#hong-kong-cinema

#hong-kong-cinema

We're Nothing at All kicks off with a moment of rupture: on a seemingly ordinary Valentine's Day in Hong Kong, a double-decker bus suddenly bursts into flames. The deadly explosion triggers a police inquiry led by Lung (Patrick Tam), a skilled forensics specialist whose investigation reveals a maze of intersecting lives. From inspecting the charred bodies of the victims rendered in lurid closeup to retracing CCTV footage, Lung's gathering of clues is crosscut with flashbacks concerning those involved in the explosion.

For a director so celebrated for his masterful urban crime thrillers, in which contemplations on brotherhood and fate are inextricable from violent cop-versus-crook setpieces, it's a surprise to discover that Johnnie To wasn't all that interested in making action films to begin with. "It was [producer] Tsui Hark's fault," To said of The Big Heat (1988), the first of his many films in that genre. "He told me to do it."

In 2015, a scrappy group of Hong Kong film-makers imagined what their semi-autonomous city could look like under the increasing influence of the Chinese Communist party (CCP). Any resemblance to actual events or persons is entirely coincidental, reads the first scene in the opening credits. But decade on, many of the predictions made in Ten Years have, in some form, come to pass.

Tony Leung and Fennie Yuen are having a teary-eyed breakup; he's tangled with some gangsters and must flee Hong Kong for Vietnam, and even though they're engaged she doesn't think she can wait for him. As they talk, a massive riot rages behind them; Molotov cocktails fly all over the place as police and protesters attack each other. (It's the late 1960s in Hong Kong, a politically turbulent time.)