An emerging industry in modern China employs 'mistress dispellers'—professionals hired by women who suspect their husbands of infidelity to discreetly enter couples' lives and remove mistresses. Filmmaker Elizabeth Lo pursued this phenomenon as a way to explore mainland China through its 'love industries' and to bridge cultural gaps between East and West. Lo located one practitioner, Teacher Wang, and filmed her work with a couple in Luoyang whose marriage was disrupted by an affair. The husband displayed visible remorse while interacting with Wang, prompting empathy despite his transgressions. The project frames intimate relationship dynamics as a window into broader cultural realities.
Lo discovered the profession as she explored ideas for her follow-up to Stray, her 2020 feature about street dogs in Istanbul. Now based in LA, the Hong Kong-born director was eager to understand more about mainland China through its "love industries", as a way to cinematically bridge a gap between East and West - particularly as China's influence over her home city grew.
"Filmmaking has always been this passport for me to get to know places in a really profound way," she says. "I knew, as a Hong Kong filmmaker in such a polarised world, that if I was going to make a documentary set in China, I wanted it to be subject matter that felt universally relatable, not something that might become weaponised to drive a further wedge between the East and West."
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