Not Just A Pretty Face

Cantonese/Mandarin title: Mei Lai Joi Mong / Mei Li Zhai Wang

The theme song I believe, is sung by Joey Yeung and Roger Kwok, the leading actor and actress.

I have to admit, I have my own reservations about this series when it first came out. But, I am a curious person and wanted to give it a try anyway, so I sat down and watched it from beginning till end. I finished it within 3 days – a total of 20 episodes.

The story is about Wu Man Sui, also known as Chut Chut (Joey Yeung), who is fat and ugly (well ugly might even be a euphemism in this sense). However, she does not care too much about her own looks as she believes in the axiom that inner beauty is far more important than physical beauty (for the first 15 minutes into episode one that is). Then, things start to take a turn for the worse, she is fired from her job, ditched by her boyfriend (yes, she has a boyfriend despite her looks) and even her mom and her sister left for a holiday without her. Feeling utterly dejected, she realizes that no matter how good she is to her friends and family, no matter how hard she works, people will always look down on her because of her inferior physical appearance. Hence, she decides to undergo plastic surgery in order to make herself beautiful.

But, she lapses into a coma due to complications from the surgery for a week. At the juncture between life and death, she somehow manages to strike a bargain with heaven. In order to keep her good looks and stay alive, she needs to find a wife for her nemesis at work, Leonardo (Roger Kwok) or Nardo, an unbelievably selfish and narcissistic guy. An angel is sent to supervise her, (she has three weeks to accomplish her mission or turn back to her former ugly self or die). In between the story, the angel starts to realize that he himself has another mission of his own. And after many twists and turns, Nardo’s family and Chut Chut’s family become friends (they were staunch enemies at one point due to a misunderstanding), and Nardo himself turns over a new leaf. And as predictable as TVB series go, Chut Chut finds herself falling for Nardo. To cut a long story short, she tells Nardo all about her experience (she is not supposed to tell anyone about it) and because of that, she becomes ugly in his eyes (she still appear normal and pretty to everyone else). Meanwhile, as her deadline approaches, she comes face to face with death, falling into a deep coma once again. Nardo, who had initially found her looks unbearable, finally comes to the realization that looks are not that important after all. It is her that he can’t live without. After many obstacles, they finally end up together (yes, it is a fairy tale ending).

Of course, my overall summary of the plot is short as I left out most, if not all, of the subplot. My main focus is on the two main characters and the main theme that the series presents: is beauty an essence in life that can propel us to success? Can we live without it? Although the ultimate message that Not Just a Pretty Face tries to bring forth to its viewers is that outer appearance is just an illusion that will not last and that beauty lies within oneself, not without, it falls short from its own premise. Instead of proving that one’s physical appearance can be outshone by one’s moral values, it tends to portray how far one can get with good looks and the shortcomings that one has to face without the looks. Even though the series tries again and again to push the idea of not judging a book merely by its cover, I cannot help but realize that there are many scenes that are contradictory to the idea. Take for example how Chut Chut gets her job back and subsequently gets promoted to a higher position after her surgery. Definitely, she would not have a chance to do so if she were the same ugly girl, would she?

But, the fact that the series is short and rather fast paced makes it enjoyable and I find the series quite engaging even though I have to put up with the many silly expressions that only TVB script writers can come up with. Some examples are Leonardo’s “Go, go, go” and Ah Che’s (Leonardo’s old flame at work) “Come on baby, cheer up”. In my opinion, these unnecessary lines only make it look sillier than it already is. And after a while, I had a hard time refraining myself from kicking the screen every time those phrases come up. No doubt, there are some unforgettable lines in some really successful series like Dicky Cheung’s “Yo! Sai mat keng ar…” in Journey to the West I and several others which I can’t name at this moment. These phrases stick to you after a while and you find them really entertaining. Not the case here though. Leonardo’s ever prevalent phrase is (to put it mildly) downright irritating.

However, despite the many shortcomings, it was an easy watch. There were no mind-boggling philosophical issues and also not too many slapstick type of comedy in it. True, it isn’t a great series and it's as predictable as it can get. Nevertheless, it proved to be more enjoyable than I expected. Maybe the reason that I find it entertaining and more than acceptable is that I expected it to be dull and senseless when I started watching it (I’ve not heard anything good about it). Hence, if there’s one thing that I learnt from this, it’s this: never judge anything solely from what you hear, see and find out for yourself before making any judgment.