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Award
at the Hong Kong Film Awards 1991:
Best Supporting Actor (Ng Man Tat)
Nominations at the Hong Kong Film Awards 1991:
Best New Performer (Wu Chien-Lien)
Best Original Film Score (Law Tai-Yau)
Best Original Film Song Tin Yuek Yau Ching (As If Heaven
Has Love)
Music: Law Tai Yau
Lyrics: Lee Kin-Yat
Performed by: Yuen Fung-Ying
Wah Dee
(Andy Lau from Running Out Of Time) is a small time
gangster whose heart and skill lies in riding motorbikes.
At a heist, where he's the getaway driver, he's forced to
take young girl Jojo (Wu Chien-Lien from Beyond Hypothermia)
hostage to avoid being caught by the police. The gang of thieves
want her dead to ensure no future troubles occur but Wah Dee
refuses and sets her free. This is the beginning of an unlikely
romance between two very different human beings...
There are different ways to approach a project which has
a familiar story like this one. You can take no chances and
make a simple take on it without no surprises. Or do what
Benny Chan did with A Moment Of Romance, inject a subtle
depth combined with some really solid writing and performances.
With James Yuen's script backing him up, Benny shows us an
already very mature and style free directing, something which
surprised me considering it was his directing debut. Benny
has then gone on to directing more shallow (yet entertaining)
movies like Gen-X Cops and if that is a bad career
choice I can not say but A Moment Of Romance showed
off great character drama skills.
He lets the technical side of filmmaking breath just a little,
which suits this human story more. There's only a few moments
where for example slow motion is used but it's employed pretty
much just right and does what slow motion should do, emphasize
the moment. Some young directors don't know how and when this
should be used but Benny has probably looked at some other
directors who are skilled in that department, therefore pulling
it off in his own movie. Other than that he concentrates on
telling the story right & clear and even if the running
time isn't very long, there weren't many moments that dragged.
The movie offers a varied gallery of characters that are all
given an opportunity to shine at some point. Everyone from
main to supporting characters are important and that as well
as mixing the two genres of romance and triad is done with
great skill by the filmmakers.
If you could describe A Moment Of Romance as a still
picture, I would say it's a dark and grim one which will stay
with you for a little while. The movie is quite gory and violent,
something that is enhanced so much more when it is someone
we care about that is on the receiving end. Ace director Ringo
Lam was one of the producers (and also Wong Jing!) and the
violence presented is sort of similar to to grittiness present
in some of Ringo's movies so maybe he influenced Benny and
the production a bit (in a good way).
Cinematographers Horace and Joe Chan also play a huge part
in painting the picture that is A Moment Of Romance.
Another movie to compare the look of this one with I think
is Riley Yip's Metade Fumaca, in other words we get
a fairly natural lightning scheme with only the beautiful
neon lights of Hong Kong creating natural atmosphere. Horace
and Joe's work should be mentioned since in the movie we don't
notice it very much. It's the story we care about and not
primarily the way scenes are shot. That is in my opinion when
cinematography is at it's best.
Law Tai-Yau's nominated score is a bit on the sentimental
side but would've worked worse if the images it was scored
too were corny and too sentimental. That doesn't happen and
dark music passages and well inserted canto pop songs (some
probably sung by Andy) makes this a nice music experience
as well. For some reason I was reminded about the score structure
and the songs used in All About Ah Long when I listened
to A Moment Of Romance. They seemed eerily similar
but you could 'steal' from worse movies than that one.
Andy Lau has been in a lot of movies and it's no wonder I
keep bumping into him in these reviews. As mentioned in other
reviews, I think Andy acts the best when he has a more subdued
and maybe dark character to play and he has on a number occasions
proven that he can do good work with a well written and fleshed
out character. The character of Wah Dee is probably one of
his strongest performances even to this date. Wah Dee is a
fairly complex guy but also some interesting traits come out
when he's with Jojo. We as an audience don't really know how
much he does or is going to care to care about Jojo and he
comes across as very cold in a few scenes, which is probably
due to him not knowing himself what he feels. Andy really
makes this role his own and all the different sides of Wah
Dee like his romantic and tough one comes across nicely in
Andy's performance.
Wu Chien-Lin made her movie debut with this role and what
an impression she made! She really looks the part of Jojo
who's trapped rich parents girl but she is also a little bit
mysterious to the audience because it's never really stated
exactly why she is drawn to Wah Dee. Is it because he indeed
is a triad or because she sees something in him that could
be improved upon? That this is not made clear works for us
for the most part and we can put all the pieces together in
the end but I do feel that in some scenes and moments a little
bit more writing was needed for her character. Not the most
layered role ever in a movie but for a debutante Wu Chien-Lin
really impresses.
The star of this movie is Andy Lau but the strongest performance
comes from Stephen Chow-regular Ng Man Tat (from Shaolin
Soccer). His very out there underdog character can at
first be seen as a painfully bad attempt to have comedy in
this serious film. During the course of the film though he
still acts very wild but there's more sadness apparent in
him. All in all Ng Man Tat very convincingly embodies this
character. Although not the same role but in Portland Street
Blues he played a similar underdog character.
A Moment Of Romance is a very well executed piece
that to me is essential viewing for those of us exploring
other genres than just action. I hope Benny Chan at some point
will revisit this kind of filmmaking since he showed here
the depths he has as one.
The DVD:
The Megastar transfer is framed at 1.85.1
and looks pretty solid throughout. Print damage is present
in the form of small dots and speckles but are not bad for
a 12 year old movie. Sharpness is good but the transfer comes
across as slightly murky at times.
The new Dolby Digital 5.1 Cantonese remix
has some out of place newly inserted foley effects but I've
certainly heard worse. Music and some of the new effects creates
fairly good atmosphere and dialogue is for once properly centered
by Megastar's sound team. A Mandarin 5.1 dub is also included.
The English subtitles are more up to average
standard on this disc. You have your usual spelling and grammar
inaccuracies but that wasn't too much of a problem on this
particular Hong Kong dvd. Japanese, Bahasa Malaysian, Thai,
Vietnamese, Spanish, traditional Chinese and simplified Chinese
subtitles are also included.
Extras consists of a plot synopsis, cast & crew listings
(with quite bad biographies of stars Andy Lau and Wu Chien-Lin
plus director Benny Chan) plus trailers for A Moment Of
Romance, Jackie Chan My Stunts, Black Cat 1
& 2 and Media Asia's DVD Promo Trailer.
reviewed by Kenneth
Brorsson
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