Writing about Wong Kar-Wai’s work is something which is a pretty difficult task in itself because every frame seems like a beautiful painting and you don’t know from where to start and where to stop but while watching Chungking Express there was a constant sense of discomfort because I expected the story to tell me more about the characters. But if we observe carefully, a lot of shots have been composed in such a way that it makes the audience a part of the crowd or someone who is trying to peep into the lives of the characters. Though both the stories lack a certain kind of depth which we people are habitual of seeing in the movies the beauty here is the ‘Midnight Express'. Let’s dive deep into the Hong Kong of 1940s.

The opening sequence of the movie is personal favourite sequence from the movie. The way Wong Kar-Wai introduces us to Hong Kong and He Qiwu is not less than a moving canvas. The use of low frame rate and handheld shots gives the perfect sense of how it might feel if we run between those narrow and crowded lanes of Hong Kong and the song ‘Baroque’ acts as an icing on the cake. The power which this whole music piece holds is just amazing. If I listen to it sitting under scorching sunlight still it will like I’m roaming on the streets of Hong Kong at night.

Wai is known for using the frame-in-frame technique of composition and a lot of layers in his dialogues. Chungking Express also has a lot of examples of the same. One more thing which fascinates me about this movie is the use of Punjabi folk song. I mean just think of it once… INDIAN MUSIC AS A PART OF A CHINESE FILM THAT TOO IN THE YEAR 1994!!! At first, I literally paused the movie and checked whether it being played somewhere outside or what. Wai literally made sure to convey each and every emotion to the audience be it discomfort, stress, anxiousness or warmth. The mediums used to convey the emotions are also very different from one another just like those emotions. He used cigarette smoke as a metaphor for relief and food as variety of humans.

Despite the fact that both the stories of the movie do lack some depth but the way they are bound together doesn’t make the transition feel like a jump. The use of food as a metaphor and both the cops doing absurd things to comfort themselves and find comfort helps in maintaining the continuity. In the first half we see Qiwu calling his friends and old acquaintance through a PCO at midnight express or him eating 30 cans of pineapple in one go just to find some sort of clarity and comfort from the outside world. While in the latter half we see cop 663 talking to the objects kept in his house and he comparing himself to chef’s salad, binds both the stories together.

Hope you guys liked my first impression about Chungking Express. Please like and share this write-up with your fellow cinephiles. Till then love you for 10,000 years ;)