Kar Wai Wong Books

"The Ashes of Time" has evolved into a kind of cult movie in Hong Kong. While being adapted from an exisitng (and much filmed) story, the end product has the unique directorial mark of Wong Kar Wai stamped all over it.

This interesting and exceptionally well-written books examines the many fascinating aspects of the film, and should to of much value to lovers of movies.

I will give it 5 stars.

A great book. The photography is well selected. An insightful analysis. A little excessive in intelltualizing the ideas of Wong Kar-Wai's art.

I only wish it would emphasize more on how seductive and sensual his works are, and how skillfully he uses the props and sounds(cigarettes , blood-red bedcover, the Falls, wallpapers etc.), the lighting (mastered by Christopher Doyle), colours (like stained glasses), and the make-up (thick, dark eye-brows rendering a Latin flavour) to exude nostalgia, time, sensuality, sorrow, and romanticism. It's very Hong-Kongish. Wong's art is all about feelings.

(P.S. Try to get Christopher Doyle's Photo Journal on Happy Together. Magnificient photography from the footages. Well written in both English and Chinese).

As a big Wong Kar-Wai fan, I had to have the book. But most of the "critical analysis" goes way too far in trying to "understand" his films. He must get a great laugh when he reads about these author's claims of knowing the deeper meaning he was going for. Check out the pictures and forget about the articles.

This is the only book out on one of the most inspirational director around now. Wong Kar-wai inspired me to become a scriptwritter, and a film director. His films are so filled with real energy and feeling that he shows the asian mind on film better than anyone ever has. This book talks about his achievements, and also explains his films. From his first film, As Teas Go By, to his last film, Happy Together, the writters of this book explain the fundamentals of his writtings and goes further by explaining what every film tried to express. If there was ever an aspect in his movie that you never understood, then it is explained in this book. Although costly, the book is worth all the money because of the rich photographhic pictures included. This is a must have for all film enthusiastics, and any Wong Kar-wai fanatic like myself.

Every fan of the Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar Wei should immediatly check out this book. It contains a critical review of all of his films to date, going into depth on the possible meanings and significant aspects of each film. As a graduate of a Film Production program, it can be a bit heady, but still very interesting. The best part is at the end when two interviews with the famed director are combined. It is a real treat to her Wong Kar Wei talk about his own work! The photography, mostly by Christopher Doyle, gives a great glimpse into the world of Wong's films.

Honestly written. Unpretentious yet intelligent. Brunette does not reach for dazzling overstatements, but instead keeps his claims conservative and convincing. Of particular interest is his discussion of Wong's recycling of and departure from genre conventions.

Wong Kar-wai is one of the most interesting and innovative directors since the French New Wave, and this collection of nearly all of his pre-"In The Mood For Love" films is well worth owning. These are all movies whose artistic and philosophic dimensions never seem to exhaust themselves...a rare thing in contemporary cinema...and a great reason to own this set...

This book is a good read if you would like to know how Wong departs from genre conventions and/or specific but general interpretations of his films by the author. However, you will slowly realize that most of the information presented in this book is re-iterated in other essays about Wong. Therefore, I would have been more satisfied with this purchase if it were to have presented more and 'newer' information, such as theories and references to other cinematic figures and scenes.

Thought provoking essays on most of his films up to this point

Wong Kar-wai's "Happy Together", which won some international films awards, is one of the best Hong Kong movies of recent years.

Jeremy Tambling here probes the film in depth an provides lots of interesting insights on the film, as well as the many possible interpretations of the plot as well as the relationship between the protagonists. In fact, Tambling goes deeper to explore the political and social undertones that the movie represents. It is therefore essential reader both for film buffs as well as those who're interested in social sciences. I enjoyed reading it very much!

Finally, there is a book - not a chapter or paragraph - solely one of the Wong Kar Wai's movie. This time, HKU Press has done a fascinating job in publishing an in-depth studies on Wong's Ashes of Time and Happy Together. Jeremy Tambling is an expert in gender studies. In the book, he analyzes the film by the theories of allgeory (in chapter 1). Besides, he also reads the film in relation to homosexuality (as expected), Hong Kong's postcolonial situation, melancholy, the American road movie genre, the meaning and tradition of tango and he also suggests the impact of choosing Buenos Aires as the setting of the movie. Tambling has included funny, impressive and amazing perspectives of reading a movie, which brought Wong Kar Wai a best director award in Berlin Film Festival.

You may not buy Tambling theories in reading the movie as you may say a too complicated way. However, what he has done in the book definitely enriches the genre of Hong Kong Cinema criticism.

Finally, there is a book - not a chapter or paragraph - solely one of the Wong Kar Wai's movie. This time, HKU Press has done a fascinating job in publishing an in-depth study on Wong's Ashes of Time and Happy Together. Jeremy Tambling is an expert in gender studies. In the book, he analyzes the film by using theories of allgeory. Besides, he also reads the film in relation to homosexuality (as expected), Hong Kong's postcolonial situation, melancholy, the American road movie genre, the meaning and tradition of tango and he also suggests the impact of choosing Buenos Aires as the setting of the movie. Tambling has included interesting and impressive perspectives of reading a movie, which brought Wong Kar Wai a best director award in Berlin Film Festival.

You may not buy Tambling's arguments on reading the movie as you may say the author has over-interpreted it. However, what he has done in the book definitely enriches the genre of Hong Kong Cinema criticism.

This film has a lot of fast cars, criminals, and of course Mr. Chan, himself. There are some slow parts but this is still a great movie.

Thunderbolt is made in 1994, not 1995, I'm not chinese, but I saw the movie when I was 4 years. Thi s movie is all about action and drama. Chinese people like to make movie that have action and drama, they pretty much don't care about how the viewer understand the story, but understand the action, not the words. This movie is rent if you can find them at blockbuster, but why not spent $17.99 without looking for it. If you saw the Fast and Furious, this movie made before the Fast and Furious, and they use no special effect, and the best racing movie I've ever see. But forget about the racing, is the action is very Hollywood like, not joking, it the truth. Shooting and moving house is had very good action-effect realistic movie. The moving house is when Jackie Chan's in a Truck storage and sleep in it. The Bad guy pick his room up and crush to his Father and sister roomes. But most chinese movie had few or no good guy die in the movie, because if they did have alot of good guy die in the movie,than is not chinese movie and end up like making very sucky Hollywood movie that were made by the chinese. This movie is worth your time. See it! Buy or rent's your choice. It's all about racing, fighting, shooting, Japanese gambleming, and coolest.

Here be SPOILERS.

Made in 1995, THUNDERBOLT is the redheaded stepchild of Jackie Chan's film oeuvre; it's not your typical happy-go-lucky Jackie Chan flick. This film spews out a vigorous blend of frenetic car chases, pulse-pounding fight sequences, and, oddly enough, a dramatic acting turn by Jackie Chan. THUNDERBOLT tells the story of former race car champion Chan Foh To (Jackie Chan) who ends up on a gangster's crap list. It all starts when Foh, now an auto repair mechanic, accompanies his father, who, every now and then, is called upon by the police to identify specially modified cars which are then towed away on suspicion of illegal street drag racing. On one such occasion, Foh witnesses a speed racer who evades capture and fatally runs down a policeman. Later, Foh engages the same speedster in a hazardous street race and manages to lead him straight to the police, where he is summarily apprehended.

Things get even more serious when it's discovered that the speed freak is none other than Warner "Cougar" Krugman, an influential criminal wanted by Interpol. A bribery attempt by Cougar's henchmen fails to dissuade Foh from coming forward as a witness against Cougar. However, Cougar means to get his vengeance on against Foh and, furthermore, aims to get another shot at racing him. With those intentions in mind, he kidnaps Foh's two younger sisters. But Cougar underestimates the resiliency and determination, not to mention the driving skills and arse-whoopin' talent, of Chan Foh To...

Don't mistake THUNDERBOLT for one of Jackie's patented, lighthearted comedy-action romps. He's pretty serious here as he and the dramatic storyline dismiss all tendencies to go for the giggles. As apropos to Jackie Chan's films, the action sequences are again exhilarating to watch. I understand that some if not most of the stunts are, this time, performed by a double as Jackie had incurred an ankle injury in his prior feature RUMBLE IN THE BRONX and wasn't able to fully step up to the plate. But the stunts mostly don't suffer for it as we get to murmur appreciatively at the high standard sequences in Foh's garage and in the pachinko parlor (for pachinko, think pinball machines). One complaint is that, at times, the action director resorted to that disjointed, blurry, slo-mo stuff - I'm not impressed. Meanwhile, the film's somber tone really sinks in during Cougar's traumatic razing of Foh's residence and place of business. I had never seen Jackie so beat up and so vulnerable as in that sequence and also in the ensuing emotionally wracked scenes at the hospital. Jackie has never invested so much emoting than when he was grieving over his cardiac-arrested father or, subsequently, when he is questioned by intrepid Interpol agent Steve Cannon (Michael Wong, who, by the way, doesn't really look Caucasian).

Another move off the beaten path for Chan (or, at least, in my viewing experience of his flicks) is the minutiae in which he involves the viewer regarding race car driving. This movie contains a decided element of THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS, which THUNDERBOLT does precede. There are two races showcased here: a fairly exciting one early on which takes place in the streets of Hong Kong, the other an extended (it's friggin' 13 minutes long!) official race car competition on a Japanese speedway. Now, NASCAR fans might warm to the auto chases, but, to me, it only meant that a bit of human kinetic vitality was drained away to make room for the vroom-vroom! energy of the film and, now, there's even less time for further fight scenes.

As mentioned, Jackie's acting is above par this time, and I must say the audience's viewing experience will be enchanced by screening the film in sub-title format, rather than in dub. Jackie, like most actors, instantaneously improves as an actor when seen and heard in his native language. Anita Yuen is the half-hearted romantic interest/obligatory female fluff here and plays the annoying, go-getter reporter Amy Yip, who kinda redeems herself at the end. Thorsten Nickel portrays the villain Cougar the same way a cabbage would portray the villain Cougar, and he unwittingly provides most of the rare humor that's in the film. Nickel's pretty dang abysmal.

I'm giving THUNDERBOLT three stars. I feel the only things that hold it up are Jackie's unusual foray into serious drama (which might draw in the curious) and the always reliable chop-socky beatdowns. The plot is blah, the pace of the film is jarring at times, and there aren't enough good acting performances. It's also the fact that I found out Jackie didn't do all his stunts this time out. And, maybe, in the end, I really was too disconcerted by the lack of Jackie's brand of over-the-top comedy. Yeah, maybe that's it.

I have to agree with others that this is the definitive version of Thunderbolt. I first saw it years ago on TNT edited down to 90 minutes and dubbed. So I bought the Taiwan version years ago. The setback of that one (like most Asian DVDs of old films) was that everyone was dubbed over in Mandarin by different actors, the picture looks old, and the subtitles are so-so. With the New Line DVD, you get the entire film, original dialogue, and better subtitling. On top of that, the picture is clean. The only thing that has been replaced are the opening and closing credits (and that is understanable since the original credits are in Chinese).

It's a top notch DVD.

Jackie Chan is a tow truck driver and lives with his dad and sisters at their junkyard. He also enjoys race car driving and helps the police capture a killer who also likes to race cars. When Jackie outdrives the killer and helps the police catch him, the killer tells Jackie that he wants a real race. In a couple of very illogical scenes the killer gets broken out of prison and kidnaps Jackie's sister. Jackie has to race him to get his sister back. The story is really bad and the only good thing about the movie is the action, but even that has its flaws.

There is one very long action sequence where Jackie tries to rescue his sister. Jackie fights about 20 people including Ken Lo who gets to show off his amazing kicking skills. Jackie is doubled a lot, but it is the wirework and the way they shoot the scene that bugged me. They use a weird frame rate and this action scene is way too stylized for my tastes. On the positive side, there is some great stuntwork in this scene and a fantastic finsish.

There is a lot of car racing and the car stunts are done very well. Most Jackie Chan movies have a big final fight at the end, but this one ends with a mildly exciting car race. But this race would have been a lot more exciting if it was better directed and if the story had more thought put into it. This was a hard movie to sit through.

2.5/5

Picture quality on the New Line DVD is perfect. Both the English and Cantonese tracks sound perfect. SUbtitles are well written.

This film has a lot of fast cars, criminals, and of course Mr. Chan, himself. There are some slow parts but this is still a great movie.

Thunderbolt is made in 1994, not 1995, I'm not chinese, but I saw the movie when I was 4 years. Thi s movie is all about action and drama. Chinese people like to make movie that have action and drama, they pretty much don't care about how the viewer understand the story, but understand the action, not the words. This movie is rent if you can find them at blockbuster, but why not spent $17.99 without looking for it. If you saw the Fast and Furious, this movie made before the Fast and Furious, and they use no special effect, and the best racing movie I've ever see. But forget about the racing, is the action is very Hollywood like, not joking, it the truth. Shooting and moving house is had very good action-effect realistic movie. The moving house is when Jackie Chan's in a Truck storage and sleep in it. The Bad guy pick his room up and crush to his Father and sister roomes. But most chinese movie had few or no good guy die in the movie, because if they did have alot of good guy die in the movie,than is not chinese movie and end up like making very sucky Hollywood movie that were made by the chinese. This movie is worth your time. See it! Buy or rent's your choice. It's all about racing, fighting, shooting, Japanese gambleming, and coolest.

Here be SPOILERS.

Made in 1995, THUNDERBOLT is the redheaded stepchild of Jackie Chan's film oeuvre; it's not your typical happy-go-lucky Jackie Chan flick. This film spews out a vigorous blend of frenetic car chases, pulse-pounding fight sequences, and, oddly enough, a dramatic acting turn by Jackie Chan. THUNDERBOLT tells the story of former race car champion Chan Foh To (Jackie Chan) who ends up on a gangster's crap list. It all starts when Foh, now an auto repair mechanic, accompanies his father, who, every now and then, is called upon by the police to identify specially modified cars which are then towed away on suspicion of illegal street drag racing. On one such occasion, Foh witnesses a speed racer who evades capture and fatally runs down a policeman. Later, Foh engages the same speedster in a hazardous street race and manages to lead him straight to the police, where he is summarily apprehended.

Things get even more serious when it's discovered that the speed freak is none other than Warner "Cougar" Krugman, an influential criminal wanted by Interpol. A bribery attempt by Cougar's henchmen fails to dissuade Foh from coming forward as a witness against Cougar. However, Cougar means to get his vengeance on against Foh and, furthermore, aims to get another shot at racing him. With those intentions in mind, he kidnaps Foh's two younger sisters. But Cougar underestimates the resiliency and determination, not to mention the driving skills and arse-whoopin' talent, of Chan Foh To...

Don't mistake THUNDERBOLT for one of Jackie's patented, lighthearted comedy-action romps. He's pretty serious here as he and the dramatic storyline dismiss all tendencies to go for the giggles. As apropos to Jackie Chan's films, the action sequences are again exhilarating to watch. I understand that some if not most of the stunts are, this time, performed by a double as Jackie had incurred an ankle injury in his prior feature RUMBLE IN THE BRONX and wasn't able to fully step up to the plate. But the stunts mostly don't suffer for it as we get to murmur appreciatively at the high standard sequences in Foh's garage and in the pachinko parlor (for pachinko, think pinball machines). One complaint is that, at times, the action director resorted to that disjointed, blurry, slo-mo stuff - I'm not impressed. Meanwhile, the film's somber tone really sinks in during Cougar's traumatic razing of Foh's residence and place of business. I had never seen Jackie so beat up and so vulnerable as in that sequence and also in the ensuing emotionally wracked scenes at the hospital. Jackie has never invested so much emoting than when he was grieving over his cardiac-arrested father or, subsequently, when he is questioned by intrepid Interpol agent Steve Cannon (Michael Wong, who, by the way, doesn't really look Caucasian).

Another move off the beaten path for Chan (or, at least, in my viewing experience of his flicks) is the minutiae in which he involves the viewer regarding race car driving. This movie contains a decided element of THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS, which THUNDERBOLT does precede. There are two races showcased here: a fairly exciting one early on which takes place in the streets of Hong Kong, the other an extended (it's friggin' 13 minutes long!) official race car competition on a Japanese speedway. Now, NASCAR fans might warm to the auto chases, but, to me, it only meant that a bit of human kinetic vitality was drained away to make room for the vroom-vroom! energy of the film and, now, there's even less time for further fight scenes.

As mentioned, Jackie's acting is above par this time, and I must say the audience's viewing experience will be enchanced by screening the film in sub-title format, rather than in dub. Jackie, like most actors, instantaneously improves as an actor when seen and heard in his native language. Anita Yuen is the half-hearted romantic interest/obligatory female fluff here and plays the annoying, go-getter reporter Amy Yip, who kinda redeems herself at the end. Thorsten Nickel portrays the villain Cougar the same way a cabbage would portray the villain Cougar, and he unwittingly provides most of the rare humor that's in the film. Nickel's pretty dang abysmal.

I'm giving THUNDERBOLT three stars. I feel the only things that hold it up are Jackie's unusual foray into serious drama (which might draw in the curious) and the always reliable chop-socky beatdowns. The plot is blah, the pace of the film is jarring at times, and there aren't enough good acting performances. It's also the fact that I found out Jackie didn't do all his stunts this time out. And, maybe, in the end, I really was too disconcerted by the lack of Jackie's brand of over-the-top comedy. Yeah, maybe that's it.

I have to agree with others that this is the definitive version of Thunderbolt. I first saw it years ago on TNT edited down to 90 minutes and dubbed. So I bought the Taiwan version years ago. The setback of that one (like most Asian DVDs of old films) was that everyone was dubbed over in Mandarin by different actors, the picture looks old, and the subtitles are so-so. With the New Line DVD, you get the entire film, original dialogue, and better subtitling. On top of that, the picture is clean. The only thing that has been replaced are the opening and closing credits (and that is understanable since the original credits are in Chinese).

It's a top notch DVD.

Jackie Chan is a tow truck driver and lives with his dad and sisters at their junkyard. He also enjoys race car driving and helps the police capture a killer who also likes to race cars. When Jackie outdrives the killer and helps the police catch him, the killer tells Jackie that he wants a real race. In a couple of very illogical scenes the killer gets broken out of prison and kidnaps Jackie's sister. Jackie has to race him to get his sister back. The story is really bad and the only good thing about the movie is the action, but even that has its flaws.

There is one very long action sequence where Jackie tries to rescue his sister. Jackie fights about 20 people including Ken Lo who gets to show off his amazing kicking skills. Jackie is doubled a lot, but it is the wirework and the way they shoot the scene that bugged me. They use a weird frame rate and this action scene is way too stylized for my tastes. On the positive side, there is some great stuntwork in this scene and a fantastic finsish.

There is a lot of car racing and the car stunts are done very well. Most Jackie Chan movies have a big final fight at the end, but this one ends with a mildly exciting car race. But this race would have been a lot more exciting if it was better directed and if the story had more thought put into it. This was a hard movie to sit through.

2.5/5

Picture quality on the New Line DVD is perfect. Both the English and Cantonese tracks sound perfect. SUbtitles are well written.

The one thing one can say about Stephen Teo is that he has figured out Wong Kar-wai in part because he understands the enigmatic director on so many levels. Part of watching movies is trying to figure them out on one level and then to try to catch other levels or layers on a second viewing. Kudos to Stephen Teo - for making me aware of the multi-layered as well as multi-dimensional quality of Wong Kar-wai's work.

On one level, Teo reads Wong Kar-wai as intensely local and at the same time are intimately global. Moreover, Teo brings to presence the iconoclastic quality of Wong Kar-wai's experiments. Lastly, Teo deftly navigates the reader to the multitude of symbols relating to Wong Kar-wai's play on time, space, and memory.

Teo's Wong Kar-wai (published in the World Directors series) situates Wong's work primarily in a Hong Kong cultural milieu as well as explores Wong Kar-wai's historical context. Teo also is really good at framing Wong Kar wai's work around the literary inspirations and sources. However, Teo does not pull any punches in that most of the literary inspirations are pushed aside and little of the book or movie that are supposed to inspire the movies show up differently in the new creation.

One could well imagine that Teo reads Wong Kar-wai's movies as text. Teo's Wong Kar-wai is easy to read but not simplistic at all. He does what few are able to do - sustain an argument questioning Wong's oeuvre. It is an understatement to say that his book is extraordinary because of its range and profundity. Teo brings together an all-inclusive sweep of home grown Chinese interpretation to the movies with a not equally matched familiarity with the Hong Kong film industry. Teo convinces me of both the local significance as well as the international impact of Wong Kar-wai's movies - which ironically fail at the local Hong Kong box office. He locates Wong's movies vis-à-vis a highly complex local historical background - which I would never have understood unless I had read this book. At the same time, Teo grounds each film against the literary readings that supposedly guide their creation. This is very difficult to do while still maintaining some sense of cohesion. Teo brings in an incredible understanding of authors like Puig, Cortázar, Murakami, Dazai, Jin Yong and Liu Li-chang while still maintaining a real sense of Wong Kar-wai's musings on time, space, and memory.

It would not be fair to ignore Teo's ability to understand genre. Teo situates "As Tears Go By" as a gangster movie. "Days of Being Wild" - I cannot help but agree - is an 'Ah Fei' (discontented punk) movie-cum-romance. "Chungking Express" argues Teo is a light romance with touches of noir intrigue. "Ashes of Time" is predictably a wuxia movie - but not really one as it breaks rules while adhering to some very key ones. "Fallen Angels" according to Teo takes over from where "Chungking Express" leaves of. "Happy Together" according to Teo is predictably gay road movie. "In the Mood for Love" is what Teo calls a "wenyi film" evoking deep emotions about love but more importantly repressed desire.

One other thing that I am grateful to Teo for is framing Wong's three great "nostalgia" movies: "Days of Being Wild," "In the Mood for Love," and "2046" which are a 1960s trilogy. The films are linked via Tony Leung Chiu-wai enigmatic character from "Days of Being Wild's" mysterious epilogue and working its way to the other two. I loved this book. It brought a new level of understanding as well as a new level of appreciation to my viewing of Wong Kar-wai in particular and movies in general.

While Wong's movies move from the narcissism of Yuddy (in Days of Being Wild) and Chow Mo-wan (In the Mood For Love and 2046), the doubling of cops in "Chungking Express," Murong Yin and Murong Yang in "Ashes of Time," the mise-en-abîme of role playing within role playing between Chow Mo-wan and Su Li-zhen Chan in "In the Mood for Love" on the surface it would lead one to believe that it was all about identity. Just like the works of Milan Kundera - which are also about identity - but they are also more than that. To reduce Wong Kar-wai's work to identity would be like saying that Tiger Wood's gold game is all about the putting. Yes, Wong Kar-wai explores the crises of misidentification as well as the pathologies of self and others that epitomize an identity without established borders. However, without Teo - we would not be able to understand that it is about that and also more.

Miguel Llora

This book is an obfuscation rather than an elucidation of Wong's films. If you use the word "teleological" frequently and think the following fragment from one sentence makes sense--"...because of the messages encoded in the ambivalence of the film's 'linguistic structure' - ambivalence that arises from the 'insertion of history (society) into a text and of this text into history' as Kristeva defines it..."--, then you will probably love this book.

Having recently discovered the films of Wong Kar-wai, I wanted a book that would tell me about him, his ways of working, and that would discuss his films in a way that would be meaningful to a reasonably well-education person who does not and did not work in academia. Because this book does have some of this information buried within it, I can't trash it completely. But, I will call it pretentious, pseudo-intellectual B.S. And, I will certainly avoid any more writings by Mr Teo.

Amazon's physical description of the paperback is filled with errors. The book is 191 pages rather than 212 pages. The publisher is the British Film Institute and not the University of California Press. The listed dimensions are wrong. Also, the subtitle listed by Amazon does not appear on the book's cover or title page.

If you must have a book on Wong Kar-wai, then go ahead and buy this. You will get a small amount of useful information and a filmography. The price is inexpensive enough to justify the purchase.

Thought provoking essays on most of his films up to this point

The problem for me with Teo's references to telos or Julia Kristeva, to follow-up on the comments of a previous reviewer, is that they seem symptomatic of the author's inability to truly get a handle on Wong's films. Teo applies ideas/theories to Wong's works like a graduate student dutifully displaying his wares. His work seems generally intelligent (as a student he'd get an A- for the assignment), but he provides very little insight into Wong's aesthetic. It came as little surprise, toward the end of the book, when the author admitted his indifference to In the Mood for Love. One thing is for sure: no one is going to write a good monograph on Wong Kar-Wai who thinks that In the Mood for Love is cold and uninvolving.