No, not a further post on the Wanchai murders. Last night I went to see Ang Lee’s latest film, Lust, Caution.

I wasn’t too sure about going to see it in a HK movie theater because I was afraid that too much of the audience would be made up of idiots merely lured into buying a ticket because of the Cat III rating and the sex scenes. Most HKers seem pre-occupied with the color of Wei Tang’s nipples (apparently they are not pink enough, leading people to believe she must be a slut) and that you can see Tony Leung’s balls in one shot.

It did seem as if the only people in the theater who were talking during the movie were the two women sitting behind me, Aunt Blabby and her cousin, who were engaged in a non-stop yak-fest. About an hour in, I couldn’t take it any more, turned around and said, “what the hell is wrong with you?” And they did then seem to keep their conversation below 100 decibels for the rest of the film.

As for the movie itself, it is as you probably know more than 2-1/2 hours long and it really feels like it, too. I think there’s a good 97 minute movie hiding inside just waiting to get out. Rodrigo Prieto’s cinematography is first rate throughout and high marks for Lai Pan’s flawless production design. The sex scenes were, I feel, necessary to the development of the plot, an important way to show how the relationship between Mr. Lee and Ms. Wong changed over time.

One thing that seriously distracted me in the movie though. Granted I’m no expert on Chinese history. My view of Shanghai during WWII was shaped by the film Empire of the Sun. Lust, Caution depicts a very different Shanghai during the Japanese occupation. A Shanghai in which lush shops and cafes are still open and thriving along Nanjing Road. A jewelry store owned and staffed by men from the middle east. Westerners can frequently be seen walking down the main streets. Our heroine stops into a western style cafe and the waiter is a European man. And at several times during the film, she goes to a movie theater showing American films (although one screening is interrupted to show a Japanese propaganda film). This stuff just took me out of the movie. I thought that all of the westerners in Shanghai were either killed or tossed out, except for Batman.

Another thing that struck me was that here we had a movie with a plot that made sense. It was well thought out and the characters’ motivations were clear and logical. We rarely get that in HK movies any more, where people act in stupidly unpredictable ways in order to advance the plot in illogical ways. Which had me thinking … where is modern Hong Kong literature, even at the pulp fiction level? Is there really no one writing novels or short stories locally? Around the world, novels, short stories, magazine articles are the primary source material for films. That doesn’t seem to be the case here. Are these things not being written? And if they are being written, why are they not optioned for films – $$$?

Does this point to yet another HK failure – the failure to provide students with education in arts and culture equivalent to the basic math and language training? In Hong Kong, art (including theatre, literature and music) is seen as something to invest in, not as a career and not as something to appreciate for its own sake. Why is Beijing a global art center but Hong Kong isn’t? (It ain’t just HK. Shanghai and Shenzhen are also both pretty much cultural wastelands.)
Take a ride on the MTR or KCR here sometime. See for yourself what percentage of people are reading books (not including textbooks or manga).

Oh well, it’s Monday.