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Gary Bettinson, The Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-wai: Film Poetics and the Aesthetic of Disturbance, 2014. 176 pgs.
In the summer of 1994, I left a cinema in Tsim Sha Tsui. It was pretty late, but instead of heading home across the harbour, I walked to a tiny shop nearby that sold DVDs and cassette tapes. Iโd just seen Chungking Express (1994) and couldnโt get the music out of my mind. Hong Kong is a place of convenience and I figured if there were a soundtrack of Chungking Express, I could probably find it at this DVD shop.
It was past 10 oโclock and I wasnโt surprised to see the shop still open. I asked the manager about the soundtrack. He told me one did not exist yet as far as he knew. But he was familiar with the music in the film and pointed me to two albums, one that included Faye Wongโs Cantonese rendition of the Cranberries hit, โDreamsโ, as well as Michael Galassoโs electric violin track. I bought a cassette of the former and a DVD of the latter, listening to them on loop for weeks. Chungking Express was unlike any movie Iโd seen in Hong Kong at that point, yet I couldnโt pinpoint why. The music was definitely a reason, but there were also the themes of expiration dates and chance encounters that resonated in those years before the Handover.
Nearly twenty years after the film came out, Gary Bettinson wrote The Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-wai: Film Poetics and the Aesthetic of Disturbance, in which he devotes a whole chapter to the music of Chungking Express. He also shows how other critics have analysed Wongโs movies in top-down fashion and that itโs difficult to fully appreciate these films unless one looks at them as he does, from the bottom up. Thereโs so much to Bettinsonโs book, but several points stand out.
Music is a big deal for Wong Kar-wai, not just in his films, as heard in Chungking Express, but also on the set while the actors are filming. I think of the B-roll footage of Maggie Cheung and Tong Leung Chiu-wai dancing on the set of In the Mood for Love (2000). And after reading Bettinsonโs book, I learned this wasnโt a fluke. Wong believes that music sets the mood for the actors to get into character. Bettinson writes that this use of music during filming is not unique to Wong Kar-wai, but it is unusual in the Hong Kong film industry.
In the chapter on music in Chungking Express, Bettinson points out that four different pieces are used in the first half of the film during the Takeshi Kaneshiro and Brigitte Lin scenes, including Michael Galassoโs iconic electric violin music. In the second half of the film, which features Faye Wong and Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Wong carries over one of the pieces from the first halfโa jazz themeโand includes Faye Wongโs Cantonese rendition of โDreamsโ, along with the Mamas and the Papasโ โCalifornia Dreamingโ and Dinah Washingtonโs โWhat a Difference a Day Makesโ. Bettinson explains that each piece is intentional.
Like certain musicals, the songs in Chungking Express seem to be directly wired to the charactersโ subjective states. For all its apparent arbitrariness, incoherence, and superficiality, the music score of Chungking Expressโlike those of all Wongโs filmsโdisplays obedience to logic, unity, and aesthetic purpose.
Bettinson includes a number of different critics and academics who have written about Wongโs films, but perhaps the most notable is Ackbar Abbas, whose 1997 book Hong Kong: Culture and the Politics of Disappearance is one of the most perspicacious about the future of Hong Kong. Bettinson writes that Abbas appreciates Wongโs films for addressing the time just before the Handover when Hong Kong was at a unique historical crossroads. When Abbas wrote his book, Wongโs films included not just Chungking Express, but also As Tears Go By (1988), Days of Being Wild (1990), Ashes of Time (1994), and Fallen Angels (1995). Just before and after the Handover, Wong continued to direct films like In the Mood for Love and 2046 that addressed uncertain futures.ย
After Wongโs first film As Tears Go By came out, he stopped using a proper script and instead pieced together his stories in the editing room, choosing from the many versions of each scene. This editing style has become a trademark of Wongโs and itโs led some critics to dismiss the artistic quality of Wongโs films. Fallen Angels is one such film, according to Bettinson, that has been not received the appreciation it deserves. Unlike Chungking Express, the stories in Fallen Angels are not separated into two parts, but are rather intertwined. Critics have viewed Fallen Angels more as a giant music video (with another spectacular soundtrack) than a film with a substantive plot. But Bettinson points out the many ways in which the movie is indeed plot-driven.
A film like In the Mood for Love has received critical acclaim, mainly for the cinematography, Maggie Cheungโs cheongsams, and the social restrictions Cheungโs and Leungโs characters face when they start having feelings for one another. Bettinson writes that Wong modelled In the Mood for Love after Hitchcock. Wong viewed this film as a thriller; Cheung and Leung figured out their spouses were having an affair and they met regularly to come up with a plan of action. The film was mainly set inside an apartment, which brings to mind Hitchcockโs Rear Window (1954). In that film, Jimmy Stewartโs character is confined to his apartment because heโs in a cast and wheelchair, while in In the Mood for Love, Cheungโs and Leungโs characters hide in a room so their landlord wonโt learn that they are meeting together alone while they are married to other people.
Bettinsonโs book came out in 2014, one year after Wongโs The Grandmaster (2013) came out. At that time, Bettinsonโno more than anyone elseโcould not have predicted what would happen in Hong Kong in the years to come. While most Hong Kong directors had started working with mainland production crews around the time The Grandmaster was made (it, too, was a mainland production), Wong was still more inspired by French and other European filmmakers. For almost four years, the Covid-19 pandemic has put a long pause on the Hong Kong film industry. So while it might have seemed that Bettinsonโs book would be outdated nine years after it came out, it most certainly is not. As of this writing, Wong Kar-wai has not directed another movie since The Grandmaster. Consquently, Bettinsonโs book is just as current in 2023 as it was when it was published in 2014.
How to cite: Blumberg-Kason, Susan. โGetting to the Heart of Wong Kar-wai: Gary Bettinson’s The Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-wai.” Cha: An Asian Literary Journal, 24 Jul. 2023, chajournal.blog/2023/07/23/wong-kar-wai.
Susan Blumberg-Kason is the author of Good Chinese Wife: A Love Affair With China Gone Wrong. Her writing has also appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Booksโ China Blog, Asian Jewish Life, and several Hong Kong anthologies. She received an MPhil in Government and Public Administration from the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Blumberg-Kason now lives in Chicago and spends her free time volunteering with senior citizens in Chinatown. (Photo credit: Annette Patko) [Susan Blumberg-Kason and ChaJournal.]