To describe Hong Kong's new wave cinema in one singular word that word would be "synthesis". A perfect synthesis between the cultures of the united states, japan, Great Britain, and mainland China. Hong Kong is built very differently compared to mainland China but without going into more recent events, Hong Kong at the time was referred to as its own entity and local compared to all of the parts of Asia. this localization at the time really deviates the culture of outside influences. an example of this would be how the people of hong kong watched American movies, played Japenese arcade games, and spoke languages of English, Cantonese, and Mandarin. another example of this would be the Japanese game King of Fighters actually creating new fashion trends within hong kong at the time. in addition, hong kong does not have the same currency and government due to Great Britain owning hong kong at the time. the new wave kicked off with the success that hong kong had when producing kung fu films and the societal impact of the Vietnam war. Prior to the new wave, hong kong thrived within its kung fu genre to the extent of reaching international success, therefore, creating a stylistic genre that can be traced to Hong Kong, a seed of the hong kong new wave would have the rising success of the American new wave or better known as new Hollywood. The new wave can be described as a movement that explored more creative freedom than films prior to films expressing darker and deeper themes through stories that involved crime and thriller with more tolerable violence, an influence that can clearly be seen from the New Hollywood genre. this influence that New Hollywood had on Hong Kong allowed for more creative films to be made that not only were made for commercial success but also for critical purposes depicting life within hong kong. in touch, this movement consisted of three different waves taking place between the late 70s to early 80s, the mid-80s to the early 90s, and the rest of the 90s through to the early 2000s. the first waves portray themes of crime, violence, and lost innocence stemming from the influence of the New Hollywood genre, the second wave takes a rather experimental character focus with a larger focus upon romance and loneliness, and the modern new wave taking its own route compared to the other two waves. Within my essay, I will be focusing more upon the second new wave as I believe it has the most stylistic features and its overall artistic features are ones I am able to relate to on a deeper level. Hong Kong's second new wave stems from the lack of identity felt by the people of Hong Kong as Britain hands over the rule of Hong Kong to Mainland China which left citizens of the region lost. The directors stemming from this wave are; Wong Kar Wai and Mabel Chueng, to directors of movies I'm choosing to analyze within this essay.
If I had to describe Wong Kar Wai's 1994 film "Chungking Express" I would describe it as confusing whilst simultaneously being considered as a masterpiece inspiring other directors upon its release. Chunking Express is a film where Wai's stylistic auteur traits show vividly within the film with an example being themes of loneliness, love, and being in a state of solitude within the characters ultimately telling the story rather than having a direct narrative openly tell the story to the audience. Chungking Express in better words can be described as a commentary of city life where the worlds of business and solitude abruptly collide. The film begins with officer 223 being dumped on April fools day. he is seen to be quite too optimistic as he believes the love that he once had will soon blossom again and until then he buys a can of pineapples with the expiry date of May 1st, his birthday. the love he once had does not gain life and he ends up with the conclusion of "everything in life has an expiry date". after this realization he then goes to the bar and determines to fall in love with the first women he sees thus being the lady with the blonde wig whos involved w trade. fast-forwarding within the movie the lady in the blonde wig kills the man that caused her involvement within the trade and leaves officer 223 a happy birthday message and this point at first glance I believed this film to be over by this point. the film quite literally bumps in too second act Fei who falls in love with another police officer who had also just been dumped. quite weirdly she breaks into his house until eventually being caught and then becoming a flight attendant and meeting the officer she one falls in love with again at the end of the movie. upon the t view of this film, I was left rather confused and disorientated by two similar storylines who both express themes of love and loneliness. to be exact I could say I yearned for more. that yearn and longing feeling I was left with is the feeling intended by Wai for the audience to depict the loneliness in Hong Kong. in fact, the city of Hong Kong is the only thing that actually ties the two storylines adding to the aspect of loneliness. within the opening scene, the officer is seen running through a crowd of people with Wong's Signature step print effect which is used to depict this loneliness. In the scene, you can see that they're a lot of people yet you aren't able to actually make out a face within the scene. as the scene progresses the tight corridors that the officer goes through only amplifies the loneliness that these people share. the film was produced in the span of 2 months with most of the script being written as the days went on during production thus being the reason for the film being quite disorientating. however the fact that wong is able to
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