The Personals (Blu-ray+DVD) (Taiwan Version) Blu-ray Region All, DVD Region All

While Feng tells the story of a lonely single person's search for a mate from a familiar point of view - a middle age man with a sometimes mean sense of humor - Chen bravely faced the challenge of taking on a female point of view in his 1999 version. Chen and co-writer Chen Shih follow Jiazhen (Rene Liu), an eye doctor who abruptly quits her hospital job and takes out a classified ad in the newspaper looking for a husband. What follows is a series of conversations between Jiazhen and potential suitors, which range from a factory worker to a salesman who turns the meeting into an unsuccessful sales pitch. The most amusing part of The Personals is that despite the fact that it's made by male filmmakers, the film brutally mocks the various men that Jiazhen come across. What's even more impressive is Chen's ability to create sympathy for some of these men, reminding us that beneath their pathetic outer shells lie sad, lonely people who are as desperate for love as Jiazhen.

Author Jade Chen reportedly took out a real classified ad and based her subsequent novel (which the film is based on) on her encounters with the suitors. This may explain Chen's use of mostly minimalist setups to capture the encounters. The director covers each conversation with only two or three stationary camera angles, and he usually stays on one particular angle for an extended period of time instead of cutting to whoever is speaking. While this style can be slightly alienating at first, one begins to realize that Chen does this to make the audience feel like a third member in the conversations. In real life conversations, we don't always put our focus on the person speaking. Instead, we sometimes focus on the person reacting to what is being said. If not for the presence of recognizable faces like musician Wu Bai and actor-director Doze Niu (playing himself), Chen could've easily convinced the audience these encounters are real.

When seen as an adaptation, If You Are The One is easily a lesser version of The Personals. While Chen's film is an anti-romantic comedy, Feng's film fits the mold of a commercially friendly romantic comedy by sacrificing natural interactions and minimalist setups for a stronger emphasis on broad humor. However, what Feng does better than Chen is managing to tell the story with a coherent (albeit somewhat loose) narrative that includes a logical beginning and a satisfying ending. In The Personals, Chen tries to wrap up Jiazhen's story with a surprise revelation from a side plot, but it only brings an unneeded dose of melodrama into the proceedings, making it the weakest part of a great film.

To be fair, The Personals has a set up that doesn't necessarily call for a conventional narrative. If most films offer an answer to the questions they raise, then The Personals simply offers an incomplete answer at best. In exchange, it offers an involving observation into the life of a lonely urbanite, and what happens when she attempts to reach out into a world she doesn't know. Along with Jiazhen, we meet people that we would think nothing of when we run into them on the street everyday. Sometimes her disdain reflects ours, and at other times, we see bits of ourselves in these men. We might even begin to wonder what we would do or say in their situation. The Personals may not offer much answers in the end, but it leaves plenty for us to think about.