DAYS OF BEING WILD/AUSTIN FILM SOCIETY

Essential Cinema Series is back at Alamo S. Lamar with films from  Hong Kong.  Tonight we saw this film by Wong-Kar Wai, who is best known in the US for CHUNGKING EXPRESS.  The most striking element of this film is its beauty.  The shots, the actors, the sets, the terrain are all visually beautiful.  That being said I found myself lost at times regarding storyline but never cared much because it was a beautiful film to watch.  It reminded me of what Liz has told us about Hong Kong: the bold directness of people and the language they use when talking to one another, the old apartments, the streets, the bars, the alleys.  Of course Chale's 4 pages of notes saved the day for me and Abe in turns of story, history and analysis.  So this is a film about longing and a man's detachment from others due to early abandonment by his natural mother.  Once I got that,  much of the movie made sense.  It's like having an interpreter after the conversation.  Nevertheless, it worked for us.