Editor's note: This is a nostalgic theater.

In addition to the few dramas starring Huang Zihua, "The Iceman" belongs to the dramas that I have to use as background music to revisit every now and then. This drama can meet my basic needs for "sweetness" and "laughter".

The theme of "The Iceman" is marriage, and "Iceman" refers to the matchmaker. The setting of the "Iceman Hall" in the play is actually equivalent to today's Century Jiayuan and Zhenai.com, which collects data and matches customers who need to choose a spouse, and Iceman collects matchmaking money from it.

"The Iceman" poster

The story takes place in the prosperous Tang Dynasty. Linghuxi (played by Gai Minghui) is a hereditary official media, but according to the law at the time, only men are eligible to hold official positions. The Linghu family had four daughters and no sons. In order to preserve the century-old foundation of the official media family, the youngest daughter, Linghuxi, disguised herself as a man since she was a child, and became an official media post when she became an adult. Only Linghuxi knew this secret. The aunt and herself.

The reason why there is an "official media" setting is because the basis for marriage at that time was the "Tang Law·Household Marriage Volume". The current dynasty has created sufficient labor productivity and troops to fight against foreign enemies.

When there is a situation of forced marriage, the official media is required, and the stamping of documents and the identification of their authenticity are also within the scope of the work of the official media.

"Gold Medal Iceman" stills

However, due to the rigidity and inefficiency of the official media system, marriageable men and women who intend to start a family prefer to choose private media to talk about their marriage. Therefore, in the prosperous Tang Dynasty, the planned economy and market economy in the marriage market launched fierce competition, which caused a lot of jokes .

Lian Baihe (played by Zhang Keyi), known as the "Golden Sunflower Fan", is a well-known private media. She is principled, efficient, and eloquent. It's just that although Lian Baihe has facilitated countless marriages, she stays in her boudoir. It wasn't that she didn't want to marry, it was just that when she was in her hometown in Hangzhou, she faced the groom escaping from marriage on her big day, so although she and the groom had never met, she became a married woman inexplicably.

Because the groom abandoned the marriage and absconded, Lian Baihe was involved in scandals, and his father Lian Yong, who is a senior iceman, was also forced to wash his hands. The father and daughter endured the humiliation and left their homes to Chang'an, intending to make a comeback in the Iceman's world. Unexpectedly, when Lian Baihe applied for a matchmaker for the wealthy daughter Lin Cuizhen, she met a rival, Quan Jiafu (played by Ma Junwei) who claimed to be "Luoyang Golden Sunflower Fan".

Family Fortune (Steven Ma), Lian Baihe (Maggie Cheung)

The Lin family has a prominent status in Chang'an City, and they donated 10,000 taels of money to select the Iceman, and the Iceman had to find a marriageable man who met the Lin family's criteria for choosing a son-in-law. Invisible "gold turtles make stars" industry chain.

The catcher Gao Fei (played by Chen Hao) came to Chang'an City in order to find his sweetheart. His outstanding literary and martial arts skills made him regarded as the best candidate to participate in the Lin family's selection of son-in-law by various private media who harbored dark intentions when he first arrived. In front of a group of gold-worshiping men trying to marry Lin's family, the private media in Chang'an set off a fierce battle for Gao Fei in order to compete for ten thousand taels of media money.

Lian Baihe and Quanjiafu lobbied Gao Fei one after another, and finally Gao Fei chose Quanjiafu as his matchmaker, because he believed the lies of Quanjiafu, thinking that Miss Lin was his ideal, and Quanjiafu just used Gao Fei as a pawn to repel other competitors After Gao Fei was selected, he found that Miss Lin was not his sweetheart, so he would naturally withdraw from the selection of son-in-law.

Gao Fei was blinded by his obsession, and after finding out that he was being used by the family for welfare, he asked Linghuxi to be his matchmaker, and the two began a delicate relationship of sympathy and sympathy. But the reason why Quanjiafu uses Gao Fei is not for the sake of matchmaking money, but to match Lin Cuizhen and his lover Liu Shiguang. The Lin family and the Liu family are feuds, but the two children love each other, but they are ruthlessly separated by the two families. The whole family took great pains to repel all suitors, just to leave the position of the son-in-law of the Lin family to Mr. Liu.

Gao Fei (played by Chen Hao), Linghuxi (played by Gai Minghui)

In line with the core spirit of the whole drama's joy, this Romeo and Juliet-style love finally touched the parents of both parties, and the two were able to live together. But only Lian Baihe sees through the chivalrous heart of the family portrait, and Gao Fei is discouraged by the private media because he is being used. In addition, he and Linghu agree with each other. In order to live in Chang'an City to find his sweetheart, he chooses to join the official media as a media agent.

Linghuxi secretly promises Gao Feifang, and hits it off with Gao Fei in both work and hobbies, but because of her "male identity", she suppresses her affection. Not long after, Gao Fei relied on his excellent detective skills to find his sweetheart who saved his life that day, Xin Xiangxiang (played by Jia Biyi), who was a maid in the Weng's house. People from two worlds made Gao Fei very discouraged.

Think about it, in order to match the strange marriage between Miss Weng's family and Mr. Parrot, I asked Quan Jiafu to be a matchmaker. Quan Jiafu learned that behind this strange marriage, there is another pair of fateful mandarin ducks-Miss Weng has a sweetheart, but hates the poor and loves the rich The Weng family detested the humble origin of the man. After the man's title on the gold list became the number one scholar, he was favored by Miss Qu, the daughter of the Minister of the Ministry of War, so the two planned to elope and die in love under the guise of "love between man and bird".

In order to please Gao Fei, he used light work to put Miss Qu on a tree, making Miss Qu believe that the parrot Lord had appeared, and the Qu family immediately divorced the engagement. Although another pair of lovers finally got married, Gao Fei's desperate approach violated the code of conduct of the official media. Seeing that Gao Fei almost made mistakes again and again for love, Linghuxi was angry, anxious and jealous, and the relationship between the two reached the point of disintegration.

And Lian Baihe and Quanjiafu turned from competitors to business partners, and jointly opened the Iceman Pavilion "One Line Leads". Because Gao Fei once had a bad relationship with Linghuxi and wanted to pursue Xiangxiang, he helped Xiangxiang redeem from Weng's family, and then resigned from the position of official media. The media is in decline.

Because Linghuxi was self-willed, she sent a sheep to a tiger's mouth in handling the marriage of Miss Fan's family, which made her regret. Later, after being framed by an adulterer and losing her position as an official media, she was invited to join Yixianqian. Then the imperial court issued a marriage order, requiring marriageable men and women to get married within one year, otherwise they may be imprisoned, and Linghuxi was exposed as a woman under the obstruction of the rebels. A farce that is a mess of mandarin ducks turns into a tragedy of life and death in minutes.

"Gold Medal Iceman" stills

Although dressed in the cloak of a costume comedy, the "people-oriented" view of marriage and love in "The Iceman" is something that many people in modern society lack. The dilemma faced by the marriageable people in the play also resonates with modern people-Ms. Lin’s pair faced the running-in between families, Ms. Weng’s pair had to overcome class differences, and what Ms. Fan had to face was even more terrifying The domestic violence of the family, the attempt of the married woman Yueniang to remarry challenged the deep-rooted feudal ethics. Mr. Qin and Ms. Ding obviously agree with each other, but because they can't overcome their psychological barriers, they can't sing harmoniously. Today, when the objectification of people is becoming more and more serious, the characters in the play strive to cross classes, cross cultural differences, struggle against domestic violence and secular prejudice, and work hard to heal psychological trauma for true love, which is really remarkable.

Because the whole play is so positive, you won’t be too demanding why the background of the play is obviously in the heyday of the Tang Dynasty. The safety of a 10-year-old child will always be able to assist at critical moments like a heavenly soldier. Although the forced reunion at the end is a standard feature of many Hong Kong dramas, and although "Gold Medal Iceman" may contribute the most happy and sweetest ending in TVB history, isn't that what is needed? Otherwise, who would dare to get married in the future?