CHINESE BOX
Reviewed by Harvey Karten, Ph.D. Trimark Pictures Director: Wayne Wang Writer: Jean-Claude Carriere, Larry Gross Cast:Jeremy Irons, Gong Li, Maggie Cheung, Ruben Blades
Whatever the virtues of lack of same in Wayne Wang's movie, "Chinese Box," the film is valuable because like Haskell Wexler's "Medium Cool," the drama is told against a background of a turning point in history. Wexler's film, which featured the newly-discovered Robert Foster, portrays a TV cameraman who is detached although surrounded by events demanding his involvement, and uses real footage of his actors at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Wang's current movie is a tale of an increasingly resigned British journalist-photographer whose final months in Hong Kong are played out against a background of the island's imminent takeover by the government of Mainland China during the first half of 1997.
Wang is for the most part as laid-back in his direction of this seemingly improvised piece as he was at the helm of his more accessible (to Americans) "Smoke" and "Blue in the Face," both humorous character studies of typical denizens of Brooklyn and parts of Manhattan. (Educated in British and American schools, the director's fondness for things American is no secret: he is, in fact, named after John Wayne.) The freewheeling director's current effort is not particularly noteworthy for incisive dialogue but more notable in its evocation of the atmosphere of one of the world's great tourist destinations which, for the time being, is being governed with a hands-off attitude by the Chinese government. The major flaw in "Chinese Box" is its heavyhanded manipulation of metaphors, not just in some of the expressions tossed about such as comparing Hong Kong to "Pompeii before Vesuvius," a "department store under new management," and "a whore who must become accustomed to a new pimp," but principally in its use of one female character who, presumably like the city, is scarred on the outside but reckless beneath the surface.
If one line defines the drama, it's a humorous one tossed off by a gypsy-like journalist, Jim (Ruben Blades), who is temporarily sharing the flat of his photojournalist friend, John (Jeremy Irons). Offered a bottle of cheap wine which Jim defines as "Chateau Hong Kong 1997," John replies, "It was a good year...no doubt about it." The irony of the remark is palpable. 1997 is the year of uncertainty and anxiety. The British, ruling the place for a century and half, are scheduled to leave on July 1, the future of the foreign journalists is uncertain, and worst of all, the leukemia-afflicted John is not expected to survive to see another year. For the past year John has been in love with Vivian (Gong Li), once a high- class prostitute who is involved with prosperous businessman Chang (Michael Hui). Vivian wants to marry Chang but is rebuffed because the Chinese culture looks askance at women with her background. John is able to enjoy Vivian from time to time, however, as the beautiful former "hostess" seeks him out each time her boyfriend puts her off.
A second story features John's relationship with Jean (Maggie Cheung), a street woman who makes her living hawking fake Rolexes and, symbolically, a can containing "the last breath of colonial air." Fascinated by her interesting albeit heavily scarred face and her impulsive, tension-filled bearing, he pays her for a videotaped interview but learns through old newspaper clippings that she is hiding one key detail. When she was sixteen, she fell in love with a young Briton, was forbidden by her father from seeing him, and attempted suicide.
Each time the loosely constructed story seems to have no place to go, Wang's regular cinematographer, Emir Kusturica, runs his hand-held camera to the outside world. We see glimpses of both the prosperity and the poverty of the island, fishing boats competing with glass skyscrapers for our attention, as people go about their jobs slaughtering chickens, cutting up fish, hawking food in the marketplace or enjoying the sensual dances of women in upscale night clubs. Kusturica includes some precious shots of the departure of the British, some with tears in their eyes, and the arrival in tanks of thousands of young soldiers from the mainland to the cheers of hordes of citizens. (In two cases dissenters show their disapproval of the change of government; one by shooting himself in the presence of New Year's Eve revelers in a classy club, the other by torching himself on the street.)
The principal chemistry in the movie is, unfortunately, not between Irons and Li, both of whom seem to be holding themselves back as though unable to transcend their cultural differences, but between Irons and his guitar-playing roommate, Jim. Ruben Blades provides the needed comic moments in this meandering tale whose principal value is not as a romance or as a study of a dying man's attempt to express his love, but as a docu-drama recording the changing of the guard over what is perhaps the world's most capitalistic enclave. The outdoor sequences might have come from the pen of Paul Theroux, one of the scripters and America's most notable travel writer. While "Chinese Box" is far better than Wang's only failure, "Slam Dance," it does not rise to the heights of his best work, "Dim Sum," a delicate reflection on family values filmed in San Francisco. Not Rated. Running time: 109 minutes. (C) Harvey Karten 1998
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