Two melancholic Hong Kong policemen fall in love: one with a mysterious female underworld figure, the other with a beautiful and ethereal waitress at a late-night restaurant he frequents.Two melancholic Hong Kong policemen fall in love: one with a mysterious female underworld figure, the other with a beautiful and ethereal waitress at a late-night restaurant he frequents.Two melancholic Hong Kong policemen fall in love: one with a mysterious female underworld figure, the other with a beautiful and ethereal waitress at a late-night restaurant he frequents.
- Awards
- 8 wins & 19 nominations
Brigitte Lin
- Woman in Blonde Wig
- (as Ching-hsia Lin)
Tony Leung Chiu-wai
- Cop 663
- (as Tony Chiu Wai Leung)
Piggy Chan
- Manager of 'Midnight Express'
- (as Jinquan Chen)
Lee-Na Kwan
- Richard
- (as Guan Lina)
Thom Baker
- Drug Dealer
- (uncredited)
Vickie Eng
- Barmaid
- (uncredited)
Lynne Langdon
- Complaining Customer
- (uncredited)
- Director
- Writer
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaSince 'Chungking Express' was filmed in sequence or "like a road movie" as Kar-Wai Wong has said, Wong wrote each scene either the night before or in the morning of the day of filming.
- GoofsIn the part where Faye leaves the apartment and the camera shows her going out, a portion of the camera is seen in the mirror for a brief moment.
- Quotes
He Zhiwu, Cop 223: If memories could be canned, would they also have expiry dates? If so, I hope they last for centuries.
- Alternate versionsThe original Hong Kong release ran 98 minutes. 'Kar Wai Wong' made several changes to the international version, bringing the running time to 102 minutes:
- The international version expands the scenes where The Blonde prepares for the smuggling trip and later searches for the smugglers.
- Indian music plays during the smugglers' arrival at the airport in international prints; in the Hong Kong version, the title theme plays.
- The international version includes the kidnapping of an Indian girl, which does not occur in the Hong Kong version.
- The sequence with Zhiwu loitering outside his girlfriend's window appears earlier in the international edit.
- In the Hong Kong version, the Faye Wong cover of "Dreams" plays over the shot of 663 drinking coffee. The international version strips out the music (leaving only ambient noise), although "Dreams" still appears at the end of the film. The international cut is Wong's preferred version and has been used for most home video releases. The Hong Kong cut was released on VHS/laserdisc by World Video and on VHS/LD/DVD by Mei Ah.
- ConnectionsEdited into 365 Days, also Known as a Year (2019)
- SoundtracksDream Person
Written by Dolores O'Riordan and Noel Hogan
Performed by Faye Wong
(cover of "Dreams" by The Cranberries)
Featured review
Masterful Hong Kong film-maker Wong Kar Wai understands that love is about the unspoken moments between people, the hidden gestures betraying loneliness. Chungking Express is a unique expression of such notions of love. The film doesn't pretend that love is all-embracing and constant, in the way so many predictable films would suggest. Love, for the protagonists of this film, comes and goes between subtle glances - always elusive. Indeed if a level of contentment can be reached at all for these characters - it is a fleeting moment, a memory of a song, the way that somebody smells. There are so many essential moments in this film - when Dinah Washington's 'What a difference a day makes' plays over two lovers cavorting, the moments when characters talk to inanimate objects to overcome their loss of love, the brief glances between the second policeman and the waitress across the counter of the fast-food restaurant. It has been dismissed as an exercise in style over substance by many, mainly due to the hypnotic way in which the film is shot and the lack of a real story as such. I don't feel the need to defend it from these accusations because the beauty of the film is there on the screen and nothing I have said or could say could really do it justice. It breaks my heart every time.
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Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Languages
- Also known as
- Chinching Samlam
- Filming locations
- Lan Kwai Fong, Central, Hong Kong, China(Midnight Express and Restaurant California locations)
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $600,200
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $32,779
- Mar 10, 1996
- Gross worldwide
- $3,294,092
- Runtime1 hour 42 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.66 : 1(original aspect ratio & theatrical release)
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