"In many ways this is the polar opposite of my former roles - women in power," says the 58-year-old Siqin. "The aunt is such an ordinary person, whose qualities and wit are familiar to many. But it is really hard to portray characters who are around us in an impressive way."

After retirement, the aunt still struggles to maintain a dignified life in Shanghai. She is proud of her painting skills and standard English accent, keen to play in Peking Opera episodes, pained that the supper of her wealthy neighbor's cat is better than her own.

The two main characters meet as the aunt is exercising in the morning in a park and is drawn to Pan's Peking Opera song. The two get acquainted, genuinely like each other, and become lovers, but hide their affair from the aunt's nephew, her nosy neighbor and others. Keeping their affair secret in a Shanghai apartment building makes for some very funny situations.

But the aunt really falls in love - her lover doesn't.

Acclaimed actress Lisa Lu plays the aunt's annoying neighbor, who loves showing off her luxuries and is always curious about the aunt's privacy.

"One memorable scene takes place when the aunt and her secret lover must climb 12 stories to evade their nosy neighborher," says a middle-aged moviegoer Xie Rong, a high school teacher.

"Actually, how to deal with your neighbors has been a basic part of Shanghai's mundane culture for decades. The picture, though, centers on funny episodes in daily life and it captures the city's character behind rapid economic progress and 'modernity'," he says.

The film moves along in a rather light-hearted way until the aunt loses all of her savings in a complicated swindle plotted by her lover. Then it turns dark and somewhat melancholic. The aunt must return to her crude ex-husband in Anshan, Liaoning Province.

She must abandon her threadbare but still interesting postmodern life in Shanghai. With an vacant expression, "Aunt" must earn a living as a shoe vendor alongside her ex-husband in the last third of the film - she goes back to the real modern world.

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