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Fallen
Angels is the dark side of Chungking Express.
Director Wong Kar Wai started from a short story, initially from the Chungking Express
script, to develop his own vision of the lack of communication in HK and the night life of
a bunch of dropouts. One of his motivations was to capture on film the last days of areas
and buildings bound to disappear in this international city. |
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Fraternal
twins
Fallen Angels has been perceived as a third act from Chungking Express
(CKE). Indeed, Wong Kar Wai said that it is actually the third sketch he wasn't able to
include to CKE. He then developed it as a script for another feature film.
 Fallen Angels is divided into two stories like CKE was.
But this time they are mixed and diluted together. A lot of elements are borrowed from CKE
as well. There are still the Midnight Express, air hostesses, a woman cleaning a man's
flat, two couples, or two fictive love triangles (the triangle Killer-Punkie-Agent that
bares no relation to Ho Chi Mo-Charlie-Johnny). There are also like mirror effects.
Takeshi Kaneshiro portrays his negative double, the mute Ho Chi Mo is a small time crook
whose jail id number is 223. In Chungking Express, he was a policeman called Ho Chi
Wu and whose id number was 223.
A new bunch of pop stars (Leon Lai Ming, Charlie Young, and
Michelle Reis) is cast for a darker and more violent extra chapter of CKE. It's not a
movie where people hang around anymore (see Chungking
Express introduction by director Christophe Gans)! Killer settles any arguments with
guns in memorable gunfights.
Some critics have assumed that the violent scenes were made this way in order to gain a
better public reception. But the box office figures aren't much better than Wong Kar Wai's
previous film (HK$ 7.68 millions for CKE and HK$ 7.48 millions for Fallen Angels).
 The second reasons for this blood bath is that Wong Kar Wai has promised
investors that he'd do an action film noir, a film genre which was popular enough at this
time in HK to assure a minimal success at the local box office. But once Wong Kar Wai gets
started in a project, nobody can foresee where he goes and what would be the result, not
even him.
Moreover, Wong Kar Wai talks about his favourite themes of
rejection, treason and communication problems:
"This movie is primarily a thriller. But actually its main theme is the lack of
communication, a constant in Hong-Kong" : said Wong to French journalists Julien
Carbon & Laurent Courtiaud on the set. ("Killer Nocturne", Cinephage
n°20, May-June 1995).
 For its darker tone and
more pessimistic stories, Fallen Angels is however to be considered as a story on
its own and not a CKE dependence. Even the style is different and has been pushed to the
extreme of what Wong Kar Wai has done so far. As if he wanted to take over his own cinema
and to magnify it to the maximum and to parody it. What was striking indeed, when Fallen
Angels hit the theatres, was its apparent lack of substance and Wong Kar Wai's
extravagant way of filming, always in wide angles and by using slow motion techniques
already experienced in CKE.
Evocative
geography
 As
for the locations, Wong Kar Wai chose inspiring places. He may even becomes immersed with
them. Hence the importance of the geographic factor in his cinema. The Tsim Sha Tsui area
came first in his mind as a fine location for Fallen Angels. But it has already
be used and re-used for As Tears Go By and CKE. More
location scouting brings him to Wanchai, a popular district where old and modern building
coexist. In 1995, such place was still intact and Wong Kar Wai wanted to save onto films
this area which would disappeared a few years later.
Frustrations
During the Fallen Angels production, stirs went through the HK film industry and did upset
Wong Kar Wai. He unvoluntarily transferred his own frustrations onto the movie.
 Moreover, the scene where the son (Takeshi
Kaneshiro) tries to communicate with his father, through a camcorder for instance, was
really hard to make for Wong Kar Wai. It reminded him painful memories.
"It was very difficult for me to make this sequence": he explained to
Jimmy Ngai (interview in Tokyo, August 1997, Park Hyatt Hotel, reported in the French book
"Wong Kar Wai", Ed. Dis Voir).
For the HK director, the father is a symbol of
comprehension, like in his following movie Happy Together.
Written
by Thomas in 1999, translated and updated in November 2002.
See
also Karen Mok exclusive interview
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CREDITS
HONGKONG/1995
 Script
& direction : Wong Kar-wai. Producer : Jeff Lau (Jet Tone). Executive
Producer : Jack Pang Yee-wah. Photography : Christopher
Doyle. Art Director : William Chang Suk-ping. Editing : William
Chang Suk-ping, Wong Ming-lam. Music : Frankie Chan, Roel A. Garcia. Starring
: Leon Lai Ming (Killer), Michelle Li Ka-yan (Agent), Takeshi Kaneshiro (Ho
Chi-mo), Charlie Young Choi-nei (Charlie), Karen Mok Joy Morris Man-wai (Punkie), Chan Fei
Hung, Chen Man Lei, Saito Toru, Kong To Hoi.
Running Time : 96 min. BO in HK : 1995, 30th out of 150
(1st: Rumble in the Bronx). Showed 28 days (21/09/95 to 18/10/95). Gross
: HK$ 7,476,025 (best local gross : HK$ 56,911,136).
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