional fantasy worlds like Narnia and Middle Earth need to be even more logical and detailed than the real world, and once this alternate reality is created then there must be no deviations from it.
Children’s author Terry Pratchett put it best when he said that you can have a story where pigs can fly, but as an author you must be fully aware of the implications: how does it affect pork prices, are pigs still considered dirty animals by some religions, is life on land very different? In “Oh My God!” neither the characters nor their world are ever anything but superficially zany.
Lack of plot – In 2008, the year he turned 25, Guo Jingming was described by The New York Times as “China’s most successful writer.” Though it is Wei Nan and Wei Min who have the dubious distinction of having directed the movie, it very much contains the signature of producer Guo in that it is full of shots of beautiful people looking happy, unexplored plot strands and nothing that can seriously be described as a story.
Anybody with any basic training in storytelling knows that a story can start with a coincidence but cannot end with one. Despite now being in his thirties, China’s most successful writer has yet to demonstrate any ability to structure a story, which is as absurd as an academic who is unable to make an argument.
The film dabbles in every cliché from recent Chinese cinematic history – the leftover woman who is desperate not to be the only old maid in her friendship circle, the manchild who is reluctant to grow up and be monogamous, the child who was orphaned and looks to his friends for familial support. All of those issues are touched on but none are turned into a story.
Warped values – The film’s first slapstick sequence involves our quartet of heroes having their efforts to commit infanticide hilariously thwarted. Finally they are arrested, booked, released, and punished by having their baby returned to them. Why the world’s largest authoritarian state allowed its police force to be portrayed as so irresponsible remains a mystery.
The main characters after a side-splittingly unsuccessful infanticide attempt
A later sequence involves Mo Han trapped at an impromptu high school reunion, unwashed and underdressed and desperate to give a good impression. She calls Chenmo and tells him to urgently get over there with the baby and show what a happy family they are. In the world of this film, being single is assumed as a defeat for any woman. This movie is not sufficiently aware of the clichés to defy them.
The movie has a theme song titled 《快乐青春》 (Happy Youth), sung by all four leads. It is catchy enough but it can best be described as bubblegum pop. This makes it even more difficult to figure out what this film is trying to say, perhaps that raising children is all just fun and games, which makes attempted infanticide all the more risible.
The viral review by Luo Beibei contains a total of five “face palm” pictures. This seems generously few.
Cheap humor – Arguably the centerpiece of the whole film is a balletic diaper-changing sequence that plays out to the tune of “La Donne e Mobile” from Verdi’s Rigoletto. The baby is both extraterrestrial and supernatural but nonetheless prone to fits of raging diarrhea that cause his female minders to shriek attractively.
As members of China’s mollycoddled Generation Y, none of our four protagonists is adept at nurturing little ones so the need to change a dirty diaper causes Chenmo and Leyi to slip and slide comically at the top of the stairs while their girlfriends sit on the sofa applying makeup and eating candy. After several near misses, the girls look up to see what is going on just in time to end up with globs of feces to land on their faces.
Jacqueline Li and Jiang Wen about to be splatted in one of the film’s more intellectually stimulating moments
Why the naysayers might be wrong
Watchability - Just like Guo Jingming’s “Tiny Times” series, “Oh My God” is beautifully photographed and populated by a cast of smoking hot actors, so it is never completely unwatchable. Also, if you suffer from Attention Deficit Disorder and do not care for a plot that you can sink your teeth into, there are some eye-catching sequences, including a wild helicopter ride and a stunning display of kung fu in front of a white tiger. That neither appear to have anything to do with anything need not matter.
Subtext – At times, “Oh My God” reminded me of collaboration between two of the greatest artists of the twentieth century. “Un Chien Andalou” (An Andalusian Dog), a 1926 short film made by Salvador Dali and Luis Bunuel which may be the big screen’s greatest ever depiction of a dream.
Its extra-logical shifts in setting and mood and resolute refusal to make it easy for the audience may have just been surpassed. The makers of “Oh My God” have arguably been even bolder with their inclusion of a wise-cracking baby and a shark with human teeth.
The writing of this movie reminds me of the below letter that was posted into irreverent British magazine The Viz:
Since I won the Football Pools, my life has been like a dream come true. Only the other day I gave my girlfriend a cuddle, but she turned into my dead grandad and started to chase me, and it was like I was running through treacle. And then I realised my maths ‘A’ level was about to start in ten minutes and I’d done no revision and couldn’t find a pen.
BBC critic Mark Kermode once insisted that all aspiring filmmakers should be forced to make a low-budget horror before they are allowed to attempt anything more ambitious. In this way they can learn the basics: plot, forces of antagonism, development of empathy between audience and protagonist, and (above all else), how to tell a story using limited resources.
The people behind this film had everything at their disposal, but unless they strive to become some cinematic equivalent of MC Confusing, then a low-budget horror might be their best bet.
