Love in the buff (2012): The representation and reconstruction of  local identity 

‘Love in the buff’ is a 2012 film which is directed by Pang Ho-cheung and starring by Miriam Yeung and Shawn Yue. It is about a love story between two leading characters. This film has gained a lot of focus since its release in last year. It also won ‘Best Actress’ award in the recent Hong Kong Film Awards. In this review, I will focus on the way how it reconstructs local identity though the idea of ‘local allegory’. 

First of all, the setting of the film reflects the situation of Hong Kong people-working in mainland China. Jimmy Cheung (Shawn Yue) worked as an Account Executive in an advertisement company; Cherie Yu (Miriam Yeung) worked as a salesperson in a cosmetic company. Because of the keen competition with Asian regions, their industries started to wither. So, they were asked to work in Beijing (mainland China). However, they could not accommodate the living style in China.  They still remained their social network as same as Hong Kong. Jimmy always hanged out with Gong Gong (Roy Sze-to) and Cherie (Miriam Yeung) always sticked with Isabell (Isabell Chan) and Brenda.  

Moreover, from the scene that Jimmy was eating the instant Spaghetti Bolognese from Hong Kong convenience store, we can see that he missed Hong Kong food very much. He also mentioned that it was the best food in his mind because it contained his past memories. Two aforementioned examples put individual story to collective experience.  The case of Jimmy and Cherie can be linked to the situation of Hong Kong people who are working in China.  Although they are working in China, they still think Hong Kong is their homeland. So, they should keep their living style in Hong Kong. It brings a message- ‘Hong Kong people are different from mainland Chinese. They should have their own identity and culture. ‘

Apart from the setting, symbolic icons also reinforce the identity of Hong Kong people. In the film, E-kin Cheng was Cherie’s ex-boyfriend. The film always mentioned about his career, such as HI-C lemon tea advertisement and young and dangerous series(古惑仔系列). The appearance of E-kin Cheng recalls collective memories to Hong Kong people. From the beginning of 1990s, Chan Ho Nam (the character which played by E-kin Cheng in the young and dangerous series) has become the icon of Hong Kong film industry. It also led Hong Kong film industry into a new golden age. Moreover, the 1990s was the glorious era of Hong Kong’s economy. Therefore, his occurrence raises the nostalgia of Hong Kong people. It also encourages Hong Kong people to stand up for local identity and culture.

To sum up, ‘Love in the buff’ use the idea of local allegory to represent and reconstruct local identity. It reflects the social problem and the importance of local identity. So, audience can have sympathetic response when they watched this film. So, that is why it has become successful.

Reference

Ashcroft, Bet. (2006). “The post-colonial studies reader” (2^nd ed.). Oxford: Routledge.

Love in the buff. 2012. Retrieve from

<http://www.mediaasia.com/loveinthebuff/download/litb_poster2.jpg>

Lo Sin Ting (Annabelle)

21047539/ 10421035

Online review: Cold War (寒戰)

LUI YEE PAN JUSTIN 10517721

Cold War poster (Yahoo! Movies, 2012)

  Cold War is a Hong Kong crime and police film which was the highest grossing Hong Kong movie of 2012; in addition it also won best film, and other eight awards, at the 32^nd Hong Kong Film Awards. It is directed by Sunny Luk and Longman Leung and stars Tony Leung Ka Fai (梁家輝) and Aaron Kwok (郭富城). Before the release of Cold War, the high-grossing Hong Kong films of the year so far were comedy films, such as Vulgaria (低俗喜劇) and Love in the Buff (春嬌與志明). Part of its success lies in the fact that Cold War is different from traditional Hong Kong crime and police films. This review will discuss why the Cold War became a success from the perspective of genre studies. 

  The first element is that of character. In a typical Hong Kong crime and police film, the policemen depicted are generally the junior constables and inspectors. In Cold War, all the characters are the senior officers of different disciplinary forces. For example, Aarif Rahman Lee (李治廷) plays a Chief Investigator in Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC). Tony Leung and Aaron Kwok play Deputy Commissioners of Hong Kong Police Force (HKPF). These characters and their professional milieu are quite fresh to the local audience.

  Nevertheless, as with other crime and police films, the males typically occupy the leading and critical characters. There are eight main characters, but only the character played by Charlie Yeung (楊采妮) is female.

Explosion in Mong Kok (Yahoo! Movies, 2012)

  Moreover, there are many different themes/subjects covered in Hong Kong crime and police films; for example, murder, robbery, drugs, undercover work, etc. However, these topics are no big surprise. In Cold War, the story is driven by multiple incidents and risks at the same time; such as the Mong Kok explosion, or a fully loaded police vehicle and five constables kidnapped by criminals. Therefore, the police force announces a tier one response (a three tier emergency response system) for Hong Kong. Compared to past Hong Kong crime and police films, the themes involved in Cold War are relatively unique.

Tony Leung Ka Fai and Aaron Kwok arguing fiercely (Yahoo! Movies, 2012)

  The narrative/plot is another successful component. No matter what the themes are, the Hong Kong crime and police film commonly focus on the process of how the police prevent or detect crime. The procedural aspect is brought to the fore in Cold War. Also, in usual Hong Kong crime and police films, mostly tend to consider the grey areas, e.g Infernal Affairs (無間道) or The Stool Pugeon(線人). However, Cold War adds some unusual elements during the narrative process; for instance, the procedure of the HKPF, the power struggle between two Police’s Deputy Commissioners, and internal issues within the Hong Kong government. These novel narrative concerns can attract the audiences easily since they have rarely experienced such elements in local films before.

A Special Duties Unit is ready to attack (Yahoo! Movies, 2012)

  When discussing genre, iconography and setting are also important elements. The weapons – especially guns and police vehicles – and police offices or the lair of the bad guys are usually signature visual aspects in the crime and police film. These symbolic icons can also be noticed in Cold War. Since the story describes risks to Hong Kong, so the setting of this film is around different areas in the city, such as Sai Yeung Choi Street South in Mong Kok, the city hall in Central, and so on. These familiar place settings can also increase the involvement of local audiences.

Yahoo! Movies. 2012. [A Special Duties Unit is ready to attack]. Retrieved from http://hk.movies.yahoo.net/assets/movie/photo/201209/ColdWar_9734_1347602213.jpg

Yahoo! Movies. 2012. [Explosion in Mong Kok]. Retrieved from http://hk.movies.yahoo.net/assets/movie/photo/201209/thumbnail/ColdWar_10495_1347602227.jpg

Yahoo! Movies. 2012. [Poster of Cold War]. Retrieved from http://hk.movies.yahoo.net/assets/poster/5e7a72821fab4696e1c8b25aeffa2303.jpg

Yahoo! Movies. 2012. [Tony Leung Ka Fai and Aaron Kwok are arguing fiercely]. Retrieved from http://hk.movies.yahoo.net/assets/movie/photo/201209/thumbnail/ColdWar_2883JPG_1347602147.jpg

Review of film: I Love Hong Kong 2013

Image(above): A poster of film I love Hong Kong 2013.

The Happiness Never Ends

In recent years, films for celebrating Chinese New Year are regularly invested by film companies, and mainly by two directors, Raymond Wong Bak-ming and Eric Tsang Chi-wai. The latter has produced “I Love Hong Kong 2013”(2013我愛HK 恭喜發財) with Peter Chik, and Director Chung Shu Kai; it was shown in cinemas between early February and late March.

The story of the film is set in recent time, with the leading role called Hung (act by Bosco Wong), facing the issues of selling his traditional Chinese restaurant, memorizing his pasts. The main timeframe of the film is from the 70s; the time when Hung has come to Hong Kong from mainland for living. Director has applied many collective memories and typification of stereotypical iconography to represent and identify the 70s, such as the settings of decoration, clothes for actors, and folk adages of people at that time. More, in the film, Hung and his friend Sum (act by Michael Tse), go to Hongkongese Cafe (冰室). They would like to make friend with Yeung (act by Kate Tsui) while Yeung and Yuen (act by Joyce Cheng) are eating ice-cream there. These hardwares effectively give an existing feeling of the 70s.

As the theme set to celebrate Chinese New Year, the feeling of Chinese Lunar New Year and happiness should be the prior feeling to deliver to the audience. Therefore, red pockets, red clothing, and the saying of “Kung Hei Fat Choy” are found in the film. More, the elements of comedy film that is similar to films of Michael Hui’s style in the 70s to 80s was added, while Eric Tsang often acted in his film. For example, In I love Hong Kong 2013, Hung speaks some tone of words those are similar to foul language. Like the New Year film he produced before, we can see the scenes of all actors singing and dancing together. Directors used this common technique of Bollywood in India as a reference (this technique has been used in early TV dramas and films in Hong Kong) to represent an atmosphere of Happiness. Using Auteur Theory to define, the director believes that singing and dancing altogether can convince the audience to bring up the mood of happiness. Also, as they would like to engage the audiences into the film, social issues and mocks on politics were added to increase the authenticity.

Besides, director also interpreted the particular social phenomenon to amplify the 70s. The role Hung and Yeung getting married means lovers from different socio-economic levels are not easy to be together because of family (pressure?), but they could overcome it eventually. In the huge gap between rich and poor, it was not difficult to see it happens. Furthermore, the most important thing for it becomes the logic from the film is the spirit of friendship at that generation. Hung is willing to work hard from worker, and being honest to everyone. It makes the spirit of unity strong between colleagues, friends of community, and family. Hung is always helping others although it will make himself in trouble. In the film, he gave the golden bracelet to the colleagues for money to help their family though it is originally the gift for Yeung for marriage; and he also spent all the money to buy the Chinese restaurant he worked for to avoid Sum to take-over as landlord ruling. 

To sum up, this type of films should be produced in every coming year, and I believe the producers will keep investing on it. One of the reasons is there are plenty of  sponsors for the film and therefore we can see many product placement through the scenes of film. And, for the wish of the producer, Eric Tsang said that he knows the negative atmosphere in the society, so he produced this film, aimed to cheer the audiences up, and brings happiness to Hong Kong people. The film name I Love Hong Kong is the simplest word to explain every love in Hong Kong.


Reference of Image: http://a753.phobos.apple.com/us/r1000/084/Purple2/v4/5c/3b/87/5c3b874e-0516-6bb1-95f2-f5666e8477b8/mzl.jahotgyp.1024x1024-65.jpg

SIU Ka Nam Maurice

Review of a Musical: Love Your Neighbor or Not (《愛里？不理？》)

 

Love Your Neighbor or Not (《愛里？不理？》) is a musical produced by the Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups, aiming at raising people, especially youth people’s awareness about the ever diminishing relationship between neighbors. The story is set in the “Oi Lei House”（愛里居）, an old housing estate which is about to be demolished by the government. Most of the residents support the rehabilitation of the old estate as they can move to a new estate with better facilities. In the meantime, a group of enthusiastic secondary students, who are residents there, feel pity to have their home being demolished, and decide to launch an event to encourage the residents to sign a petition for objecting the rehabilitation of “Oi Lei House”. Throughout holding such event, the residents’ disinterest towards their actions has made them puzzled. Meanwhile, a property developer feels discontent towards these students’ actions. He decides to impose pressure on them, and one of the students is beaten up by gangsters as a result, which has aroused the students’ concern about the sparse relationship between neighbors nowadays.

This musical is successful in showing some factors driving the ever diminishing relationship between neighbors to a large extent. It can be reflected from some of the scenes. First of all, there is a scene showing the time while the students fail to find a neighbor of them to sign a petition for them, a friend of them tell them that all residents are concentrating on watching TV and “no one is going to show up”. It has reflected the social phenomenon regarding people’s disinterest about the affairs happening in their neighborhood, as they rather “watch TV” instead of caring about the students’ actions of concerning the community.

Secondly, there is a scene showing the time when some students are making effort in encouraging residents to sign, their parents come out and object their actions, urging them to leave immediately and saying that “Children should not care about such matters”. It has reflected the truth that some parents in Hong Kong are unwilling to let their children express their opinion towards social issues, which has suppressed their freedom of speech as well as their enthusiasm towards social issues.

Thirdly, after a student is beaten up by gangsters, other students rush home and report this to their parents, so as to seek a helping hand from them. However, none of the parents are willing to help him, and even think that he deserves such consequence as “young people should not be so nosy”, while some of them are afraid about the consequence of helping him, such as being revenged after reporting it to the police. The social phenomenon of people’s reluctance in helping each other, and their selfishness in “maintaining their own benefits” is clearly shown. Such scene has clearly illustrated how such value retained in modern people’s mind contributes to the sparse relationship between neighbors nowadays.

The story then develops with Miss Lee, the students’ teacher, recalling the memory about the good old days in which neighbors in “Oi Lei House” (i.e. Miss Lee is a former resident there) were enthusiastic in helping each other and were tied closely with each other, while telling students about such memories makes them more determined to build a good relationship with neighbors afterwards. It reflects the importance of getting someone to arouse other people’s awareness towards something. As Halbwaches argued about “social frameworks of memory” that, “Provided that individuals perform their essential duties, they are free to live and to think as it pleases them, to form their opinions as they wish. Society seems to stop at the threshold of interior life. But it well knows that even then it leaves them alone only in appearance” (Halbwaches, 1992). It means that people’s hardhearted attitude towards different things may only be true on their surface. Each of us may actually get more positive feeling about particular issues. If there’s anyone showing up and arouse their awareness towards it, their “passion” and “enthusiasm” may appear eventually. Such fact could be applied on the issue of “neighborhood”. On the surface, many people may be hardhearted towards maintaining a good relationship with their neighbors. However, if anyone comes out and emphasizes the significance of “neighborhood” and the importance of maintaining a good relationship with their neighbors, it is likely that people’s enthusiasm in doing so can be activated. Hopefully, audiences’ “passion” in improving their relationship with neighbors could be enhanced after watching this musical.

References:

Halbwachs, M. (Ed and translated by Coser L.A.) On Collective Memory. United States: The University of Chicago Press, 1992. Print. 50, 51.

Image obtained from:
<http://www.facebook.com/NEIGHBOURHOODFirst>

MAN Ho-Fai Ronald

Review of a book: Our Hot Dogs’ Story (2012)

Public transport is a part of everyone’s daily life. In fact, they may contain a lot of memories inside, such as journeys of going to school, journeys of dating your companions, etc. As non-air conditioned buses have retired in May 2012, Dominic Kung, as a bus enthusiast, wrote a book called Our Hot Dog’s Story, describing the development of “hot dog buses”, a remarkable type of transportation which has grown with many Hong Kong citizens.

The author of this book describes the development of “hot dog buses” in a chronological order. The book starts with description of the earliest type of double-decker buses appeared in Hong Kong in 1949, with different remarkable moments of development “hot dog buses” mentioned afterwards, such as longer buses being imported in 1960s, elimination of ticket-sellers on buses in 1970s, and the appearance of 12 meter-long jumbo buses in 1980s. There are factual descriptions about “hot dog buses” during different generations on one hand, with several color pictures showing the real appearance of “hot dog buses” being described. It is easy for readers to find themselves familiar with the description of the bus service in which they have really experienced, especially for readers who born in 1960s to 1970s, they may find the old-fashioned buses being described in the book very familiar, thus they may start to recall their memories about that. In fact, this is a reflection of “collective memory” of the readers, while the photographs showing the images of the old-fashioned buses are the “collective frameworks”. According to Halbwachs, collective frameworks are “the instruments used by the collective memory to reconstruct an image of the past which is in accord, in each epoch, with the predominant thoughts of the society”. (Halbwachs, 1992) For the readers, their memories generated from the images of the buses may not solely focus the body or interior seats of the buses. In fact, the memories may be about their life scenes during childhood such as going to and from school by bus, chatting with girlfriends on the “hot dog buses”, or rushing back home seeing TV dramas after work using “hot dog buses”. The images of “hot dog buses” have become the collective framework for them to develop and reconstruct further memories among themselves.

Some people may argue that “hot dog buses” were not decent while some people enjoyed the time riding on “hot dog buses” and always look back onto it. Such phenomenon could be explained by Halbwachs’ suggestion about kinds of memory. According to Halbwachs, there are two kinds of memory as “one made of habits and turned toward action, and another which involves a certain disinterest in present life”. (Halbwachs, 1992) Some people’s good perceptions towards the memories of hot dog buses may be generated from their disinterest in present life, such as feeling dizzy in the sealed bus compartment nowadays, thus recalled his memory about the time when he can open the windows and enjoy natural wind when riding on “hot dog buses”.

Figure 1A: Upper: A "Hot Dog" bus featuring "Hong Kong: Asian's World City" Advertisement in Kowloon City
Figure 1B: Below: A modern bus featuring the same advertisement at the same position running on the same route as above

References:

Halbwachs, M. (Ed and translated by Coser L.A.) On Collective Memory. United States: The University of Chicago Press, 1992. Print. 40, 47.

By MAN Ho-Fai Ronald

Figure 1A,1B taken by the writer.
Image of the book cover copied from <http://www.orientalmodelbuses.co.uk/news_120704-1.jpg>