General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

If You Are the One (非诚勿扰)

If You Are the One (非诚勿扰) is a 2008 Chinese romantic comedy film written and directed by Feng Xiaogang (冯小刚), starring Ge You (葛优) as the Beijing inventor Qin Fen and Shu Qi (舒淇) as the flight attendant Liang Xiaoxiao. It was the highest-grossing domestic film released in China in 2008 and spawned two sequels, in 2010 and 2023.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Original title / English title	非诚勿扰 / If You Are the One¹
Director and writer	Feng Xiaogang (冯小刚)¹
Stars	Ge You as Qin Fen (秦奋); Shu Qi as Liang Xiaoxiao (梁笑笑)³
Release	Mainland China 28 December 2008; Hong Kong 25 December 2008; 128 minutes⁴
Box office	Over ¥364 million (about US$53.7 million); the top-grossing domestic film of 2008 in China²^•¹
Inspiration	Chen Kuo-fu's 1998 Taiwanese film The Personals (征婚启事); Chen also served as the film's producer¹^•⁵
Sequels	If You Are the One 2 (2010) and If You Are the One 3 (2023)⁶

Spoilers

Plot

Qin Fen, a Beijing inventor, sells his "dispute terminator" (分歧终端机), a device for settling disagreements, to the gullible investor Mr. Fan (范伟) and becomes rich overnight. Wanting to find a wife, he posts an online marriage-seeking advertisement, and meets a string of unsuitable candidates: a gay former friend (冯远征), a cemetery saleswoman, a woman obsessed with stocks, a pregnant single mother (徐若瑄), and others.⁴^•²

Among the respondents is Liang Xiaoxiao, a flight attendant who admits she is still entangled with a married man (方中信) and came to the meeting only at her family's urging. Qin Fen is drawn to her but gives up his pursuit. When Xiaoxiao later reenters his life, the two travel to Hokkaido, Japan, where an old friend of Qin Fen hosts them; Qin Fen accepts that he cannot win her heart, while Xiaoxiao carries a depression of her own that the trip forces toward a resolution.⁴^•⁷

Sequels

The first sequel, If You Are the One 2 (非诚勿扰2), released in 2010, continued the on-and-off relationship between Qin Fen and Xiaoxiao and added a meditation on illness and death that several commentators credited with deepening the characters.⁶^•¹²

If You Are the One 3 (非诚勿扰3), Feng Xiaogang's return to directing after 13 years, opened on 30 December 2023 with the original leads reprising their roles. Set on Hainan and incorporating an AI-robot premise, it underperformed: a first-day box office of 24.36 million yuan, roughly 50 million yuan in its first four days against high screening rates, a Douban score of 6.1, and a cumulative total of just over 100 million yuan after 35 days, far behind same-season releases such as Johnny Keep Walking! (about 1 billion yuan) and One Sparkling Star (680 million yuan). Critics attributed the failure to scattered plotting, awkward comedy, and a loss of the everyday, common-man perspective of the earlier films.¹³^•⁶^•¹⁴^•¹⁵

Production and origins

Feng Xiaogang said the film's inspiration was The Personals (征婚启事), a 1998 film by the Taiwanese director Chen Kuo-fu (陈国富), who joined If You Are the One as a lead producer. The connection is visible in the structure: both films are built around a protagonist meeting a series of marriage candidates, and several character types in If You Are the One, including a pimp-like figure, a man selling burial plots, and a gay suitor, have counterparts in The Personals.¹^•⁵^•⁸

The film was produced by Huayi Brothers Media together with Media Asia Films and Zhejiang Film and Television Group. The crew included cinematographer Lü Le (吕乐), sound recordist Wang Danrong (王丹戎), and editor Liu Miaomiao (刘苗苗).³^•⁹

Reception and box office

The film opened in mainland China in late December 2008 in the New Year (贺岁) release season that Feng Xiaogang's own comedies had helped establish. Sina's box-office coverage reported the film passing 200 million yuan in 13 days and finishing above 340 million yuan; the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes records a total of over ¥364 million (US$53.7 million). 1905.com, the state film database, lists it as the 2008 box-office champion among domestic Chinese films.⁹^•²^•¹

Critical response was largely favorable but not uniform. Sina's press roundup collected both praise, such as Sanlian Life Weekly's view that Feng had his audience's support, and criticism, including the Beijing Times' complaint that the beginning and ending felt abrupt and the plot loose, and Modern Express's remark that the film's literary touches changed the flavor of the romance.⁹ A 2010 academic study of the film's visual culture argued that it emphasized a male gaze, structuring the first half as a sequence of matchmaking scenes in which women are observed and appraised.¹⁰ A Douban essayist later placed the film as a representative of northern Chinese middle-aged romance, contrasting its wisecracking, life-worn tone with the more restrained southern register of B for Busy (爱情神话).¹¹

The same-name television program

The title also belongs to a Jiangsu Satellite TV dating show, If You Are the One (非诚勿扰), which premiered on 15 January 2010 and became one of the most-watched matchmaking programs in China. Its format, one male guest facing 24 female guests who vote by keeping or switching off their lights, drew large audiences and repeated controversy over materialism and staged behavior, leading to a suspension and retooling in its early years. Scholars of Chinese media treat the show as the third generation of Chinese television matchmaking, after TV Hongniang and Hunan TV's Rose Date.¹⁶^•¹⁷

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026