Top to bottom: Alyssia Chia, Gigi Lai, Kitty Lai
After reading the book , I realize that none of the actors who have played Zhao Min in the TV series match well with the book's descriptions. When we first meet Zhao Min, she is dressed up as a man, holding a fan with a handle that is made of white jade. "The hand that held the fan was so pale they matched (23, p.1075). Even in male dress, she looked very pretty. When she spoke, she did so delicately and did not try to conceal her true gender.
At the Green Willow Villa, Zhao Min wined and dined with Zhang Wuji and the rest of the Ming Sect desciples. After a while, her face developed a blush from the alcohol, and this actually made her look even prettier. She is still dressed up as a man to boot!
What makes her so mesmerizing is not just that she's pretty, but in her beauty there is an underlying current of the heroic and the noble.
I have seen 3 versions of HSDS, and I think that Gigi Lai looked best as Zhao Min, but Kitty Lai played the payed the role the best. Alyssia Chia, as pretty as she is, looked a bit too gentle, and acted the part with too much delicate childishness. Now, after reading the descriptions, I realize it's foolish to picture any actress as Zhao Min because she is described in such a way that she could never appear in the flesh.
I wish Jin Yong had spent equally as much paper on describing Zhang Wuji's appearance.
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