Director/writer: Wong Kar-Wai
Photography: Christopher Doyle, Wai Keung Lau
Music: Frankie Chan, Michael Galasso, Roel A. Garcia, Faye Wong
Editors: William Chang, Kit-Wai Kai, Chi-Leung Kwong
Cast: Brigitte Lin, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Faye Wong, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Valerie Chow, Piggy Chan
Director and writer Wong Kar-Wai does not entirely fit with my conception of a Hong Kong filmmaker of the ‘90s, benighted as that might be. My expectations are still more along the lines of extravagant action set-pieces and outrageous settings and setups—Jackie Chan and John Woo kinds of things. There’s much less of that in Kar-wai pictures, of course, but he has perhaps outdone the others with his dazzling style and unusually pure commitment to romance, which only seems to go over better every year. I am astonished to see that In the Mood for Love has now reached the top 20 of the big list at They Shoot Pictures, Don’t They? (#17 to be specific). Chungking Express is next on the list, at a perhaps more sedate #159. But it has also seen a steady rise over the years from the lower echelons of the top 500.
For me, it is Kar-wai’s deeply romantic vision that wins me over, augmented as it is with the stunning cinematography and canny soundtrack choices. It is a full-on package of sensation. Chungking Express splits across two mostly distinct narratives. The first is a ridiculous young policeman, known as Cop 223 (Takeshi Kaneshiro), who is trying to grasp the reality of a failing relationship. He has just been dumped. He calls her family members and acts like everything is fine, hoping they will be his allies. He buys cans of pineapple, her favorite food, looking for expiration dates of May 1 because she broke up with him on April 1, because May 1 is his birthday (turning 25), because the young woman’s name is May, or perhaps more than anything because he believes it will somehow help his cause. It’s somewhat murky and hovers close to silly—among other things he takes up with a drug-dealing spy who wears a wig, sunglasses, and trenchcoat—but it’s a useful overture, familiarizing us with Kar-wai’s style and approach for what is to come in the second narrative.
Director and writer Wong Kar-Wai does not entirely fit with my conception of a Hong Kong filmmaker of the ‘90s, benighted as that might be. My expectations are still more along the lines of extravagant action set-pieces and outrageous settings and setups—Jackie Chan and John Woo kinds of things. There’s much less of that in Kar-wai pictures, of course, but he has perhaps outdone the others with his dazzling style and unusually pure commitment to romance, which only seems to go over better every year. I am astonished to see that In the Mood for Love has now reached the top 20 of the big list at They Shoot Pictures, Don’t They? (#17 to be specific). Chungking Express is next on the list, at a perhaps more sedate #159. But it has also seen a steady rise over the years from the lower echelons of the top 500.
For me, it is Kar-wai’s deeply romantic vision that wins me over, augmented as it is with the stunning cinematography and canny soundtrack choices. It is a full-on package of sensation. Chungking Express splits across two mostly distinct narratives. The first is a ridiculous young policeman, known as Cop 223 (Takeshi Kaneshiro), who is trying to grasp the reality of a failing relationship. He has just been dumped. He calls her family members and acts like everything is fine, hoping they will be his allies. He buys cans of pineapple, her favorite food, looking for expiration dates of May 1 because she broke up with him on April 1, because May 1 is his birthday (turning 25), because the young woman’s name is May, or perhaps more than anything because he believes it will somehow help his cause. It’s somewhat murky and hovers close to silly—among other things he takes up with a drug-dealing spy who wears a wig, sunglasses, and trenchcoat—but it’s a useful overture, familiarizing us with Kar-wai’s style and approach for what is to come in the second narrative.
That involves another cop, known as Cop 663 (Tony Leung Chiu-wai), and a woman who works the counter at a walk-up restaurant, Faye (Faye Wong). Faye has a mystical fixation with California but she might love Cop 663. Like the first, he has reached the end of a relationship, dumped by his girlfriend. But he is infinitely more stoic about it, collapsing within himself in some ways but maintaining a functional exterior. Faye’s favorite song is “California Dreamin’” by the Mamas & Papas, which she plays at levels that make conversation all but impossible. And she plays it a lot—I tallied eight or nine times that distinct fragments of various lengths are played. I love that song but it’s possible Kar-wai and certainly Faye love it more. It is obviously speaking to Faye’s own melancholic romantic worldview. And ultimately to our own, or mine anyway.
Faye Wong herself also gets a couple of turns at singing on the soundtrack, with covers of the Cocteau Twins (“Know Oneself and Each Other”) and the Cranberries (“Dream Person”). They are achingly gorgeous, used within the film as well as in the closing credits. Chungking Express is a movie that is never afraid to go to the same songs more than once. For brief passages these interludes are even what I always imagined music videos were supposed to be, arresting on their own merits in concert with the music, full-on sensations.
Chungking Express is characterized as both comedy and drama as well as romance, mystery, and crime, which makes me more inclined to dismiss the creepy lines of business that emerge in the second half. Faye gains access to Cop 663’s apartment and goes there when she knows he will not be there. It felt close to the line for me to stalker business, but maybe I’m more sensitive and woke about such things all these years later. Or maybe I consume too much true-crime. Anyway, it’s played off as a kind of sitcom-level joke—Cop 663 is a bit dense and doesn’t seem to notice someone has been in his place moving things around and other pranks. Hyuk-hyuk. I would freak out if it was me, and I think I would notice more quickly. I admit that some of the scenes of her in the apartment, such as one where he has come there unexpectedly and she moves stealthily around, hiding from him, are playful in ways that reminded me of Godard’s Breathless (a movie, as it happens, I don’t actually like that much).
But never mind. Chungking Express is not very much about its wannabe elegant little narrative ploys. On that score it is confusing, to be honest. But oh lord it can be so beautiful, the kind of thing you don’t want to take your eyes off, even if you don’t understand at all what is going on. The music lays on emotional cues with a heavy hand and I just respond and eat it up. It’s really a great one and while you’re at it why not take another look at In the Mood for Love too? You can’t go wrong.
Faye Wong herself also gets a couple of turns at singing on the soundtrack, with covers of the Cocteau Twins (“Know Oneself and Each Other”) and the Cranberries (“Dream Person”). They are achingly gorgeous, used within the film as well as in the closing credits. Chungking Express is a movie that is never afraid to go to the same songs more than once. For brief passages these interludes are even what I always imagined music videos were supposed to be, arresting on their own merits in concert with the music, full-on sensations.
Chungking Express is characterized as both comedy and drama as well as romance, mystery, and crime, which makes me more inclined to dismiss the creepy lines of business that emerge in the second half. Faye gains access to Cop 663’s apartment and goes there when she knows he will not be there. It felt close to the line for me to stalker business, but maybe I’m more sensitive and woke about such things all these years later. Or maybe I consume too much true-crime. Anyway, it’s played off as a kind of sitcom-level joke—Cop 663 is a bit dense and doesn’t seem to notice someone has been in his place moving things around and other pranks. Hyuk-hyuk. I would freak out if it was me, and I think I would notice more quickly. I admit that some of the scenes of her in the apartment, such as one where he has come there unexpectedly and she moves stealthily around, hiding from him, are playful in ways that reminded me of Godard’s Breathless (a movie, as it happens, I don’t actually like that much).
But never mind. Chungking Express is not very much about its wannabe elegant little narrative ploys. On that score it is confusing, to be honest. But oh lord it can be so beautiful, the kind of thing you don’t want to take your eyes off, even if you don’t understand at all what is going on. The music lays on emotional cues with a heavy hand and I just respond and eat it up. It’s really a great one and while you’re at it why not take another look at In the Mood for Love too? You can’t go wrong.
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