Shanghai Blues

Shanghai Blues

Dir: Tsui Hark
Scr: John Chan Koon-chung, Raymond To
Prod Co: Film Workshop
Cast: Kenny Bee, Sylvia Chang, Sally Yeh, Woo Fung
1984 Colour DCP Cantonese Chi & Eng subtitles 103min

This is the film with which that New Wave maverick Tsui Hark jumpstarted a mid-1980s nostalgia craze. The story, about a couple who falls in love in the dark when Shanghai was blacked out during wartime air raids, is a comedy colored by melancholy and livened up by slapstick gags and farcical musical numbers. Director Tsui animates Shanghai of the 1930s and '40s with equal measures of nostalgia for old China and projection of Hong Kong's modernity, with references to such Shanghai classics as Crossroads and Street Angel. He also executes the nostalgia with a mix of romantic naivete, ironic sarcasm and cartoonish sophistication, projecting late-century bittersweet sentiments onto memories of mid-century difficulties.

日期 日期 Date 時間 时间 Time 地點 地点 Venue
2/2/2020 (Sun) # [Cancelled] 2:00pm Cinema, Hong Kong Film Archive