Florence Sloan is an ardent feng shui believer. She has three 'Tigers' in her life so her boutique is named 'Tigerjade'! Florence has feng shuied her husband Harry Sloans MGM office in Century City to the last inch with crystals, amethyst boulder, water features and an amber lion, doubtless in tribute to Leo the Lion, the lucky mascot and symbol of MGM. She had Harry changed his office number with a new one, replacing the many '4's with '8's which is a lucky number. So it is surely not surprising that Snow Flower and the Secret Fan contains subtle feng shui elements.
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| Movie Snowflower And The Secret Fan |
The fan itself in feng shui means 'warding off bad vibes and keeping sentiments pure' - a perfect medium for the two girlfriends to communicate...
Florence and Wendi wanted the movie to come onto the screen in an alive, contemporary fashion that would be relevant to today's audiences and cut across cultures. It must have been good feng shui as by coincidence, the much-lauded Chinese American director Wayne Wang had actually read 'Snow Flower and the Secret Fan' and was fascinated with the material before his agent brought him to meet the two female producers!
Wayne Wang had adapted Amy Tan's novel 'The Joy Luck Club' so sensitively into an entertaining and blockbuster film, so he was the natural choice for 'Snow Flower and the Secret Fan', more so as his grandmother had bound feet!
The film opens in 19th century China when two 7-year old girls were matched, based on their horoscope, as 'laotong' or literally 'old sames', bound together for eternity. Isolated by their families they furtively communicated by a secret language called Nu Shu, written and passed along in the folds of a white silk fan.
In a parallel story set in today's Shanghai, the laotong's modern descendants Nina and Sophia struggle to maintain the intimacy of their childhood friendship in the face of demanding careers, complicated love lives and a relentless evolving Shanghai.
The two modern women must understand the secret of their ancestral connection, hidden from them in the folds of the antique white silk fan or risk losing one another forever. What unfolds are two stories, generations apart, but everlasting in their notion of friendship, hope and love.
Says Florence, "The New China is evolving at a speed most can't comprehend so we felt it would be interesting to juxtapose who women lived nearly two centuries ago with how they are living now. We focus on parallels, not differences.
"Today we don't talk about 'laotong' but we have best friends. We don't have our feet bound but we are bound by circumstances, like marriage, family, career, children, economic situation and state of the world."
Nina and Sophia (the modern counterparts played by Korean actress Gianna Jun and Li Bing Bing) see themselves reflected in Snow Flower and Lily. In the bad old days, Chinese women were subjected to the starkest injustices, from foot binding to arranged marriages, extreme isolation and the archetypal wicked mother-in-law. Today, the modern miss must brace herself for a bitchy boss, back-stabbing office colleagues and keeping up with the Joneses with the latest must-haves.
Florence explains, "Once Chinese women sacrificed personal dreams and independence for family, marriage and social hierarchy. Today, women are bombarded with too many choices! We wanted to fuse these two worlds, so we developed an unconventional screenplay that showed deep connections between the two eras. The screenplay shows how much has changed... but also how some things remain the same.
We lead different lives but still have great friendships, we share secrets and we struggle with jealousy, loneliness, competition and misunderstanding." The fact Florence Sloan and Wendi Murdoch named their production company 'Big Feet' says a lot about the freedom that comes with unbounded feet!
Prior to establishing Big Feet Production in which Florence Sloan was co-creator, producer and CEO, she wrote children's books while living in London. There she met Harry Sloan. This is her second marriage and they now live in one of Los Angeles more upmarket suburbs in a mansion once owned by Janet Jackson. They have four children. Florence's sons Christopher and Alexander are in their twenties. Harry Sloan's new company Global Eagle Acquisitions, launched in February this year, sounds wonderful and must have had input from Florence!
A philanthropist, Florence Sloan sits on the board of many charities, including The Los Angeles County Museum of Arts, Facing History and Ourselves and American Ballet Theatre.
Both Florence and Wendi plan to produce more Chinese oriented movies. As Florence points out, "In China, 'big feet' also means 'taking the first step' so it is all systems go!" This ends part 2 of Movie Snowflower And The Secret Fan.