Hacker Cinema
Chungking Express
重慶森林
1994 · Film · 102 min
Directed by Wong Kar-wai
Two melancholic Hong Kong policemen fall in love: one with a mysterious underworld figure, the other with a beautiful and ethereal server at a late-night restaurant.
8 positive7 neutralfrom 15 commenters
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15 comments on Hacker News
I think it makes sense that historically American film focused on narrative based dramas and slow burn horror. Think of classic Hollywood hits such as Citizen Kane and Psycho. This is even apparent in the recent success of Obsession, which really follows strongly in the trend of Hitchcock, magical realism, human drama, psychological horror.
Compare this with historically successful Honk Kong films: Kung Fu Hustle, Police Story, Ip Man. I mean there are examples of Hong Kong films that are slow burn human dramas, like Chungking Express and Eat Drink Man Woman, and successful American action films like Diehard, but I think its clear that Hollywood film didn't start out with action movies, and Hong Kong film didn't start out with slow burn dramas, but adopted these genres afterwards; you could even claim that successful Hong Kong films like the Bruce Lee films of the 70s fueled the American appetite for action in the 80s, which was the most prominent era for that genre in the US.
As a corollary to this, it becomes clear that the Korean and Japanese film making industries are not as culturally distinct from Hollywood as Honk Kong film making is. For Korean film, the reason is obvious: Koreatown in Los Angeles is right next to Hollywood, in some respects is a part of Hollywood, and there are deep ties now between the Korean and American film making industries for that reason, and Korean-Americans have an overly high degree of representation in American media, and Korean productions often come to America to shoot (think of the end of Squid Games: it's almost certainly the case that they shot in LA because a producer has a cousin or something that works in Hollywood).
Dreams I've had (since a late teenager) have often taken place in some kind of architecture with infinite rooms, hallways…
I wrote a computer game where a paper airplane flies room to room… It occurred to me that I was not indirectly surfacing this "endlessly scrolling building" that has recurred so often in what I suppose are nightmares(?).
At the same time, memory being what it is, I worry that the reverse is true—that the game I write inspired the nightmares (and that I now miss-remember when they began, misattribute them to my teenage years).
There is at times a feeling of infinite possibility when I find myself in these places while dreaming. I always enjoy exploring new places and so a place with infinite rooms, hallways, floors is going to keep me busy.
When I learned of Kowloon Walled City [1][2], that caught my attention. I've seen too descriptions of the underground portions of Hong Kong [3] that let you move from place to place without every stepping outside. The movie "Chungking Express" gives off that vibe [4]. The imaginary prisons of Giovanni Battista Piranesi [5].
[1] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/kowloon-walled-city.html
[2] http://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-xI_c78etYDc/T61_qAwHWFI/AAAAAAAB7MI/j9A8NsIRRME/s0/Kowloon-Cross-section-low.jpg
[3] https://weburbanist.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/hong-kong-map-detail-960x691.jpg
[4] https://youtu.be/0uMekCFDnkI
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carceri_d%27invenzione
I’ve only seen that movie on an old MacBook about a decade ago, but I can certainly believe it’d be a treat seeing it the way you mention.
Funny enough, I want to see a version of Chungking Express that feels processed to look like an early-2000s digital camera.
Interesting to read, but this is where movies are more "real" than true life - people can't verbalize their true feelings and need to experience or work through them in some way non-verbally.
If you've seen any Kar-wai Wong movies, that's basically his whole filmography (In the Mood for Love, Chungking Express, etc.).
So he was trying to be like Wong Kar-wai [1]:
> Wong has an unusual approach to film making, starting production without a script and generally relying on instinct and improvisation … cast are given a minimal plot outline and expected to develop their characters as they film
Edit: Yes:
> the director has shared a list of 19 movies that inspired Megalopolis … Wong Kar-wai's Chungking Express. [2]
[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wong_Kar-wai#Method_and_collaborators
[2]: https://movieweb.com/megalopolis-director-reviews-his-own-movie-rating-it-5-stars/
My most (deliberately) rewatched movies include:
* Breakfast Club
* Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
* Penn and Teller Get Killed
* Chungking Express
* Pink Floyd PULSE
* Black People Hate Me and They Hate My Glasses
* Pulp Fiction
* Fringe (not a movie)
You can probably identity my real identity from this list alone. YOLO.
Shoah - a 9.5 hour documentary about the Holocaust https://letterboxd.com/film/shoah/
Sügisball - an Estonian movie that introduced me to the works of Bohren & der Club of Gore, now my favorite band https://letterboxd.com/film/autumn-ball/
Fitzcarraldo - Werner Herzog moves hell and earth in this film https://letterboxd.com/film/fitzcarraldo/
Chungking Express and In the Mood for Love - Wong Kar-Wai's movies affected me so much that when I went to Hong Kong about half my trip was just looking for the filming locations https://letterboxd.com/film/chungking-express/ & https://letterboxd.com/film/in-the-mood-for-love/
UHF - Probably the reason I like underdogs https://letterboxd.com/film/uhf/
I never find Hopper's paintings striking, or overwhelming (perhaps because I've never seen one in person). But I think about them all the time. I think that's because he captures the kind of moment you see all the time; and those moments you experience alone quite often.
I think of him every time I watch a Wong Kar Wai movie, especially Chungking Express, and In the Mood for Love.
I definitely think his movies with Doyle are worth watching, but without . . . he just seems lost. Chungking Express, Fallen Angels etc. through to 2046, are cinematographic first with anything else a very distant lower priority.
What seems so unusual is the reverse is also true. Doyle without Wong Kar-wai is not the same.
California Dreamin is forever associated with Chungking Express now, it's impossible to listen to it without thinking of the movie.
If you enjoy In the Mood for Love, I would highly suggest watching the rest of his movies. Every single one is a masterpiece. Maybe start with Chungking Express for a more upbeat and fun movie.
I can really recommend Wong Kar-Wai. I may have rewatched some of his movies four or five times.
Chungking Express is such a beautiful movie. You can also take a look there at a bit less developed and less modern Hong Kong.
One of the major phenomena of Hong Kong in the 1980s and early 1990s was families getting out if they could afford it, because everyone was nervous about the Chinese handover. This wave of emigration even plays a role in contemporary Hong Kong film of the era like Chungking Express. And even before the fears of the handover, many educated HKers were emigrating to the US for the sake of higher wages.
Yes, HKers have ties to HK that are a hassle to break, but plenty of people have broken them and up and left.
I‘m also fascinated by Kowloon Walled City since the first time I saw it in the Dreamcast game Shenmue 2.
One of the best documentaries IMHO is the following 4 part series from 1989 which shows the everyday life in KWC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lby9P3ms11w
I also recommend the already mentioned book City of Darkness and movie Chungking Express. Additional Jackie Pullinger‘s books "Crack In The Wall: Life & Death in Kowloon Walled City" (http://amzn.to/1nNKkuq) and "Chasing the Dragon" (http://amzn.to/1kd9zWc) are worth a read.
This is actually common in many cultures. In South-East Asia I have heard this many times, that people have/had this belief that taking pictures of them "steal their souls". You can see it mentioned in a movie from Wong Kar Wai, Chungking Express, if I remember correctly, when the protagonist talks about his father.