Shine With Grace

Chungking Express directed by Wong Kar Wai is my all time favorite.  Released in 1994, it was starred by Tony Leung, Faye Wong, Brigitte Lin, Takeshi Kaneshiro and Valerie Chow.  The film won the Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Tony Leung) and Best Editing awards in the 1995 Hong Kong Film Award and the Best Actor Award (Tony Leung) in the Golden Horse Awards (Taiwan).  It was also voted no.8 amongst the ten best film in the last 25 years in a poll published by Sight and Sound (the monthly magazine of the British Film Institute).

We rub shoulders with each other everyday.  We may not know each other.  But we could become good friends some day.

Chance encounter is one of the main theme of Chungking Express.

When we are closest, we’re just 0.01cm apart from each other.  57 hours later, I fall in love with this woman.

At the high point of our intimacy, we are just 0.01 cm away from each other.  I know nothing about her.  6 hours later, she falls in love with another man.

The film composed of two separate stories:  The brief encounter between Police PC No. 223 (Takeshi Kaneshiro) and the mysterious woman (Brigitte Lin) and the triangular love story amongst Police PC No. 663 (Tony Leung), “the girl” (Faye Wong) and the flight attendant (Valerie Chow).  Without their (and even the audience’s) knowing, the characters had bumped into each other.  Just that some encounters developed into a story, while some didn’t.  Say, 223 remained a stranger to 663, “the girl” and the flight attendant even they had rubbed shoulders.

Watch the trailer:

Chungking Express is extremely romantic, symbolic and poetic.  In terms of film language, it has demonstrated its excellent mastery of montage (editing), mise-en-scene (framing), filming (the use of hand-held camera in particular) and the use of sound and music.  

It is well known that the director has this habit of continuously rewriting the script and giving instructions to the actors on the spot (sometimes without a script).  He nevertheless has the talent in discovering the uniqueness of each of his actors and brings out their best and the most special characters (and charisma) through his film. 

An episode by Faye Wong (Song: “The one from my dream”, also by  Faye Wong):

The episode shown in the above extract is particularly interesting.  Faye the girl fell in love with 663 and she hacked into this apartment while he’s on duty and changed the daily stuff in his house.  The result?  663 did not realise all the small changes taking place in his house, but gradually fell in love with Faye even without his knowing it. 

The monologue:

The use of monologue in the film is superb.  In the following episode, 663 “talked” with the stuff in his house and projected his own emotions onto them.   

BTW, are you aware that the big white toy has been replaced into a Garfield by Faye?  No, you don’t?   Not a problem.  Because 663 didn’t realise it either…

Related posts:

• Film On Saturady - Rataouille (Remy The Rat Who Becomes The Chef) 
• Film On Saturday - Love Is Actually All Around: Films By Richard Curtis (Notting Hill, Love Actually, Four Weddings And A Funeral
• Film On Saturday - Before Sunrise, Before Sunset
• Film On Saturday - Sliding Doors (Life Determined By Chance?)
• Film On Saturday - Pursuit Of Happyness

Popularity: 10% [?]

If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!