Wong Kar Wai: Chungking Express

Chungking Express

Director/Writer – Kar Wai Wong

Cast Character

Brigitte Lin Woman in blonde wig

Tony Leung Chiew Wai Cop 663

Faye Wong Faye

Takeshi Kaneshiro He Zhiwu, Cop 223

Valerie Chow Air Hostess

Chen Jinguan Manager of Midnight Express

Chungking Express is not so much a movie about characters and plot, but rather moods and atmosphere. Wong Kar Wai is a master of subtlety navigating your senses through calm transitions of color and camera angles to give you a canvas of raw energy and emotion no other director could touch. His film is more of an impressionistic painting seduced by the music not unlike Godard’s Breathless. He brings you to his charming characters that are arrested in not their limitations but the immobilizing possibility of “what if.” No other film shows this dilemma more masterfully than In the Mood for Love and Chungking Express.

Chungking Express is about two lovelorn cops trying to forget past women without sabotaging new ones that come into their lives. Each cop meets a woman who is fascinating in their own way but preoccupied by their own worlds and whims. They seek the ethereal, the men seek the tangible and real. This creates a believable and engaging chemistry between the actors that is nothing short of hypnotic. All things come to an end and everything has an expiration date even a can of pineapple. Cop 223, He Zhiwu, buys a can of pineapple each month with an expiration of May 1. He waits for the time he will be rejoined with his lost love and repeats this agonizing torture.

Wong Kar Wai uses stop motion photography in his film to add a sense of danger and tension of the unknown and chaos of these people’s lives and their fractured hearts. The film starts with He Zhiwu, Cop 223, calling several women from his past hoping to get a date. It is both hilarious and embarrassing to feel his frustration. He is optimistic and unrelenting despite his failures. He is lovable but very sad. The colors in Wong Kar Wai’s films are so rich and saturated you feel as if they dictate the mood throughout. The same is true for his film Ashes of Time Redux which is equally stunning.

The film is constructed into two parts. One centering on He Zhiwu and his pursuit after the mysterious women in a blonde wig and the second on the distant romance of Cop 663 and Faye. The first two are distant and tense. The second pair is playful but timid.

What is interesting about both couples is that they seem to be the same people. The two men are given police numbers and the two women’s names and Faye and May. Both sets of people may be symbolically the same representing their past and present selves. Their past selves are more tense and frantic their present selves played by Tony Leung and Faye Wong are more accepting of their situation and are playful about it.

Cop 223 vows to buy 30 cans of pineapple for 30 months as due dates for May’s love. She loved pineapple hence the idea. One of the funniest scenes in the film is when after a failed drug smuggling the blonde mysterious woman kidnaps an Indian’s daughter threatening to kill her then takes her to ice cream while the conspirator waits. Chance meetings and interactions detail the film. Just like when Cop 223 bumps into the mysterious blonde, we see Faye exiting a shop buying a bear as the mysterious blonde waits outside.

It is interesting why Wong Kar Wai put a fish tank in the film. Maybe it symbolizes Cop 223 waiting for his ex girlfriend’s love like the fish waiting for the crumbs. The voiceover’s and musings are funny throughout.

Cop 223: We're all unlucky in love sometimes. When I am, I go jogging. The body loses water when you jog, so you have none left for tears.

His birthday is on May 1 and runs to rid himself of tears. It is no coincidence his birthday and love is May. It is little nuances like this that make the movie so enjoyable.

The way the foreigner puts a blonde wig on his worker’s head is like that of the mysterious blonde. Later we see the mysterious blonde kill him and drop the wig transferring herself to the new woman giving up on the potentially ambiguous relationship between the foreigner and her. Most likely he was involved with the drug smuggling where the Indians stole the dope. As he dies there is a funny shot of a can with an expiration date – all things must come to an end.

As the new chapter of the story begins we get Cop 223, played by Tony Leung, who order a chef salad. He and Faye give one of the best conversations in the movie:

Cop 663: You like noisy music?

Faye: The louder the better. Stops me from thinking.

Cop 663: You don't like to think? What do you like?

Faye: Never thought about it.

Cop 663 orders fish and chips and salad for his girlfriend symbolizing options and that he can change for her. But like the rejected food people know what they like and usually never change. When she does try to contact him she goes to Midnight Express to drop off a letter for him. Faye studies her intently to see Cop 663’s type. A hilarious scene follows of everyone in the whole restaurant taking turns reading the letter. She leaves the keys to his apartment in the letter, which will be Faye’s advantage throughout the film.

The fractured stop motion camera shots show Faye and Cop 663 stuck in time. He is lost in his thoughts; she is becoming lost in him. In his apartment he loses himself in his wallows. He talks to his possessions to ease his pain.

Cop 663: Since she left, everything in the flat is sad. Everything needed lulling to sleep.
[to a bar of soap]

Cop 663: You've lost a lot of weight, you know. You used to be so chubby. Have more confidence in yourself.
[to a threadbare wet dishcloth]

Cop663: You have to stop crying, you know. Where's your strength and absorbency? You're so shabby these days.

After telling him she has his letter, she asks for his address to send it to him. Faye yearns for him from afar but puts on her carefree self. What entails is a series of break-ins where she redecorates his apartment. Replacing old things with new symbolizing her want for him to move on emotionally from his ex girlfriend.

When he tries to call out his ex’s name to get out of the closet hoping in his mind she will return. Instead we get the mischievous Faye who actually is in the closet who hides throughout the apartment. When he leaves she calls out to him the same way his air hostess ex girlfriend did leading one to believe they are in fact cosmically the same person. She also plays with the toy airplane the same way his ex did. She goes on to clean his apartment and look at his bed with a magnifying glass to look for women’s hairs. As he tells her earlier that he drinks coffee because he cannot sleep, she breaks into his apartment again and puts sleeping pills in his water. She replaces the old white stuffed animal with a big orange one of Garfield. Again she is trying to subtly put herself in his life and in his subconscious. Before leaving she erases his outgoing answering machine message with his ex girlfriend’s voice.

When she is finally caught in his apartment she gets a cramp and cannot leave. Another funny similarity between Cop 663’s ex girlfriend and Faye are they loved the same song “California Dreamin.” All the similarities between these two women show they are in fact the same person.

Spoilers

When he does finally visit her at the restaurant to ask her out. She is scared after being caught in his apartment. He tells her to meet him at California Restaurant. She seems excited after he leaves but sabotages herself for fear of possible failure. When he goes and waits for her the owner of Midnight Express brings him a note saying she couldn’t make it. This is the same way he was let go by the Air Hostess. Faye becomes an Air Hostess leaves for one year to return later to Hong Kong. Faye tries to become his ex so he desires her more. When she returns the fire is still alive.