Mike Lee has rarely created a harmonious and warm family. There are no disturbing family quarrels in other works, and there is no family relationship full of estrangement and resentment. Vera, such a kind, hardworking, and gentle old lady takes care of a family of four like an angel and helps young girls in need. What hasn't changed is that Mike Lee still focused his lens on the lower-class family in society, a harmonious lower-class family. Vera’s story is easy to think of Chabrol’s masterpiece "Women's Charm", which also talks about abortion. The difference is that the female protagonist in "Women's Charm" is charged for abortion, and she also accommodates prostitutes in her own home to get rent. This is completely free of charge and completely out of goodwill in this film. The simple starting point for helping a girl in difficulty is completely different. Therefore, Vera's role is more idealized and moving, but it also lacks more extensibility and interpretation. In both films, a woman expresses her aversion to having children frequently.
The first half of the film is quite warm. The family of four has a very harmonious relationship. Vera's motherly face when she privately aborts the girls gives a great sense of security. But the abortion tool she used repeatedly eventually cost her. The girls who received her abortion services were all from the bottom of society because of the low fees (her friends collected the fees behind her back). While Vera worked as a cleaning maid in an upper-class family, the young daughter of the upper-class family became pregnant because of rape, but she paid a lot of money to find a doctor with complete medical facilities and clean and hygienic to perform an abortion. This contrast also ruthlessly reveals the difference in class and the difference in living environment. Vera is kind, but she can't get more professional and hygienic equipment. While helping others, she is also spreading risks. In the end, she was discovered because of an abortion girl's infection. The warmest passage in the film is the moment when Vera’s daughter and her boyfriend are engaged. A family of four, including the husband’s brother, sister-in-law, and son-in-law, a total of seven people sit around the dining table and enjoy themselves, and the darkest moments also come together. Vera was taken away by the police during the reunion. When the family who had been kept in the dark learned about Vera, the son was very angry. He thought the mother was immoral, but the father understood the mother's kindness. This is also the moral dilemma presented in the film. The law prohibits abortion, pregnant girls desire abortion, and Vera freely helps girls in difficulties. These three forces are tied together and it is difficult to define them individually. Vera is at a loss when facing the police, but keeps emphasizing that the girls need help, nothing more. In the end she was sentenced to jail, became a sinner, and became a person who lost morals, but she was obviously so kind and so helpful. Vera was a victim of that era. The law is constantly improving, and now is different from the past, and the ending will be different. But each era has its own problems specific to this era, such as the moral dilemma of a certain country on whether to help...
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