Icarus Films Looks To Oct. 9 For The Domestic DVD Debut Of Writer/Director Vivian Qu’s Angels Wear White

Icarus Films and the KimStim Collection will be teaming up on Oct. 9 for the domestic DVD debut of writer/director Vivian Qu’s critically-heralded and award-winning sexual-abuse thriller, Angels Wear White.

China’s Hainan Island, home of tropical beaches and resorts, is the location for Qu’s tale of power, corruption and sexual assault, but as is often the case, the abuse of young women and girls — the sex-trafficking trade — is certainly international in scope.   

It is here that we meet Mia (Vicky Chen — Blood of Youth, For a Few Bullets), a cleaning “maid” for one of the local resort hotels, who is filling in as the night clerk for a fellow employee.   She is just a teen herself and something of a drifter — she lives in the shadows.  

On this particular shift, her antenna go up when a middle-age man, whose identity will be revealed in the aftermath of the evening’s events, has a couple of school girls with him.   Young girls, older man … that spells trouble.

The hotel has security cameras, but Mia suspects that if there is trouble, real trouble, those tapes might just disappear, so she uses her cell phone to tape the man entering the girl’s room.   

All hell breaks loose as the girls are in fact sexually assaulted, their parents are furious and the hotel is in a state of chaos.   Mia, has it all on video, but knows that she can’t go to the authorities or her own status would be revealed.   What to do?

The mother of one of the girls, Xiaowen (Zhou Meijun), reacts to the medical examiner’s news by assaulting her own child — punished for being assaulted.   The other girl, Xinxin (Zhang Xinyue), finds that her parents after their initial anger are more than willing to just let the matter go (for reasons that will become crystal clear).  

There will be no justice for either child … unless Mia takes matters into her own hands.   Doing that, as she learns — despite a “crusading” prosecutor (played by Shi Ke — Heaven Eternal, Earth Everlasting, The Postmodern Life of My Aunt) — can be dangerous, especially when those in power are more than willing to destroy evidence and protect one their own.

A picturesque resort, corruption and sexual abuse … a deadly mixture in filmmaker Vivian Qu’s Angels Wear White, which could be about the same type of crimes just about anywhere.   

Angels Wear White is presented in Mandarin with English subtitles.