[The following review contains SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!]
All Shall Be Well is best classified as a horror film—though not in the conventional sense. It lacks, for instance, the masked murderers and lurking phantoms traditionally associated with the genre; instead, it adopts the basic narrative structure of a domestic drama akin to Tokyo Story, finding its terror in social conflicts rather than geysers of gore.
The movie is, at its core, about a relationship—two lives so inextricably interwoven that they’re nearly indistinguishable (elegantly illustrated in an early montage depicting the couple’s perfectly synchronized morning routine: preparing tea, eating breakfast, shopping for groceries, et cetera)—and what happens when death abruptly severs that bond. It’s about the devastating realization that decades’ worth of love is, in the end, barely substantial enough to fill a small urn. It’s about how the departed often become abstract after they’re buried, their ambitions and desires reduced to irrelevancy; only their material possessions remain, to be divided among (and bickered over by) those left behind. It’s about the fragility of the family unit once “blood relation” has been removed from the equation—how quickly “support” and “affection” evaporate when they are no longer convenient, how the warm, friendly faces that once smiled from across the dinner table soon transform into the cold, indifferent glares of strangers. (That the protagonist is a middle-aged lesbian, and was therefore never “officially” married to her deceased partner in the eyes of her culture, certainly doesn’t do her any favors; seeing her gradually excluded from the grieving process—dismissively described as her own wife’s “best friend” even before the funeral arrangements have been finalized!—is absolutely heartbreaking.)
These themes are obviously accompanied by a turbulent emotional undercurrent—fears, anxieties, and truths that are almost too petrifying to confront (for example: Do you ever really know your closest kin? How can you be expected to simply “move on” when one half of your soul essentially ceases to exist? Is human decency too fragile to survive tragedy and economic hardship?); indeed, scenes frequently cut away just before the tension escalates to the ignition point, as if to allow the characters a degree of privacy and dignity. Director Ray Yeung nevertheless does a magnificent job of conveying our heroine’s innermost thoughts and psychological state via concrete imagery, utilizing negative space, static framing, and dreary lighting to externalize her feelings of loneliness, isolation, and abandonment. Ultimately, regardless of how one chooses to categorize it, All Shall Be Well is a genuine cinematic masterpiece and a worthy spiritual successor to the works of Yasujiro Ozu—keenly observed, profoundly sensitive, and sublimely subtle.
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