What is the price for a woman who is not married?
Self-combing - is a woman in the old Lingnan region, who braids her hair on her head and combs it into a bun, indicating that she will never marry for life, also known as "combing up". Self-combing is a marriage custom unique to the Pearl River Delta, centered on Shunde, Nanhai and Panyu, which prevailed in the early Qing Dynasty until the early xinhai revolution.
According to the old custom, when a woman gets married, she must braid on her head and comb it into a bun, indicating that she is no longer a girl. Since the comb girl does not get married, she also has to choose a good day and auspicious day, through a certain ceremony, in full view of relatives and friends, she will put the debate into a bun and indicate that she will no longer court.
There are two reasons for this practice:
First, the feudal patriarchal system is centered on men, and after a woman gets married, the family authority is in the hands of her husband and aunt. Entering a poor family, living a difficult life, having to raise children, mentally and physically tortured; marrying into a rich family, worrying about her husband's different thoughts, greed for the new and forgetting the old, abandoning his wife and spoiling his concubine. Therefore, many rural women, in order to escape the abuse of the feudal patriarchal family and get rid of the severe shackles of their husband's power, would rather sacrifice their beautiful youth, determined not to marry, and voluntarily combed up.
Second, at the end of the Qing Dynasty, the silk reeling industry and commerce developed, the silk reeling girl earned more and more, and the old savings were very rich, which created self-supporting economic conditions for finding women who passed by to live alone, most of them combed each other to "know each other", bought a house (commonly known as the aunt's house) to live together, and never married.
Directed by Zhang Zhiliang and starring Liu Jialing and Yang Caini, "Self-Combing" tells the story of self-combing women.
In Shunde, Guangdong in the 1940s, women still lived under the shackles of patriarchy. The young Yi Huan (Yang Caini) was sold to the landlord by her father, and she preferred to be a self-grooming woman rather than die. He is rescued by Yuhuan (Liu Jialing), a prostitute in Xinghualou who passes by. Yuhuan marries Chen Yaozong (Dong Wei), the owner of the local weaving factory, as the eighth aunt, and constantly fights with other wives, but regards Yihuan as a confidant, and the two talk about nothing. Yi Huan and Qingmei Zhuma's lover (Qian Jiale) are happy with each other but it is difficult to become a family. Yuhuan was betrayed by her husband and became a bargaining chip for the warlord to talk about business, and in anger, she left the Chen family. Yi Huan did not abandon Yuhuan, which made her very moved, and her feelings gradually surpassed friendship. At this time, Yi Huan and her lover cheated on the night of "buying the threshold", and Yuhuan was worried and angry, and finally couldn't help but tell Yi Huan the secret of his heart.
Can a lover eventually become a family member? What is the secret between the two women? And who is the person who Huangu has been looking for for 50 years?
"Self-Combing" is the famous work of the great director Zhang Zhiliang, simple and unpretentious but touching, with a profound portrayal of human nature, and the sensitivity to the times can also be seen.
The story in the movie made me want to believe that there really is such a sincere feeling in the world. They have tolerance and understanding when they misunderstand and hurt, they have the pure and thoroughness of suffering and poverty, they have the inseparability of life and death, and they have the wait that can withstand half a century of time...
But more than that, I think that this movie not only tells a moving love story, but also exposes women's gains and losses in their relationships. In fact, many times, whether men or women, we have to be responsible for our own lives, do not pin our happiness on others, pinned on love.
And I don't think it's a movie that celebrates same-sex love, love doesn't really need to have a gender definition, and even if it's bigger, I don't think there's even so much reason.
In the end, I was very touched by such feelings, and I could not forget it for a long time.