Wong Kar Wai - Feature Films, 1988-2007

this is amazingly difficult.
well, my first stab is to eliminate Ashes of Time and My Blueberry Nights.

2046, Fallen Angels and As Tears Go By have all grown considerably on me despite initial cool receptions, but I don't think they are nearly as strong as the remaining films.

ok, that cuts it down to 4. that's about all i can do for now... may be inspired for a massive rescreening sesh to pull the trigger on one.

In the Mood For Love and Chungking Express are the obvious contenders, but I have a soft spot for Fallen Angels.

fallen angels would be my pick

In the Mood for Love is one of my favourite films this decade.

Happy Together

PREDICTION: Happy Together will get robbed. xpost

I voted for Happy Together.

A perfect film 1) Happy Together (1997)
small margin behind 2) Ashes of Time (1994) (which is seriously underrated for some crazy reason)
another small margin behind in a tie for 3) Days of Being Wild (1991)
In the Mood for Love (2000)
these are basically the same movie except the latter has poorer lighting tie for 4) Chungking Express (1994)
Fallen Angels (1995)
remember this being kind of over-baked now, but still well worthwhile 5) 2046 (2004)
this is decent HK gangster flick, but lacks trademark cinematography 6) As Tears Go By (1988)
this is garbage 7) My Blueberry Nights (2007)

The run from Days to In The Mood is maybe the greatest single directorial run in the history of cinema. I could re-watch any of those films a kajillion times.

Actually that should be less lighting, not necessarily poorer for Fallen Angels.

I discovered Wong Kar Wai when I walked into 2046 knowing nothing except for what it said in the film festival catalogue I saw it as part of. I was convinced until someone bought In The Mood For Love for me on DVD that it had to be a fluke, that no director could stumble across this exact combination of muteness and stylization and carpeted over feeling more than once, that it was this perfect movie synthesised with my enjoyment as its sole motivation, like it was the most intensely focus-grouped movie I have ever seen. Happy Together was like a perfect synthesis of Malick and Kenneth anger, a bruised, defeated elegy to fucked up relationships, the romance for shitty apartments you used to live in, with a vested interest in some redeeming notion of queerness.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQe6v0v_0uQ

In The Mood For Love is a good insomnia cure.

Happy Together

havent seen as tears go by, and easily eliminate 2046 and blueberry nights... i guess in the mood?

do not see how you could categorise 2046 together, that is mad rong in my opinion

I've only seen Fallen Angels & 2046, so I won't be voting in this, but I'm flabbergasted that anyone would vote for Fallen Angels over 2046.

my favorite quote of wong kar wai's is when he was asked about the then-controversial opening scene of "happy together" which has tony leung bonking another dude in graphic detail and he was like "yeah, if people come late to the cinema they might think it's a film about two brothers"

HAHAHAHAHAHA

I've seen all of them but Ashes Of Time, though I hope to catch Redux on video in the next few weeks. Really enjoy them all except My Blueberry Nights which I couldn't even finish.

Went with Happy Together, though I think In The Mood For Love is just as good. My favorite Leslie Cheung performance gives it the edge.

I think my order of preference would be Happy Together > In the Mood for Love > Fallen Angels > Chungking Express > Days of Being Wild > 2046 > As Tears Go By

my faves are Days of Being Wild, Happy Together and 2046, but I don't particularly feel like choosing btwn em.

ive talked about this elsewhere but i happen to think 2046 is straight self-parodic garbage

In the Mood for Love = accidental, beautiful
2046 = deliberate, disastrous

i've seen 2046 three times now, the first time i was not feeling it at all, the second time i realized it was much better than i had originally thought and the third time (seen in succession after Days of Being Wild and In The Mood) I realized it's place in his legacy as closure of several interwoven thematical arcs that weave in and out of most of his strongest work. it made much more sense when seen as a trilogy and while i don't think it's his strongest work, it shits from on high all over Ashes of Time wtf AlexSF.

In the Mood for Love = accidental, beautiful
2046 = deliberate, disastrous

― sir-mounter (Eric H.), Sunday, August 16, 2009 8:28 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

accidental how?

also, can i just say i <3 tony leung and maggie chung... if it wasn't for WKW i may never have paid so much attention to these guys.

In the Mood for Love = yeah yeah yeah, pretty ppl in slow motion w/ same song under it really makes romance seem important.

2046 is a contender for my Ten Best of '00s (admittedly worst decade in cinmea history, far as I can judge).

Fallen Angels uber alles

Days of Being Wild a close second

romance? itmfl is all about heartbreak and fucking over the people you love imo. would watch with you and discus.

I will also LOL if As Tears Go By gets any votes, as basically that means you hate WKW's guts and wish he would die

it's his most succesful film to date iirc

Chunging Express is the best - the least pretentious of them all, followed by 2046 - the most pretentious of them all.

He is at his best on the extremes.

toss up between days of being wild and happy together... voted the former

I have traumatic teenage memories of getting scolded for watching Happy Together when my parents walked in during the scene where one of the characters was getting a handjob in a theatre.

As such, I voted for chungking express because I have lots of happy memories of that.

i haven't seen blueberry nights -- i think i'm afraid of denting my wong idolatry. but of the rest, it's very hard to choose. i think in the mood is maybe his most perfect movie -- if i had to pick one movie to represent his whole thing, i'd go with that -- but i think i might like the scruffiness of happy together and the dizziness of 2046 better. really, the run of ashes of time thru 2046 is pretty amazing. (nothing wrong with the first 3, they only suffer in comparison. well, and as tears go by has a sort of dated '80s cheesiness to it -- albeit an attractive one.)

as tears go by is fucking awful
in the mood for love ftw but rogue props to fallen angels, days of being wild

other poll ideas: dobw v itmfl v 2046, chungking express v fallen angels, wkw v stephen chow

I had a friend who listed "Chunking Express" as her favorite film on facebook for the longest time

"it made much more sense when seen as a trilogy and while i don't think it's his strongest work, it shits from on high all over Ashes of Time wtf AlexSF."

It's not my fault you hate Sergio Leone and Tsui Hark, Shasta.

Seriously if you don't like Chinese sword epics then I guess I could see how Ashes might not be your thing (and I know Shasta has suspect opinions about Yakuza films so maybe it's just a prejudice on his part) but if you love 'em and you love Wong and Chris Doyle, I don't understand how you couldn't think this is very nearly his best picture (one upped only ever so slightly by the even more well put together Happy Together). It's gorgeous and melancholic and everything you'd expect from Wong's other films with fantastic (and gorgeous) acting. Aces stuff.

Hate to be boring, but gotta go with In the Mood for Love (which, yes, IS romantic and also unbearably wrenching...)

I agree 2046 is "deliberate" but wouldn't go so far as "disasterous"....but i do think it is a failure. Though sometimes I think the deliberateness is an intentional, almost nihilistic parody of the "romantic" elements of the earlier movies. just a thought.

Chungking Express is another favorite, and Days of Being Wild has maybe one of my favorite opening shots/music ever...

I love almost all of these movies. 6 years ago, a friend had acess to a threatre at U.T. and told me to be there at 8p.m. He said I could bring one friend, but not to tell anyone else. When I got there, he had beer and popcorn, and In The Mood For Love. Watching it, alomst alone in that theatre, and not knowing anything about the movie; it was amazing. We screen movies all summer in that theatre, but none was as breathtaking as ITMFL.

surprised myself by voting for fallen angels on the basis of, which one would i most want to watch right now.

of what I've seen I'd say 2046 and Happy Together are the two most ambitious movies.

i've seen 2046 three times now ...

it made much more sense when seen as a trilogy

a trilogy... of itself!!

I have learnt the following:

Really wanna watch Ashes of Time.

Really don't want to watch Blueberry nights.

Really wanna re-watch 2046.

Voted Days Of Being Wild. Happy Together is his most visually annoying film - all those filters, the timelapse scenes, the Hong Kong upside down travelouge.

I'll rep for Ashes Of Time too, th redux on Blu-Ray is amazing (though ironically the most gorgeous and HD enhanced image in the package - the sea at Cannes - is in the extras, not the film.)

Have seen Days of Being Wild, As Tears Go By, Chungking Express, In the Mood for Love and 2046. didn't really get 2046 the first time and had a hard time getting through Chungking Express with all that California dreamin going on. pretty hard to argue against In the Mood for Love here which is a terrific movie in every way.

"Happy Together is his most visually annoying film"

?!?!

I do agree that overuse of the Mamas and the Papas is a slight misstep in an otherwise great film.

chungking, no?

surprised myself by voting for fallen angels on the basis of, which one would i most want to watch right now.

― flying squid attack (tipsy mothra), Monday, August 17, 2009 1:11 AM (9 hours ago) Bookmark

this is very OTM - it's about the only film of his I'd watch without first preparing a huge pot of coffee and taping my eyes open before watching

WKW's films benefit hugely from second viewings, or from reading spoilers so you know the general plot outline that all his dreamy sequences reference obliquely

despite California Dreamin', WKW really does use music impeccably; I really, really, really have to thank him for introducing me to Xavier Cugat's 'Perfidia'

I mean, you would never ever otherwise be able to get me to say that an acapella version of 'Only You' is good quality music

faye wong singing that cranberries song was way more annoying than mamas & papas

you sir, are dead wrong

that reminds me, the best part about As Tears Go By is Sandy Lam's version of 'Take My Breath Away'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K38Ov3U71ag

you guys should also seek out FW's Cocteau Twins covers

wong kar wai is boring i would rather watch, i dunno, bullwinkle cartoons

you sir, are dead wong

WKW's films benefit hugely from second viewings, or from reading spoilers so you know the general plot outline that all his dreamy sequences reference obliquely

despite California Dreamin', WKW really does use music impeccably; I really, really, really have to thank him for introducing me to Xavier Cugat's 'Perfidia'

― a being that goes on two legs and is ungrateful (dyao), Monday, August 17, 2009 3:27 PM (4 hours ago)

this is so otm, and by otm I mean OFF the mark

kind of bewildered by people who hate 2046, I think it's just overwhelmingly beautiful. but I like Eyes Wide Shut and other pretentious shit too.

^^ OTM

yeah, but without the eyes wide shut bit, eyes wide shit morelike

Lol Kubrick, agreed. But 2046 is a film of wonders though isn't it? Like akm said, so overwhelingly beautiful

yeah if Happy Together and 2046 are my two favourite def, with Happy Together barely clinching it

A Christopher Doyle poll would be interesting as well.

Yeah except I've never seen his crazy ass film.

western directors don't know what to do with doyle anyway, so it might as well be a wkw poll

How about a Non-WKW Cinematography of Christoper Doyle poll? I'll start one soon.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

I'm cool with all of this except DoBW placing so low, it's considered by many (in HK) to be the pinnacle of HK cinema.

0 votes for Ashes is a shame. In retrospect I should have voted for that just to give it some much-needed love (although HT didn't get enough either so whatever.)

i think chungking express is overrated here. it's a lot of fun, but i don't quite class it with the other top 5.

I honestly think, Alex, that you're the only one in the world who likes that movie!

nah i love ashes. just didn't vote for it.

xp nah I know plenty of other folks who do too. Quentin Tarantino likes it too, I think!

i think he likes CK Express more... he paid for the distribution costs on its first US theater run IIRC.

as much as Paasion of the Christ? xp

Just checked my Asian Cult Cinema book and he gives Ashes 4 stars and Chungking and Days two and two and half respectively. Admittedly that book came out in 1997 so maybe Thomas Weisser changed his mind, but yeah I'm not the only one so *blows raspberry*

xxxp the DVD was definitely initially on Rolling Thunder or whatever it was called.

Thomas Weisser is like the Chuck Eddy of film, why on earth would you actually keep a copy of that book!!!!?????!?!??!

LOL

Anyway I'm guessing Thomas Weisser's taste in HK cinema is closer to mine than yours is. Don't you hate yakuza films too. Talk about suspect tastes.

i hate all that shit which is why I like WKW.

One doesn't have anything to do with the other (although I don't agree with Weisser that Chungking and Days are boring.)

Bordwell loves Ashes IIRC

Yeah, but he's the Frank Kogan of film so fuck that guy too.

it's considered by many (in HK) to be the pinnacle of HK cinema

this may be true of HK critics but I have yet to meet an actual HKer who loves Wong Kar-Wai

"it's considered by many (in HK) to be the pinnacle of HK cinema"

Yeah this is bullshit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong_Film_Awards#Best_100_Chinese_Motion_Pictures

I know that DoBW pretty much swept the HKFA when it came out, but I think it was due to a feeling of "finally, one of ours is also doing arthouse cinema"; the thought was that WKW was legitimizing HK cinema in the eyes of the West, for better or for worse

So does the fact that A Better Tomorrow is one spot higher mean that its the super pinnacle of HK cinema?

I would watch A Better Tomorrow over Days of Being Wild

I'd watch A Better Tomorrow 2 over either.

Happy Together

just watched happy together. def his most narratively straight forward film outside of as tears go by, of the ones I've seen (haven't seen ashes of time or my blueberry nights). man, when tony leung gets left alone with that tape recorder...

I saw Chungking last night for the first time since soon after it came out. (A seemingly tipsy Christopher Doyle was there to introduce the film.) I like the Faye Wong/Tony Leung half (or more); the Brigitte Lin/Takeshi Kaneshiro section doesn't go anywhere for me, and he's thoroughly annoying. Overall, I'm somewhat puzzled as to why this is so highly regarded.

Cuz it looks great!

That said it's not my favorite of his. It's still ranked tied for fifth on my list with Fallen Angels (although the bits with Kaneshiro and his father are probably my favorite bits in either film.)

xp to think that that would be enough.

(A seemingly tipsy Christopher Doyle was there to introduce the film)

this is either just what CD is like, or what CD is like all the time

wondered if this might be a bump w/a trailer for his martial arts flick

Honestly, I didn't think Chungking looked all that great, especially all that stop-motion stuff near the beginning. I realize a film like Lost in Translation probably wouldn't exist without Chungking--and also realize I'm opening myself up to ridicule here--but to me, that's a much better looking film.

Thanks for the clarification on Doyle. I was hesitant to say he was drunk--I guess that's just his manner.

its def a possibility that hes drunk/buzzed p much all the time i think

its def a possibility that hes drunk/buzzed p much all the time i think

I recall the voice did a piece on him mid-decade - the title was "Legend Of Drunken Master".

would read

there is a book he put out a few years ago too. some of his weird photo-collage things he makes on set are real nice.

Here's a link for the Voice piece:

http://www.villagevoice.com/2004-08-03/film/the-legend-of-drunken-master/

Very much confirms my initial impression. Doyle mentioned last night that he had one of those photo-collage exhibits in a Toronto gallery right now.

y'huh, i just googled to see if i could include a collage & found that there's another book, a cloud in trousers (his other book being called RGB something-something-something).

thanks for the link!

Overall, I'm somewhat puzzled as to why this he is so highly regarded.

"I realize a film like Lost in Translation probably wouldn't exist without Chungking--and also realize I'm opening myself up to ridicule here--but to me, that's a much better looking film."

I can't remember anything about the visuals in Lost in Translation (outside what for all intensive purposes could be very nice stock footage of Tokyo and Bill Murray's mug) whereas there are sequences (admittedly mostly from the second half with Faye Wong in Tony Leung's apartment) from Chungking Express that have stuck with me for almost twenty years.

it's amazing how much of Chungking I had forgotten -- almost everything -- incl what a cutie Takeshi Kaneshiro is.

http://images4.static-bluray.com/reviews/3488_1.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/qyfUz.jpg

well, less so w/ pig action

pig looks really into it

http://i.imgur.com/U9zrq.gif

http://dgeneratefilms.com/critical-essays/two-greatest-films-polls-yield-different-results-for-best-chinese-films

I'm guessing that pig scene is from Fallen Angels? rewatching in a few days.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aUuei4WOHw

for the good doctor

http://i.imgur.com/FRUIH.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szvRRy8Lkz4

i know, how fantastic is that.

http://www.avclub.com/articles/wong-karwais-my-blueberry-nights-relocates-the-aut,91263/

Hmm.. a curious recommendation here. Will anyone vouch for My Blueberry Nights? I've seen all but three of them so I imagine I'll watch it at some point anyway...

I just watched "Fallen Angles" and a) I cannot stop craving dim sum b) I really, REALLY want to plan a trip to HK and stay in Chungking Mansions c) I forgot how sumptuous and intoxicating his films felt. I just want to rewatch everything now!

1. chungking express
2. ashes of time
3. 2046
4. happy together
5. in the mood for love

btw

Ya Chungking is my all time fave. I haven't seen Ashes, though!

i need to rescreen ITMFL, 2046 and ashes

i got 5 minutes into blueberry nights before getting mega creeped out

days of being wild is still really good

hey dayo how well versed in Chinese cinema are you? Do you know of any directors w similar neon-lit city at night kinda vibes?

suzhou river

I haven't thought about him much in the last eight or nine years. It's time I got a fresh infusion of young Tony Leung.

dayo, what else is must see by Lou Ye? Saw blind massage recently, it had some amazing moments, but was also a bit conventional in places. I want to watch more.

Neon lit city at night: Jia Zhangke's digital camera captures some wonderful lights at times, and the recent Tsai digitalism can do the same. But they don't have the same mood, not really.

Confession time: I kinda like My Blueberry Nights... It's the worst Wong, by far, by really really far, but it's still pretty amazing for an American film.

I've only seen weekend liver otherwise and it's very aggressively just ok xp

MBN is not the worst, last i looked

I'll have to check out "weekend liver"

BFI monograph on ITMFL out

http://www.davidbordwell.net/blog/2016/03/06/in-the-mood-for-wkw/

sounds rad, i like tony rayns

http://i.imgur.com/iFIb3FL.jpg

the 10th anniversary box set came with a pair of boxers

http://i.imgur.com/7Pnlalj.jpg

On Friday, Amazon confirmed five new projects — series greenlights for a period drama from Paul Attanasio and Wong Kar-wai and a comedy starring Fred Armisen and Maya Rudolph; two comedy pilots; and a Seth Rogen-produced comic book adaptation eyed as a straight-to-series order — that reflect the drive to find shows that deliver sizzle in the water-cooler environs of social media and can travel around the world.

In an interview on Friday, Price told Variety that there is a new focus on finding “big shows that can make the biggest difference around the world” in growing Amazon Video’s reach and Amazon Prime subscribers. “Tong Wars,” the drama penned by Paul Attanasio and directed by Wong, is a prime example of a period piece that blends the epic history of Chinese immigration to the U.S. with a crime potboiler. “It’s a very compelling show,” he said.

http://variety.com/2017/tv/news/amazon-studios-jeff-bezos-roy-price-zelda-1202552532/

WHAT?!?!?

Wow this sort of sounds like Wong's Yakuza Papers! Exciting!

Here for it all day

wow yeah

Nice thread on the man who wrote the story which In the Mood for Love is based on:

The great modernist Hong Kong writer Liu Yichang 劉以鬯 passed away today. Peripatetic, diasporic, cosmopolitan - Liu's life and work embodied a lesser known trajectory of modern Chinese literature. Wong Kar Wai's IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE was inspired by 2 of his best known stories. pic.twitter.com/jONyGdiNBt

— eileen chengyin chow (@chowleen) June 9, 2018

ok but where's my Amazon series

amazon need to be nationalised.

thought that was roger ebert at first

this guy went to shit, jesus.

what has Christopher Doyle been up to?

I look at that run of films and think, "My god, that feels so long ago..."

right?

Doyle was on-camera extensively in Anthony Bourdain’s Hong Kong episode that just aired a week or so ago. Seemed like a pretty exasperating guy. Lots of talk about the WKW films.

i went to a talk of his where he was showing clips and i had to leave because he was so boring and annoying.

Actually I saw WKW talk once at the NYFF, and he was kind of annoying as well. Totally talked trash about Doyle, among other things.

So, um, he turns 60 today, apparently. A lot younger than I thought.

yeah! been around for quite a while

I saw Days of Being Wild last week, and it was pretty great. Especially the start. Vintage Wong, the very moment he found his style.

It's kinda crazy that in the sixteen years from 88-04 he made As Tears Go By, Days of Being Wild, Ashes of Time, Chungking Express, Fallen Angels, Happy Together, In the Mood for Love and 2046. And in the fourteen years since then he has made My Blueberry Nights and The Grandmaster. Sigh.

Well, whatever he's doing I hope he is happy. He deserves it.

It was a great run, no need to make more. Hb wkw!

Just saw As Tears Go By - a lot of standard crime drama content but I liked its stylishness and its homage to 70s crime films

ok but where's my Amazon series

― the masseduction of lauryn hill (Stevie D(eux)), Tuesday, June 12, 2018 2:48 PM (two months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

not sure what to make of the first appearance of Tony Leung in Days of Being Wild being in a dank low-ceilinged room just at the end of the movie

was Wong Kar-Wai was setting us up for In the Mood for Love a decade later

-2nd was

It's the same character, yeah

didn't hate but also didn't love the comedic aspects of Fallen Angels. it was beautiful though.

like so many auteur films, it's something to watch and ponder again at a later date

I do want to see Chungking Mansions

^ this
The slapstick of the mute guy is so out of tune with the criminal romance

I have worked my way chronologically through Wong Kar-Wai’s films recently, and am up to In the Mood for Love, which again seems like just about the greatest film I’ve ever seen. Every aspect of it has such vibes. And for such a seemingly simple concept it has very dense storytelling. It’s like he had an 8 hour story to tell in 1 hour 39 minutes. I’ve seen this movie three times now, but it still feels like it has a lot more to reveal

The highlights of the movie for me this time were the string of scenes in the middle that included the exploratory conversation in the restaurant where Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung reveal what they know about the infidelities of their spouses, their tentative reenactment of the scenes of betrayal and rehearsal for a confrontation, their subsequent acknowledgement of their feelings and the surreal farewell during the rainstorm, and their missed connection in the hotel room just before he leaves for Singapore

there was also a lot of interesting echoing or presaging of various scenes and replaying of scenes with a different perspective

not to dismiss the cinematography, the costumes (so many different qipaos), and two really great performances I think, portrayals of isolation and the yearning for connection, internalized performances that are apotheoses of the actors’ on-screen personae and which are always the kind I remember the most

(love morbs' description of it "ppl in slow motion w/ same song under it")

I did like how there was sometimes extremely subtle and sometimes not so subtle slowing of the frames

the music was beautiful: Zhou Xuan’s “Hua Yang De Nian Hua”, Nat King Cole’s ”Aquellos Ojos Verdes", "Te Quiero Dijiste", "Quizás, Quizás, Quizás”, and especially Shigeru Umebayashi’s “Yumeji's Theme”

loved the scene where they share two separate meals during their entrapment in his room overnight while his landlord and friends played an epic series of mahjong games. also the repeated foregrounding of the noodle container as a metaphor for desire, the clock as metaphor for constriction/estrangement/distance

"2046" was very complicated - three love stories plus a future fantasy, all told in fragments nonsequentially. I hated it the first time I saw it, but looking at it again a second time I thought it was pretty incredible

Making my way through Days of Being Wild and I think the most crushing scene is when the policeman is waiting by the phone booth waiting for the girl to call - then gives up and walks down the street and I was so sure the phone was going to ring just as he moves out of audible range

that was a great scene

(My Blueberry Nights was not very good, but it was so nice to see Chan Marshall (Cat Power) in the film and to hear "The Greatest" in the soundtrack

I hated it the first time I saw it, but looking at it again a second time I thought it was pretty incredible

― Dan S, Friday, October 19, 2018 5:19 PM (forty-seven minutes ago)

pretty sure someone says something similar upthread (and has some advice for a 3rd rescreen).

well I should definitely see it a third time. Can't think of a film I've had such different reactions to between viewings

though I still think In the Mood for Love is his masterpiece

I'm not sure but was Wong Kar-Wai's mistake with My Blueberry Nights his trying to transpose his aesthetic to NY, Memphis, Las Vegas?

makes me wonder if that that film was just an exploration and if he still has a lot more to reveal to us

I kinda thought My Blueberry Nights was okay, it's just so much worse than anything else he has done. But I'm happy it exists.

My Burberry Nights

My Blueberry Nights is a horrible enough title already.

Chungking Express is available for now on the new Criterion Channel streaming site if you sign up (free to cancel):

https://www.criterionchannel.com/

this movie kicks so much ass

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7Ly030AcwY

has any movie so densely imagined been so light on its feet?

And for such a seemingly simple concept it has very dense storytelling

this is almost every WKW movie-- there's just so much going on.

like little worlds, really.

the moment the 2nd story in this film begins, with Tony Leung walking up the camera, is one of the great movie moments. fun fact: i used to hate "california dreamin" but it's hard to hate it after this movie.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAH-0GKvIrM

also chef's salads are gross

this movie kicks so much ass

has any movie so densely imagined been so light on its feet?

someone should re-dub that scene where they hit the jukebox and, like, papa roach starts playing.

why was chef's salad handheld and wrapped in tinfoil

I never understood this

i love how wong is such a sensualist, and there's such an attention to food here, but so much of the food is (IMO) unaccountably gross. chef salad? fish and chips? sardines? pineapple? ok, pineapple is fine, but those cans are expired.

something very inspiring about a film that's so rapturous over such mundane food.

imagine some american director getting all moony over a big mac.

Wong Kar-wai announced his new film BLOSSOMS as a part of trilogy with In The Mood For Love and 2046. He said he has prepared the script for last 4 years and he’s ready to shoot in the end of this year or beginning of next year #WKWisback pic.twitter.com/d73Cueo39a

— Hang Lu (@hanglutvd) March 19, 2019

coincidentally 2046 is also when we can expect him to wrap postproduction

I thought it already was a trilogy with Days of Being Wild

so is this Amazon series just not happening?

https://www.screendaily.com/news/filmart-huanxi-releases-details-on-wong-kar-wai-web-series-paradise-guesthouse/5137774.article

Wong was previously attached to Amazon web series, Tong Wars, about Chinese immigrants in the US in the 19th Century. However, an Amazon spokesperson said the project is no longer in active development and the company has relinquished the rights.

oh

oh, that's too bad. it never seemed terribly likely, though.

It is in some ways remarkable how steeply downhill non-mainland Chinese filmmaking went this decade. Tsai Ming-Liang, Hou Hsaio-Hsien, Wong Kar-War, neither of them has made a film in five years, no?

well tsai has said he's going to stop making 'conventional' feature films altogether, and hou and wong haven't been particularly prolific for 20+ years....

Eh, Hou made four films 01-07, Wong three 00-07. It really went off a cliff after that, and nobody else took up the mantle.

well the hong kong film industry kind of cratered in the new millennium, and taiwan's cratered back in the early '90s. johnnie to keeps busy, at least.

by which i mean, the # of films has just dropped precipitously in general, which affects auteurs and non-auteurs alike.

He, I haven't seen a Johnnie To film as well since 'Office', which is kinda remarkable. But yeah, the industries seems to have cratered, Hou made several films abroad as well. It is kinda remarkable, and the rise of a new generation of Chinese film hasn't really made up for it yet. It's just weird for me having to deal with Singapore films instead of Hong Kong all of a sudden.

"Happy Together" was 90 minutes of tedious bickering. Disappointing.

Have to be in the mood I guess

One of my favorite queer films.

Relationships are a lot longer than 90 minutes of bickering, so 90 minutes is a breeze.

Explains why my relationships have been lasting under 90 minutes

I do need to rewatch Happy Together for the same reason as Michael, I was just not really tuning in

are his films streaming anywhere? I wanted to watch chungking express the other day but couldn’t find it

looks like the criterion channel has both chungking express and happy together

Plus In the Mood for Love and Fallen Angels.

I just rewatched "Happy Together", I am 32 and the last time I saw it I was... 20? It was very fascinating seeing it as adult with 10+ more years of life and love experience. The thing that struck me the most was that the characters exist in a world without a trace of oppression or homophobia, there is not even a single passing glance or snide remark from a stranger, it focused squarely on the relationship between these two men and let that be the sole focus of the film. And while it's a film about a toxic relationship between two people and not a film about """gay men""", there is enough queerness in the film (bathroom cruising, sugar daddy/rent boy stuff, etc) that this isn't just a hetero film with gay characters palette-swapped in.

I guess I'm not surprised that someone's takeaway would be "90 minutes of tedious bickering", bcz like yeah, you're not wrong, but the things that make this film so profound esp from a queer perspective are the things that it lacks and not the things that it contains, it has a simplicity abt it that queer ppl haven't really been afforded in film and I think this aspect is lost if you are not queer, have not immersed yourself in queer cinema, have not thirsted for acknowledgement and representation. I remember feeling this the last time I watched it, when I was in college and was doing a lot of research and writing abt queer representations in film, but what's surprising now is that 12 years later it still feels so fresh and rare to have a queer film that's not centered around queerness.

Film at Lincoln Center and Janus Films present World of Wong Kar Wai, a retrospective of the Hong Kong master, rescheduled from its original dates in June and opening November 25 as this year’s FLC holiday series.

Contemporary cinema’s supreme rhapsodist of romantic longing, Wong Kar Wai makes mesmerizing mood pieces that swirl around themes of time, dislocation, and the yearning for human connection. Ever since exploding onto the international scene in 1994 with his third feature, Chungking Express—an art-house sensation that would become one of the defining works of the Hong Kong New Wave—Wong has been refining his signature style, marked by woozy, hallucinatory visuals (often shot in sumptuous color by frequent cinematographer Christopher Doyle); the indelible use of pop music; and elliptical editing that evokes the impressionistic haze of memory. Though he’s renowned for his sublime studies of love and its absence, Wong’s small but exquisite filmography encompasses idiosyncratic forays into science fiction, crime thrillers, and the martial arts epic, all infused with his trademark motifs and swooning style.

FLC is honored to present this career-spanning retrospective of one of the greatest auteurs working in world cinema today, with brand new restorations of some of Wong’s most dazzling films including Chungking Express, Happy Together, Fallen Angels, Ashes of Time Redux, Days of Being Wild, 2046, As Tears Go By, and a never-before-seen extended cut of The Hand, plus an expanded run of In the Mood for Love commemorating its 20th anniversary. The films open in the FLC Virtual Cinema, accessible to audiences nationwide. Visit https://virtual.filmlinc.org/ in the upcoming weeks for specific dates.

ugh, I have spent a lot of time over the last week or so thinking abt film screenings and how much I miss them and all the specific things that I love about them that home viewing lacks. I heard about this retrospective about a year ago from some film-world friends and have been VERY eagerly anticipating it and it fuckin blows this is just gonna be some VOD thing and I’m not gonna get to experience the magic of seeing these on a huge screen in a room full of ppl

like I know this is #firstworldproblems as fuck but it’s one of those little things that inexplicably hits harder than it ought to, I really miss life

on the bright side these restorations were all done by Criterion which means there is likely a Blu ray box in the works!!

Excited by Wong's missive: "I invite the audience to join me in starting afresh, as these are not the same films, and we are no longer the same audience." pic.twitter.com/6YqdSJhlrA

— Nick Newman (@Nick_Newman) December 1, 2020

most of these available tomorrow — can’t wait!

Where will they be available?

https://virtual.filmlinc.org/page/world-of-wong-kar-wai/

I hope Fallen Angels will still be available somewhere in 1:85

Hoping the bfi pick up this retrospective for London.

Really disappointed with the new Wong Kar Wai restorations @janusfilms @Criterion pic.twitter.com/hJBSVXbJHH

— jaiden (@steph_turkey) December 1, 2020

Lol

xxp I think Criterion Channel and Netflix dvd both have Fallen Angels in 1.85:1

I really liked the scene in Fallen Angels toward the end that is an appealing close-up of the killer’s agent casually eating noodles in a restaurant while ignoring (but apparently taking delight in) the violence unfurling around her

I rewatched Fallen Angels earlier this year, I think it's his coolest movie if not his best. Cool in the Godard sense, even more than Chungking Express I think it embodies that side of Wong's influences and inclinations. The other side of him is the romantic longing side, which is In the Mood for Love and Happy Together and 2046. (What both tendencies share, obviously, is noir — his real home territory.)

FALLEN ANGELS is prob my #2 fav after Chungking and also his most underrated and slept-on

It's pretty/artistic but the story is among his weakest of his acclaimed-tier films.

lmao I am completely not paying $12 each to stream these (or an incomplete $70 7-film bundle) when I could just watch these on Criterion Channel or buy the inevitable Blu-ray box 6 months from now.

also re: the damaged HAPPY TOGETHER footage, why excise it entirely instead of just subbing footage from an existing print? or is that much easier said than done?

These are great films but I agree re: price

I got nothing to do tonight so I’ll probably stream one of them but otherwise yeah, will probably wait for other venues

xxp I see subbed-in footage in restorations all the time. I haven't seen Happy Together, so maybe the footage is integral enough to make a noticeably lower quality substitution not worth it. Idk. You see it pretty frequently though, particularly with 2K and 4K restorations, and not just optical shots. Off the top of my head, there are a few long shots in Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant that are clearly from a poorer-quality print.

I think Fallen Angels has that romantic longing, the killer’s agent is completely alone throughout the movie but then suddenly meets He, a victim of the restaurant violence and the main character from the other half of the story

the idea that making a real lasting connection with another person is hard and that it would be extremely fortuitous for it to happen to anyone seems like the main theme of Wong’s movies

“I ask him to take me home. I haven't ridden pillion for a long time nor have I been this close to a man in ages. The road home isn't very long, and I know I'll be getting off soon. But at this moment, I'm feeling such lovely warmth.”

https://www.criterion.com/boxsets/4117-world-of-wong-kar-wai

lmao that sure was fast

do they not own blueberry nights

or Ashes of Time I guess

That's ok, I didn't want to own My Blueberry Nights either.

oh god blueberry nights is so terrible. i feel bad about wkw. the first film i saw by him was 2046 which i loved so much and i feel weirdly implicated in his subsequent decline/stalling

tbh i think only in the mood for love and happy together are very good but they're both so wonderful it feels like a miracle

happy together i saw at a p formative moment in my life and the cruising scenes, the romance of the flea-eaten flat with the mean ruined boyfriend. they left a mark.

in the mood for love feels subtle, rich and condensed but many of his other films feel haphazard. maybe i've just never understood his version of nouvelle vague im willing to concede that.

it does feel very condensed

You guys should I get a Blu-ray player (for this but also in general)?

I feel I may have missed the window on BR and physical media is obv on the way out and feel I should just skip it and embrace streaming and uhhh non-streaming digital formats wink wink but I also love physical media and WKW

Oh man that is super tempting
Not sure how many more times I need to watch these though

Hell of a bookshelf ornament though

You should absolutely get a blu-ray player. They are relatively affordable, I see a bunch on Amazon for $75 or less. Backwards compatible so you can save your DVDs. Physical media will never die, there will always be expensive curios like this, but the resignation with which people accept an all-streaming future seems insane to me. DVDs still look very good or great for the most part, and blu rays are cheaper than ever. These streaming platforms are not reliable. It's worth hanging onto every disc you can.

I use my Xbox as a blu ray player about half of the time

Yeah, they're all over the place. You could probably get one at Target or Best Buy or whatever for under $50. Obviously physical media has been headed for a niche since Napster, but its death is premature and exaggerated, and the only people that want it eliminated completely work for Disney and Apple and Amazon and Netflix. Fuck them!!!! Options!!!!! Also it's a film preservation issue, the myth that you can find "anything online" is going to bring about a world where you can't find anything.

im not sure how well his films have aged, though maybe now i can watch them comfortably without thinking they are all a bit too 90s. hes def overrated, or maybe he just does what he does, which is what makes him so good. always thought hed be a great music video director. did he do any? his little tic/trick of using one piece of music or one song over and over also got irritating.

"too 90s?"

He directed DJ Shadow's Six Days video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eY-eyZuW_Uk

Christopher Doyle was DP of Justin's "SexyBack" video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gOHvDP_vCs

(cue arguments about how much Doyle was responsible for the textures/feel of Wong's peak filmography)

WKW went out of his way to trash Doyle when I saw him speak way back when.

(Doyle shot the "6 Days" video as well, a song/video I'd never heard of until today)

Yeah I read somewhere they had a major falling out, will need to google for more...

something I saw said they were recently working together on restorations though

I had never seen one of his movies and finally saw In the Mood for Love. I loved it. So lush, gauzy, beautiful, and sad. The way the main characters "roleplay" their spouses' affair was so subtle and conveyed their damaged feelings so well.

Maggie Cheung's dresses were incredible (especially the lime green plaid). I will now probably be unsuccessful for the rest of my life in getting my wife to buy one.

Are there any reviews of the new edits/versions anywhere?

In the coming 5 weeks a local cinema is organising screening of the following 4K restored movies:
Chungking Express
Fallen Angels
Happy Together
In The Mood For Love
2046
I've never seen any of them so may sign up for all five

Lucky you!

Faye Wong in Chungking ftw

x-post thank you :) Tickets for Chungking Express ordered! I can't even remember the last time I went to a cinema

if you do plan/have the chance to see more, go for Happy Together and In the Mood for Love, I say

I’d go for Chungking and Fallen myself

Really just go for all of them

In the mood and happy together are the only really 'great' ones

https://asia.si.edu/events-overview/films/

The Freer has a virtual WKW festival starting June 11. What besides In the Mood for Love do I need to see?

There was a retrospective at Anthology Film Archives where I caught "Chungking Express" and "Days of Being Wild". Saw "In The Mood for Love" on the big screen when it came out. The rest I've only seen on video.

all his films I’ve seen (in the mood, chungking, ashes of time, fallen angels) are well worth the price of admission, but only in the mood for love I’d call a great film, chungking just a tier below

thanks for the feedback everyone, it's appreciated! I'll try to go see as many as I can :)

i remember how gorgeous 2046 looked on the big screen when i saw it originally, but some combination of the look of that particular film aging badly and needing the big screen has meant that it has never come close again

happy together is definitely the equal of in the mood for love i think, a really great film about lots of things: buenos aires, loneliness, apartment buildings, and being young and gay in a big city.

this is an incredibly controversial piping-hot take but the order in which you listed them is actually my ranking of them all, FALLEN ANGELS is incredibly underrated and cool and excellent, ITMFL is probably the "best" in terms of like the most impactful and stuff, idk, I just didn't click with it super hard when I watched it (though I need a rewatch), HAPPY TOGETHER is honestly one of the best and most groundbreaking works of queer cinema imo, I would say all of those are like 10/10 essential except 2046 which you could skip if you really wanted to.

all the leaves are Brown

https://www.ifccenter.com/series/the-world-of-wong-kar-wai/

Daaaamn

box set is 50% off at barnes and noble rn if 6th ave is too far a trek

A very nice piece on the stars of WKW films: https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/7448-the-stars-in-wong-kar-wai-s-universe

I noticed Ashes of Time Redux is on Mubi so I rewatched it. I saw it when the Redux edit was released in 2008 (on a big screen, thankfully) and I remembered it as gorgeous and nearly incomprehensible. Rewatch confirmed both, tho the plot strands do more or less all connect. It just gets hard in the middle to keep track of who’s in love with/wants to kill whom. But just one ravishing image after another, and the very ‘90s high contrast saturated look feels dated now in a good way — it makes it aesthetically singular. Never seen fight scenes like the ones in this movie, the slow-motion blues are really effective and evocative. Not Wong’s best, but in my second tier of faves by him.

Slow-motion blurs that should say.

The original 1994 release of Ashes of Time is sublime

Is that available anywhere? Seems like Redux is the only print in circulation.

It’s on backchannels. There is no HD version of it available, so it’s basically VCD quality. I just hate his revisionist bullshit, as the film was perfect as is

I thought the revisions were partly because he didn’t have the original master to work from anymore. But not having seen the original I don’t know what changed.

I’ve seen both (might even have the VHS copy I picked up in Montreal Chinatown around) but don’t remember any significant differences, except that the blood spatters in Redux seemed faker (CGI?).

I’ve always been a little disappointed by it in either version, likely because I was expecting something far more experimental, non-narrative, and “difficult”, based on all the wailing and gnashing of teeth by Western HK movie fanboys at the time (check out vintage HKMDB reviews for some classic “you got arthouse in my grindhouse!” sentiments), or J. Hoberman’s memorable description of it as “The Seven Samurai at Marienbad”. But aside from the Brigitte Lin sequence (my favorite section) it seemed relatively straightforward.

In the long run I prefer Tsui Hark’s The Blade, which has sometimes been viewed as an “answer” to Wong. Certainly the character of the dreamy, romantically longing heroine who narrates the film feels like a pointed parody, especially since there’s otherwise zero romanticism in the Tsui, just sweaty, half-naked, seemingly deranged men beating and flogging and chopping the hell out of each other.

There are a hell of a lot more differences between the two versions than blood spatters. For god’s sake, the entire colour palette was altered. The blue skies in the original look like teal vomit in the Redux. It’s shorter. The score was redone. Even the credits are completely different.

Tsui Hark’s The Blade is magnificent. Very fortunate to have seen it in 35mm some years back. Maybe the single best wuxia film of the last 40 years

Ah see I like the weird palette of Redux. But would be interested to see the original too.

I remember seeing the original and thinking that it couldn't have seemed more incoherent if all the shots had been edited together in random order.

has anyone seen blossoms shanghai?

On the to-do list! Hopefully later this weekend.

I tried but couldn’t get into it. The obvious effort to ape Succession was greatly offputting.

didn't know about the leaked tapes & exploitation accusations, depressing stuff https://www.worldofreel.com/blog/2025/11/13/wkw

wow, ghastly if true

The fact that he badmouthed the Chinese govt allowed me some "it's a set up" thinking, but the details here seem very damning.