Touches You

Simply A Masterpiece

Gripping story with well-crafted characters

best movie i've ever seen.

I was willing to give this film a chance. I like Australian films, Guy Pearce, the accent, etc.,but when it started with a sequence showing the happy, singing orphans in China, grinning and swaying as they sing their way through their day's work at the clean, sunny state orphanage with private rooms, I knew I was in for trouble. It's not exactly propaganda, it's just freakin' unbelievable. But, then, eventually you can ignore the preposterous orphanage and watch the story unfold in the backstreets of Sydney. It turns out that the orphan's Australian sponsor is not in a good position to take her in, in spite of the fact that he somehow managed to funnel money to the orphanage for her upkeep for-what-ten years? Guy Pearce is a good actor, but his roll here is so downbeat that he's hard to watch. How did this guy last this long with so little resilience in his character? I guess it has to be that way so that all the resilience and determination can be larded onto the Chinese orphan. At any rate, she stands by him and is there at the end to nurse him back to health, although she seems to wind up doing it from some picturesque, beautifully-shot part of China. If you can accept that he can pluck her out of an orphanage 2,000 miles away, then she can support him from mainland China? Oh well. I guess the story doesn't have to make sense to be entertaining.

When I read the premise of this film, and some of the other enthusiastic reviews, I was quite excited about it. I really enjoy Guy Pearce, and this sounded like a winner. Unfortunately, this movie is flawed in so many ways. SpoilersFirst, we see Mei Mei growing up in an orphanage, and we learn she has a sponsor, Dean Randall, who has been providing for her, and writing to her. But this is glossed over so quickly, and it would have been nice to see how that relationship developed, even though he was making up his life story. We get snippets, but there is no depth to that story line. Mei Mei never really develops much as a character. She seems very one- dimensional and lacking complexity. And overall, the characters are a collection of caricatures that are largely clichéd and melodramatic. There are so many story lines that are just unnecessary and pointless. It seems that the writers didn't have the courage to let the two main characters interact and develop. Instead, we are served up a silly plot line where she is put in danger, and Dean has to rescue her. Pearce does a good job with what he has been given, but he wasn't really give much of a script to work with, and we are left at the end with no real insight into what motivated him to sponsor this girl he never knew.This could have been a terrific little film, and they just plain missed the opportunity.

I can't comprehend how this movie has such a poor rating.. I checked it before I watched the film so I was not expecting much but giving it a crack; mainly because I love Claudia Karven.. Now I'm one to check my phone throughout a film, especially for the first 30 or so minutes but this film had me 100% focused from start to finish; a long with lump in my throat and a hand on my heart. I had to review it just so I could talk about it, because I'm sitting here absolutely touched by this film. I hope the actors are proud of it despite the reviews.. You can tell they put their everything in it and it showed by how quick I connected with each character.I love Australian film and 33 Postcards reminds me why I have such a place for it in my heart.

It is incredible how hard it is to write a good story and yet this film takes the simple premise of an orphaned Chinese girl sponsored into schooling by a benefactor she has never met except via postcards and letters and turns it into an achingly good two hours of entertainment.Mei Mei, Little Sister (Zhu Lin), is a sixteen year old whose life in a Chinese Orphanage has been supported by regular payments made by Dean Randall (Guy Pearce). Mei Mei is training to be the conductor of a children's choir who are to tour in Australia which is where the bulk of this film takes place.The plot and screenplay are developed with such simple brushstrokes you know there is a masterpiece being painted before our eyes. And this film doesn't let you down through all its wonderful and deft touches. Even the violent scenes are made to fit the delicate canvass the whole is painted upon, and we are never driven to the need for explicit artistic license.The soundtrack too is so finely tuned to the images, with some breathtaking choral singing at appropriate moments. The acting is strong, brilliant from Zhu Lin and Guy Pearce, and only occasionally overstated by the support. The script is just wonderful but then the message from this film is wonderful too.Recommended viewing. Nine out of ten.