Lecture 6 - Chungking Express

dir. Wong Kar Wai, 1994

Time, Relationships and the City in Chungking Express

A. Narrative

  • 2-part story
  • Characters from different stories sometimes cross paths 
      E.g. Quick glimpse of 633 when Qiwu attempts to call May after making an arrest
  • Reflects nature of encounters in the city 
      "Everyday we brush past so many other people. People we may never meet or people who may become close friends." - Qiwu
    • There can be chance encounters that are more significant
  • Suggests other potential stories in the city
  • Hints at the city as a place of multiple possibilities

A1. Dramatis Personae

1st Story 2nd Story
Cop 233 / Qiwu Cop 633
May Air Stewardess
The Blonde Faye

A2. First Story: key points

The first story is about living in the random flux of the city and yet being able to transcend it

B. Relationships

Every other detail in the film relates to the relationships of the characters

These details:

  • Give information about the characters
  • Give insight about the characters
  • Invite us to interpret their relationships

Characterized by non-relationships that grow to become meaningful

B2. Relationships in the city

Random, chance encounters that are fleeting and empty of meaning, Brownian motion

  • “Proximity without Reciprocity” (Ackbar Abbas)
  • Physically close but emotionally distant, no meaningful reciprocal interaction

B3. Relationships embedded in time

  • Relationships may have an expiry date
  • Relational opportunities exist within time
    • E.g. to miss a moment or to be just in time
  • Different relationships may experience time differently

B3-i. Songs to reflect time and relationships

See Sound

B4. Relationships in the two stories

Chungking Express represents two different relationships that, in their own different ways, are successful in overcoming the random flux of the city and time to form significant connections

B4-i. Relationships in the First story

Focus on Qiwu and The Blonde’s relationship

  • Transcends the random flux of the city
  • Relationship centered on coincidences 
      E.g.

  - Accidental bumping into each other at the beginning
  - Coincidental meeting in the bar
  - Happy birthday greeting
Non-relationship in the First story
  • “Relationship” is virtually a “non-relationship”
    • Brief encounter in bar followed by stretch of empty time in the hotel room
    • Lack of proper conversation
    • Minimal reciprocity

Despite their relationship being a reflection of — indeed, a function of — the random flux of the city, they are able to generate between them a very deep connection, and a moment of lasting significance and transcendence.

Effect on Qiwu
  • Deep connection occurs when The Blonde’s message reaches Qiwu at the exact time of his birth
    • Qiwu is touched, experiences deep emotional moment of permanence he will remember forever
    • Random chance paradoxically results in deep significance and transcendence
  • Use of Freeze Frame to preserve special moment
    • Finding moment of significance in the flux of time
    • Associated with Canning motif
    • Metaphorical “canning” of time
    • Qiwu experiences an epiphany, is able to carry on 
      "Is there anything in the world that doesn’t expire?"

"If memories could be canned would they also have expiry dates? If so, I hope they last for centuries."

- Qiwu
Effect on The Blonde
  • Parallel with Qiwu: she is able to move on beyond her former relationship with the Caucasian man
    • She sheds her wig and false identity
    • True identity is barely glimpsed, or just missed
    • Freeze Frame also used to preserve this moment

B4-ii. Relationships in the Second story

Focus on Cop 633 and Faye’s relationship

  • Succeeds in overcoming the changes wrought by the passage of time
  • Encounters structured by predictable routine rather than coincidence
    • Contrasts when Faye breaks into 633’s apartment: a break in routine
Non-relationship in the Second story
  • Parallel to First story: relationship is fairly insubstantial
  • Characterized by daydreams, being out of touch with reality.
  • More imagined then real: California Dreaming
  1. 633
    • Living in the past
  2. Faye
    • Interest in 633 characterized by daydreaming and being out of touch with reality
    • When asked out by 633, suddenly confronted with reality
Overcoming the non-relationship

After Faye leaves, relationship is held together only by the thinnest of threads: the Boarding Pass

  • Imaginary pass
  • Scribbled on napkin
  • Barely legible future date
  • Puts the open-endedness of time between them

Relationship is still maintained one year later

  • Faye returns on the actual date of the boarding pass, 1 year later
  • 633 has kept the boarding pass

Change in identities

  • Reversal of roles (breaking of 180-degree rule)
  • Changes have possibly made them more compatible with one another
  • Even more ready to embark on a relationship after the changes of 1 year
  • But still an open-ended relationship in process
  1. 633
    • Behind the counter
    • Now likes California Dreaming
  2. Faye
    • Now in uniform, an air stewardess
  3. Midnight Express
    • Played major role in film, now also undergoing renovation

B5. Film-making and Relationships

See Food Motif

C. Time in Chungking Express

Time is an omnipresent entity but it is also abstract and metaphysical

  • Despite abstractness of time, Wong makes the viewer conscious of time 
      E.g. Crosscutting to the clock
  ...on 28 April, 1994 at 9pm, Qiwu bumps into The Blonde -> cut to clock

C1. Time as a flux

  • Relentless, high-speed, undifferentiated flux
  • Reflects experience in fast-paced city
  • Represented by fast motion

C2. Time as a moment

  • Idea of arresting or capturing a moment within the relentless flux of time
    • Very human desire
    • Arrest moment of permanence within the ephemeral, high-speed flux of time
  • Represented by freeze frame
  • Wong plays with different aspects of “The Moment”
    • Just in time
    • Events just missed by a moment 
      E.g. In The Mood For Love
    
"It is a restless moment.  She has kept her head lowered to give him a chance to come closer.  But he would not for lack of courage.  She turns and walks away." - Intertitle

C3. Passage of Time

Wong is also concerned with the passage of time, and the changes wrought by the passage of time

  • Applies to second story
  • Passing of time shown through changes in the mise-en-scene

C4. Time in the two stories

  • Different concepts of time in both stories
  • Reinforced by Narrative Parallels 
      Examples:
    
  - Dumped by 2 women
  - Qiwu dumps his pager; 633 throws away the letter from Faye
  - Receiving messages from various women

Shown through use of Parallel mise-en-scene

C4-i. Time in the First story

  • Fast
  • Precisely-defined
    • Qiwu’s precise time keeping 
      "57 hours later, I would fall in love with this woman" (he meets The Blonde 57 hours later)
    • Moment of transition from day to day: intercut scenes of clock
Hotel room scene

  • Qiwu trying to kill time by eating and watching old movies while the blonde sleeps
  • Sense of empty time, trying to fill it but can’t

C4-ii. Time in the Second story

  • Gradual
  • A flow and a continuum
    • No clear boundary that marks precise points in time
    • Open-ended flow
    • Relationship as an open-process without precise boundaries
Boarding pass scene

  • Rain: blurring and movement conveys sense of time
  • Spinning toaster: gradual, perpetual motion
Fish tank scene

  • Shot through fish tank
  • Dreamy feel to the scene
  • Fish tank, water and bubbles gives an alternative sense of dreamtime/dream space

D. The City: Urban Space in Chungking Express

In Chungking Express, space is not homogeneous and uniformly the same. Instead, it is:

  1. Heterogeneous
  2. Differentiated into various dimensions
  3. Made up of multiple, different elements
    • Cultural
    • Psychological

D1. Urban Space as a Heterogeneous Space

Differentiated into non-homogenous zones or spaces

Different physical zones

E.g. 633’s apartment

Different psychological zones

“The city is a ‘space of desire’… not only a physical space, but also a psychic one” (Ackbar Abbas)

  1. Faye buying the bear
    • Whimsical, positive mood
  2. The Blonde standing outside
    • Moody, contemplative

D2. Hong Kong as a Multicultural Space

See Mise-en-scene juxstaposition

Also:

  • Midnight Express — an American fast-food joint or an Asian adaptation?
  • American pop music or Indian adaptations of this cultural form?

D3. Use of Cinematography

See Selective focus, Different rates of motion

E. Film-making in Chungking Express

E1. Mise-en-scene

E1-i. Costume changes

In some scenes, we become aware that time has passed only through changes in the mise-en-scene, especially costumes.

E.g. After one year, 633 and Faye have changed

- Faye in stewardess uniform
- 633 no longer in uniform, wearing the shirt Faye gave him

E1-ii. Parallel Mise-en-sccene

  • Paralleled by rectangular block on the left
  • Pager vs Handwritten letter

E1-iii. Juxstaposition

  • Chungking Mansion complex as a multicultural space
  • The use of mise-en-scene to suggest how the space is made up of many different cultural elements
    • Chinese altar juxstaposed with television set
    • Highlights heterogeneous space, never homogenous

E2. Cinematography

E2-i. Freeze frame

Frozen shot of Qiwu

Frozen shot of The Blonde

We miss The Blonde’s identity by just a moment

E2-ii. Selective/Racking Focus

When the focus changes mid-shot

Wong uses selective focus to segment urban space into differentiated zones

E.g. Shot where 633 and Faye are face-to-face

633 shares what he likes (Chef's salad) -> superficiality of city life
  • Highlights basic condition of urban experience, proximity without reciprocity
  • Contrasts with deep focus in Citizen Kane to show relational gulf

E2-iii. Different Rates of Motion

Wong uses different rates of motion, including fast motion, to segment urban space into different psychological zones

E.g. Shot where 633 drinks coffee as he thinks about his ex-girlfriend

  • Segmented into different psychological zones
    1. 633’s melancholic brooding (past)
    2. Faye’s growing infatuation (future)
    3. Indifferent passing crowds (present)

E2-iv. Others

  • Stretch printing
  • Mobile framing (camera movement, handheld camera)

E3. Editing

  • Dynamic (e.g. drug smuggling scene)
  • Disjunctive and discontinuous
  • Crosscuts

    Editing that cuts between two or more actions occurring in different places, usually simultaneously

E4. Sound

Used to reflect time and relationships

  1. Things in Life - Dennis Brown 
     "It’s not everyday that things are gonna be the same way. There must be a change somehow."
  2. What a difference a day makes - Dinah Washington
  3. California Dreaming - The Mamas and the Papas
    • Represents Faye’s dreamy, out-of-touch-with-reality state of mind

E5. Motifs

Major motif of Food

E5-i. Chef’s salad

633 buys chefs salad for his air stewardess girlfriend
  • As 633 changes his food orders, we can discern how his girlfriend responds to his food choices
  • His girlfriend also comes to conclude that she can “try other men” like she tries new food
  • Helps us interpret his relationship with his girlfriend
Subtler points
  • 633 does not understand his girlfriend, thus she leaves
  • 633 is a creature of habit
    • Not suited to the stewardess
    • Stewardess ends up with a biker, a more adventurous type (?)

E5-ii. Black Coffee

After his girlfriend leaves him, 633 drinks black coffee everyday
  • Gives us insight into 633’s state of mind after the breakup

E5-iii. Canned pineapples

May likes eating pineapples
  • Qiwu’s obsession with canned pineapples: trying to preserve memories of girlfriend
  • Cans are ambivalent motif: suggest preservation and expiry