Nam yan sei sap

A touching love story reminiscent of ‘In the Mood for Love'. Drawing heavily on Chinese poetry and how this is used by eastern people to communicate feelings to each other, the story focuses on a schoolteacher who wants so much to be a model teacher as well as a good husband and father. A senior student is very attracted to him. As the story unfolds we see the emotions below the surface in his 20 year marriage and how he grapples with the moral dilemmas that face him. A beautiful and moving story.

This story of a teacher who has a relationship with a student is told in a subtle manner, something which sets it apart from most films with this plot. Mr. Lam (Jacky Cheung) has a relationship with Choy (Karena Lam, who was also so good in "Koma") in what at first appears to be an inexplicable situation. He is married for 20 years to Ching (the great Anita Mui, in her last role before she was cruelly taken from us), and it appears to be a loving relationship. When Ching offers to care for hers and Mr. Lam's former teacher, Choy and Mr. Lam have the opportunity to be together. What makes the film so good is director Ann Hui's pacing. It takes a while to uncover the secrets of the Lamsm and it all makes sense. The movie is very dramatic and touching. You don't feel any repulsion about the teacher/student situation, something that elevates this film above many with the same plot. It is slow moving, but stay with it. Also, revel in Ms. Mui's wonderful, unglamorous but beautiful performance. She was and is someone truly special and in this film you fall in love with her one last time. It is worth the time to witness and just be there with her.

This is an odd little film that has depicted ordinary life empathetically. The plot is very weird, it like a story within a story and these stories are parallel.

I like how the movie is presented, it is on a realistic basis, in a realistic city like Hong Kong but the storyline is almost surreal. Applause for the actors and the portrayal of their roles. Everyone has acted their role so strongly and their acting is harmonically woven into a movie.

I was captured by the movie and the title. I thought they are odd which makes the ordinary lives of its characters to be abstract. Thus making reality abstract.

Jacky Cheung plays Lam Yiu Kwok who is a Hong Kong high school teacher who is facing a mid-life crisis. While he has only is pride and Chinese poetry to fall back on, his peers are successful businessmen and professionals who flaunt their extravagant lifestyles at reunion dinners. After all these years, Lam is still living in a cramped apartment with his wife, Man Ching (Anita Mui) and two teenage sons.

However financial stagnancy is not his only problem. An old flame and ex-teacher of both Man Ching returns to Hong Kong and uncovers old wounds. Man Ching feels obliged to help her ex-lover...

Meanwhile Yiu Kwok faces another dilemma; Choy Lam (Lam Ka Yan) a precocious student, has a crush on him and the 'forbidden fruit' looks more and more tempting in the light of his wife's 'infidelity'. Will he succumb to young charms and let history repeat itself?

July Rhapsody is a touching story about a man for whom honour, truth and fidelity mean a lot. Personally I have only known highly of Jacky Cheung's singing ability and have not thought much of his acting moreover in serious roles as in this movie but after watching him grapple with Lam's problems, I hold him in high regard. Anita Mui is also convincing as a wife caught between the past and present but her role is definitely being over-whelm by Lam Ka Yan who is indeed the show stealer and is so delectable in her Lolita role that she heats up every scene she appears in.

Drama about mid-life crisis often need comedy to spice them up and here in this movie you can find the mixture blend of poetry, passion and pain...

Excellent introspective / interpersonal piece that really had some teeth to it without feeling hopeless or worse, manipulative & artificially gratifying. Might be a good double feature with American Beauty as well. Best performance to date that I've seen from Anita Mui, and every actor in this seems like a powerhouse. Hats off to Ann Hui for the direction and Ivy Ho for the brilliant script. Seriously one of the best dramas I've seen in a while, especially if you have a taste for classical literature ALA poetry. Again, excellent.