Two melancholy Hong Kong policemen fall in love: one with a mysterious female underworld figure, the other with a beautiful and ethereal server at a late-night restaurant he frequents.
Two neighbors, a woman and a man, form a strong bond after both suspect extramarital activities of their spouses. However, they agree to keep their bond platonic so as not to commit similar wrongs.
Director:
Kar-Wai Wong
Stars:
Tony Chiu-Wai Leung,
Maggie Cheung,
Ping Lam Siu
Several women enter a science fiction author's life over the course of a few years, after the author has lost the woman he considers his one true love.
Wong Kar-Wai's movie about two love-struck cops is filmed in impressionistic splashes of motion and color. The first half deals with Cop 223, who has broken up with his girlfriend of five years. He purchases a tin of pineapples with an expiration date of May 1 each day for a month. By the end of that time, he feels that he will either be rejoined with his love or that it too will have expired forever. The second half shows Cop 663 dealing with his breakup with his flight attendant girlfriend. He talks to his apartment furnishings until he meets a new girl at a local lunch counter.Written by
Tad Dibbern <DIBBERN_D@a1.mscf.upenn.edu>
Kaneshiro Takeshi spoke four languages himself in this film. His narrations were all in Mandarin, most of his live lines are in heavily-accented Cantonese, he spoke Japanese when he called one of his ex-girlfriends, and had one line of English when he apprehended a suspect (he said "hands up!" to him). He used all 4 when he approached Bridgett Lin's character. See more »
Goofs
The woman in the blonde wig had no apparent opportunity to get the beeper number except from Cop 223 himself the night before, and he wouldn't have started to abandon his beeper as useless if he had just given someone new the number. See more »
Quotes
[223 phones some potential dates]
He Zhiwu, Cop 223:
Lulu? This is Qiwu. Want to come out for a drink? You're in bed already? This early? You were asleep? Never mind. Bye.
[He phones another]
He Zhiwu, Cop 223:
Chieko-san? Guess who? This is Qiwu. That's right. Want to come out for a drink? Your husband? When did you get married? Five years! Has it been that long? You have two kids! You're happy, that's great! Okay, never mind.
[He phones another]
He Zhiwu, Cop 223:
Is Kong Siu-wai there? This is He Qiwu. We were classmates in grade four. You don't ...
See more »
Alternate Versions
The original Hong Kong release ran 98 minutes. 'Kar Wai Wong' made several changes to the international version, bringing the running time to 102 minutes:
The international version expands the scenes where The Blonde prepares for the smuggling trip and later searches for the smugglers.
Indian music plays during the smugglers' arrival at the airport in international prints; in the Hong Kong version, the title theme plays.
The international version includes the kidnapping of an Indian girl, which does not occur in the Hong Kong version.
The sequence with Zhiwu loitering outside his girlfriend's window appears earlier in international edit.
In the Hong Kong version, the Faye Wong cover of "Dreams" plays over the shot of 663 drinking coffee. The international version strips out the music (leaving only ambient noise), although "Dreams" still appears at the end of the film. The international cut is Wong's preferred version and has been used for most home video releases. The Hong Kong cut was released on VHS/laserdisc by World Video and on VHS/LD/DVD by Mei Ah.
Masterful Hong Kong film-maker Wong Kar Wai understands that love is about the unspoken moments between people, the hidden gestures betraying loneliness. Chungking Express is a unique expression of such notions of love. The film doesn't pretend that love is all-embracing and constant, in the way so many predictable films would suggest. Love, for the protagonists of this film, comes and goes between subtle glances - always elusive. Indeed if a level of contentment can be reached at all for these characters - it is a fleeting moment, a memory of a song, the way that somebody smells. There are so many essential moments in this film - when Dinah Washington's 'What a difference a day makes' plays over two lovers cavorting, the moments when characters talk to inanimate objects to overcome their loss of love, the brief glances between the second policeman and the waitress across the counter of the fast-food restaurant. It has been dismissed as an exercise in style over substance by many, mainly due to the hypnotic way in which the film is shot and the lack of a real story as such. I don't feel the need to defend it from these accusations because the beauty of the film is there on the screen and nothing I have said or could say could really do it justice. It breaks my heart every time.
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Masterful Hong Kong film-maker Wong Kar Wai understands that love is about the unspoken moments between people, the hidden gestures betraying loneliness. Chungking Express is a unique expression of such notions of love. The film doesn't pretend that love is all-embracing and constant, in the way so many predictable films would suggest. Love, for the protagonists of this film, comes and goes between subtle glances - always elusive. Indeed if a level of contentment can be reached at all for these characters - it is a fleeting moment, a memory of a song, the way that somebody smells. There are so many essential moments in this film - when Dinah Washington's 'What a difference a day makes' plays over two lovers cavorting, the moments when characters talk to inanimate objects to overcome their loss of love, the brief glances between the second policeman and the waitress across the counter of the fast-food restaurant. It has been dismissed as an exercise in style over substance by many, mainly due to the hypnotic way in which the film is shot and the lack of a real story as such. I don't feel the need to defend it from these accusations because the beauty of the film is there on the screen and nothing I have said or could say could really do it justice. It breaks my heart every time.