If marriage counselling or divorce proceedings sound like a chore, suspicious wives in China have an alternate method of dealing with a cheating husband. Behold, the so-called “mistress dispeller”: a woman who goes undercover to break up the affair between a wayward man and his secret love. It sounds like a kooky invention, but it’s a real booming profession – just as long as you’re rich and live in China.
In a new documentary, Mistress Dispeller, Hong Kong filmmaker Elizabeth Lo follows one such example in Luoyang: Wang Zhenxi, so wise she’s known as Teacher Wang. Even though infidelity is rampant around the world (and not just on Coldplay international tours), these anti-matchmakers are part of an industry that doesn’t exist anywhere else.
“The first day I met Teacher Wang, she convinced three of her clients – a wife, a husband, his mistress – to be on camera,” Lo tells me in a London cinema. “That afternoon, I felt so much sympathy for the cheating husband and the mistress. I was shocked. So I wanted audiences to experience what I experienced, where your empathy is expanded towards the corners of a love triangle that are typically maligned.”
In the shockingly intimate film, which is so free from fourth-wall-breaking it could often be mistaken for a fictional drama, Teacher Wang is hired by Mrs Li when the latter correctly guesses that Mr Li is having an affair with a younger woman. Pretending to be a badminton enthusiast, Wang befriends both the husband and the mistress to convince them to end their relationship.
The resulting film is so peculiar that there could be a standalone doc about how it was made. How did Lo convince these participants, including the mistress, to speak so candidly on camera? Why did the cheating husband and the mistress consent to the film being released? To start with, Lo initially claimed to be shooting a film about China’s love industries like matchmaking events, dating camps, and parental markets. On the second point: to avoid humiliating anyone, the film will never be distributed in China.
There were husbands we filmed whose behaviour felt inexplicable. In one scene, he’s denying having an affair to his wife, and an hour later I’m with him as he’s making a move on this young woman
Mistress Dispeller differs from typical western values when it comes to infidelity. Mrs Li, a middle-aged Chinese woman, would rather hire a mistress dispeller than a divorce lawyer, while Mr Li barely disguises his cheating. In a further twist, Teacher Wang proposes that it’s the mistress, Fei Fei, who deserves the most sympathy. All in all, it’s a sharp contrast from the schadenfreude over Astronomer’s CEO and HR manager resigning after they were caught cuddling on a Coldplay “kiss cam” video.
Lo theorises that mistress dispellers are thriving in China due to a societal “need to preserve face” in Asian culture. The director interviewed multiple mistress dispellers but settled upon Teacher Wang due to her knack for convincing clients to appear on camera. In terms of costs, Teacher Wang has hundreds of clients, and charges 700 renminbi (£73) per hour, which includes transportation and sleeping time. “It’s about $20,000 per case,” says Lo. “It’s a middle-to-upper-class pursuit.”
Lo, who previously directed Stray (2020), filmed over three years but focused the edit on one love triangle. As in her earlier work, she uses long, static takes, often leaving participants alone for hours to capture unfiltered intimacy. “In these situations, the men and women don’t have anyone else to talk to because they’re enshrouded in shame and secrecy,” Lo says. “Teacher Wang positions herself as someone to confide in. She’s always 10 steps ahead. When she pulls the lever, you see her clients fall into her plan.”
Based on hearing the description, you might think that Mistress Dispeller, which premiered at the Venice Film Festival, is an elevated form of reality TV. In a way, it is. Lo admits to adoring Love Island and acknowledges the similarities. “But the protagonists of our film were never coached or directed in the way that reality shows are scripted. Teacher Wang wanted our interactions with her clients to be kept to a minimum so that we didn’t inadvertently disrupt her mistress dispelling process. We were truly flies on the wall who didn’t know what was going to happen.”
Is the more apt comparison, then, Nathan Fielder, particularly how he orchestrates relationships on The Rehearsal? “I think their crew is more masterminded and meta. We really pushed it as an observational documentary. But maybe the Nathan Fielder character is the mistress dispeller.” Could she use her documentarian skills to become a mistress dispeller? “No, I’m too straight-forward.” Doesn’t her job revolve around getting strangers to trust her? “True. I do feel overlap with Teacher Wang in that she approaches clients with empathy and no judgement. That’s what drives me as a filmmaker.”
The audience is laughing out of a deep discomfort. When I watch it and chuckle, it’s because I can imagine myself in all three roles, from different parts of my life
Lo spent three years filming Teacher Wang and several of her cases but only included one love triangle in the film. The other examples were incomplete or too off-putting. “There were husbands we filmed whose behaviour felt inexplicable,” says Lo. “In one scene, he’s denying having an affair to his wife, and an hour later I’m with him as he’s making a move on this young woman. He’s doing this all on camera. That might seem like salacious material to build a film out of, but his behaviour was so beyond the pale. It would undercut what I wanted, which is to help people understand why a man or woman does what they do in a relationship.”
Despite the universality of the themes, Lo has detected different responses to the film from country to country. In Egypt, women told Lo they recognised themselves in the story. In America, audiences were loud and raucous during screenings. “I think they’re laughing out of a deep discomfort,” says Lo. “When I watch it and chuckle, it’s because I can imagine myself in all three roles, from different parts of my life. Well, not literally. But the breakup scene – I’ve been both of those people.”
Mistress Dispeller is out in UK cinemas on August 22