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As humans, there are a lot of ways we try to cope after someone ends a relationship with us. Some of us eat entire pints of ice cream, while others spend their time at the gym or trying on new clothes. Some of us simply listen to Taylor Swift's entire discography on repeat. However, few things can take you out of those repetitive patterns of heartbreak like a good, relatable film about love lost or taken away. 

From serious, Oscar-bait dramas to laugh-out-loud-funny rom-coms, plenty of films perfectly capture the universal experience of going through a break-up, whether you're an adult struggling with a family-splitting divorce or a teenager experiencing your first crushing heartbreak. These 15 films might have happy endings, bittersweet endings, or just plain sad endings, but they might in some way offer comfort for those who are currently going through the summer without another person by their side.

It was recently reported that the home video distributor Shout Factory is collaborating with Hong Kong Film Archives to bring you the 4K remastering of the most coveted of Chinese action film classics. The films will include works by Jet Li, Chow Yun-Fat, John Woo, Ringo Lam and Tsui Hark. One of the titles included was Peking Opera Blues from 1986 and Blu-ray.com reports on the new details. Tsui Hark directs with a cast that includes Brigitte Lin, Sally Yeh, Cherie Chung, Kenneth Tsang and Mark Cheng. The new remastered release is due to hit retailers on September 23.

Description: Shout Factory’s Hong Kong Cinema Classics continues to offer movie enthusiasts a treasure trove of must-see film classics from a remarkable era in cinematic history. The goal is to preserve and present these iconic movies in their finest form for fans, both old and new, at home.

Official selection of...

Jude Law is one of the most versatile actors in Hollywood, who has spread his roots through every genre that exists. From giving standalone blockbusters with films like Hugo, The Grand Budapest Hotel, and Closer to working in franchises like Sherlock Holmes, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and now Harry Potter, clearly, he’s been part of everything grand.

Surprisingly, his best film is a 2007 underrated masterpiece, My Blueberry Nights, by the critically acclaimed director Wong Kar-wai. The film is so overlooked that chances are even the most ardent film connoisseurs have not heard about it. However, being on the sidelines doesn’t make it dismissible because it features a gentle story wrapped around the chaotic life of the metropolis.

Jude’s Law My Blueberry Nights: Serve a Note from Moving on

There are films, and there are great films, that are so criminally underrated that once discovered, they blow up the internet.

The next in our series of writers on their go-to comfort watches looks back at Wong Kar-Wai’s unusual and profound romantic comedy

Chinese auteur Wong Kar-Wai is not a director you’d immediately seek out for a cosy feelgood experience. His films delve into loneliness, yearning and doomed love affairs, carried along by a melancholy undercurrent. Chungking Express, the story of two Hong Kong cops reeling from being dumped by their respective partners, doesn’t deviate from these obsessions of his but the quirky romantic comedy also manages to be his most joyous and uplifting offering.

The film has a playful energy and is brimming with offbeat humour. Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Takeshi Kaneshiro play the heartbroken policemen, both deep in denial over the end of their relationships. We watch them cope in very different ways with their heartache. Kaneshiro’s Cop 223 pines outside his ex’s flat, buys...

Following a highly successful run in China, where it topped TV ratings and became the most-streamed TV series throughout the country, Wong Kar Wai’s 1990s-set drama “Blossoms Shanghai” will stream exclusively in North America on The Criterion Channel. Comprising 30 episodes, the show tracks the rise of a financial titan whose wealth comes in the wake of Shanghai opening its own stock exchange.

Created and directed by Wong, the filmmaker said of the project in a statement, “I am thrilled to continue my long-standing relationship with Criterion with the North American debut of my first series on the Criterion Channel. The series captures the vitality of Shanghai’s roaring 90s, revealing universal human truths about desire and destiny. We hope the series provides insight into the pivotal moment of China’s reinvention.”

Like many of Wong’s works, “Blossoms Shanghai” contains strong romantic elements amid real-life historical foundations. It was...

“We have the new Jim Jarmusch film. We are a co-producer on that, and it’s already confirmed to be in competition at Venice,” Mubi CEO Efe Cakarel said this afternoon during a Q&a session at SXSW London.

The new film from Jarmusch is titled Father Mother Sister Brother and stars Cate Blanchett, Vicky Krieps, Adam Driver, Mayim Bialik, Tom Waits, Charlotte Rampling, Indya Moore, and Luka Sabbat. We’d heard from many sources that the film was heading for the Lido, but this is the first time it has been confirmed publicly.

The official synopsis for Father Mother Sister Brother reads: Estranged siblings reunite after years apart, forced to confront unresolved tensions and reevaluate their strained relationships with their emotionally distant parents.

Elsewhere during this afternoon’s session, Cakarel told the SXSW crowd that Mubi has bought La grazia, the new film by Paolo Sorrentino, which he said...

With its lush-urban greens and reds, and neon fonts, Evan Wijaya's key art design for Indonesian romantic drama Goodbye, Farewell cannot help but evoke the 1990s cinematography work of Christopher Doyle. The quiet ennui and clutter, the lone illumination source, all do all there needs be done to give you the mood and the tone of Adriyanto Dewo's award winning film.   There is no credit block here, perhaps from it saying "Coming Soon" and being a teaser poster, but more likely, because, well, 2025. This alternate poster is in the same vein and also excellent.  ...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

Exclusive: Music to arthouse film lovers’ ears: Wong Kar Wai’s epic drama series Blossoms Shanghai is finally getting an international release, via Mubi.

Mubi will release the 30-part drama series in Latin America, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Turkey and India. Dates haven’t been set yet. There’s still no word on a UK or U.S. release but we hear something could be in the works.

Blossoms Shanghai marks the first ever series for the revered Hong Kong filmmaker, known for acclaimed movies such as Chungking Express, In the Mood for Love and 2046.

Based on the novel Blossoms by Jin Yucheng, Blossoms Shanghai chronicles the ascent of a self-made millionaire Ah Bao, the Jay Gatsby of Shanghai, from the slums to the height of the gilded city. The series explores how Bao personifies the idealism and adventurism that defined the city in the 1990s.

During the troubled production of Ashes of Time, which was supposed to be his third film, Wong Kar-wai took some time off and did what anyone in his position would do: made another movie. And he did it with a fast-paced, highly improvisatory shooting schedule, writing pages of the script during the day and shooting them at night. The result, Chungking Express, is among Wong’s most exciting films and is an early precursor to the expressive odes to romantic longing that have come to define his work.

The title is symbolic of the film’s lively, anything-goes sensibility, representing the pair of largely unrelated stories that make up its bifurcated narrative. The first story, which takes place mostly at Chungking Mansions shopping complex in Hong Kong, focuses on the lovesick Cop 223 (Kaneshiro Takeshi), who pines over an ex-girlfriend named May. The officer has taken to collecting cans of pineapple...

What does the Criterion Collection have in store for home video enthusiasts this June? The boutique label just announced their new releases for that month today, with five new movies entering the Collection. Leading the pack? A Sidney Lumet musical and one of William Friedkin‘s tensest efforts, as well as a classic screwball comedy, a doc about one of jazz’s greatest pianists, and a boldly unconventional film biography.

Read More: Criterion’s April Releases Include ‘Anora,’ ‘Chungking Express,’ ‘Some Like It Hot’ & More

new titles include Sidney Lumet‘s musical take on L.

Continue reading Criterion’s June 2025 Releases Include William Friedkin’s ‘Sorcerer,’ Sidney Lumet’s ‘The Wiz,’ ‘Thelonious Monk Straight No Chaser’ & More at The Playlist.

If Steven Yeun had decided to pursue law or medical science rather than acting, the cinematic world would have missed out on a gem of an actor. Born in Seoul, South Korea, Yeun is an American actor who has delivered acclaimed performances in the popular television series The Walking Dead, Bong Joon-ho’s Okja, and Lee Chang-dong’s Burning. He is the first Asian American actor to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor. In 2023, he starred in the dark comedy series Beef (2023), for which he won two Primetime Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe Award. Most recently, he reunited with Bong Joon-ho for his latest sci-fi satire Mickey 17.

With such a list of great honors, it’s undoubted that Yeun is one of the best actors in the film industry. Apart from being a great actor, his script choice is also commendable. The actor discussed his Criterion favorites,...

Film enthusiasts have much to anticipate in May with a captivating lineup of releases that span various genres and eras for the estimable Criterion Collection.

This bespoke DVD/Blu-Ray label’s eclectic selection for May includes three new films never part of the collection before Charles Burnett’s classic black-slice-of-life street poetry film, “Killer of Sheep,”—often described as very Terry Malick in tone— Abbas Kiarostami’s “The Wind Will Carry Us,” and Richard Lester’s “The Three Musketeers/The Four Musketeers.”

Read More: Criterion’s April Releases Include ‘Anora,’ ‘Chungking Express,’ ‘Some Like It Hot’ & More

Previously released titles either long out of print or upgraded into new editions include Bruce Robinson’s “Withnail and I” and “How to Get Ahead in Advertising,” Jacques Demy’s “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg,” and Norman Jewison’s “In the Heat of the Night.” These films offer a unique glimpse into the artistry...

The 1981 film Love Massacre (Ai Sha) was a jarring shift in genre for Patrick Tam. After making his directorial debut with wuxia outing The Sword, Tam returned with a tale of drama and horror. Now, to the uninitiated, this collaboration between Tam and writer Joyce Chan — they would work together again — seems like the furthest thing from horror; the film’s first half is an attractive but somewhat aimless tune about the pangs of romance, the uncertainty of life, and the toils of obligation. Once you reach the other side of this cinematic compromise between arthouse and commercial, though, it becomes clear why Love Massacre has amassed such a cult following over the years.

In the vein of horror films where expats and tourists discover peril overseas, Love Massacre chronicles the grisly misfortune of several Chinese international students. Shot in California, the film begins with a foreshadowing sign of things...

The Criterion Collection's recent announcement of its April 2025 slate stirred up controversy across social networks and the internet at large, due entirely to the eye-catching cover of Sean Baker's Anora (2024), a tip of the hat to a pose captured in an image for Jess Franco's Vampyros Lesbos (1971). Be that as it may, my personal reaction centered entirely around the forthcoming release of Wong Kar-wai's Chungking Express (1994), a film that electrified me when I first saw it in the late 90s on videotape, and then again on DVD, and then again on a film print at the Beverly Cinema in Los Angeles a few years later. Featuring a "4K digital restoration, with 5.1 surround DTS-hd Master Audio soundtrack, both supervised and approved...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

The Criterion Collection has announced their April slate of discs, with one soon-to-be Oscar nominee, Anora, among the titles. Unveiled as spine #1259, Anora could see a little push from voters, especially as voting has been pushed back to January 17th due to the ongoing fires in Los Angeles. While Anora won’t actually see the streets until April 29th, the announcement alone could give it even more prestige for voters.

Anora wouldn’t be the first time that Criterion announced titles that neatly coincided with the Academy Awards. Two of the biggest stand-outs of recent years were The Grand Budapest Hotel and Parasite, with Wes Anderson’s film being revealed in January when Academy Award nominations are traditionally announced and Bong Joon-ho’s picture being promoted just a few days before final voting closed.

Of course, there’s no real scientific proof that Criterion is trying to give Anora a...

Even though we are in the cold, dark days of winter, we can start to look forward to spring and what’s to come with the April Criterion releases. And boy, do we have a busy April for new discs.

Read More: The 20 Best Films Of 2024

Leading the way in April is none other than one of the leading Oscar candidates of the year, “Anora.” As you might expect, the Criterion release is jam-packed with special features, including two commentary tracks, a new making-of documentary, new interviews, and, of course, a new 4K digital master overseen by filmmaker Sean Baker.

Continue reading Criterion’s April Releases Include ‘Anora,’ ‘Chungking Express,’ ‘Some Like It Hot’ & More at The Playlist.

Criterion’s starting 2025 with 4K on the mind: today brings news that April will bring Sean Baker’s Anora and a Blu-ray of Prince of Broadway alongside 4K releases for Julian Schnabel’s Basquiat (both the theatrical edition and black-and-white director’s cut), Some Like It Hot, and two films by Claude Berri, Jean de Florette and Manon of the Spring. Of those last two the former is, of course, among the most iconic films ever made, non-pareil from comedies of its era; the latter two are far less-known, and even among American Francophiles is Berri hardly mentioned. In their distinct ways does either mark an essential release.

For major catalog titles, Ugetsu, about as notable a Japanese film as any from its era, is upgraded to 4K alongside Chungking Express, albeit (as with In the Mood for Love) likely the 2020 restoration about which, we’ve all discovered, your mileage will surely vary.

It's pretty amazing that acclaimed American filmmaker Martin Scorsese finally took home the Oscars for Best Director and Best Picture for a movie that was, for all intents and purposes, a remake of a foreign-language gangster film that originated in Hong Kong. After all, Scorsese is an artist who has largely seen his career defined by idiosyncratic films that practically no other filmmaker could ever recreate.

The Departed concerns itself with the story of two moles, one planted in the Massachusetts State Police Department and the other finding his way into Boston's Irish Mob. Four years earlier, Hong Kong directors Andrew Lau and Alan Mak brought that same story to life through a different geographical lens, and its name is Infernal Affairs.

Related 10 Best Foreign Gangster Movies, Ranked

Foreign films often break the mold and reel audiences in for generations, and gangster movies are a great example of this.

What Is Infernal Affairs About?...

While the name Tony Leung (also known as "Tony Leung Chiu-wai") may be widely unknown to Western audiences, he happens to be one of the most well-known and renowned actors in Chinese cinema. It was thanks to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, however, that he became a much more recognizable face in America and other parts of the West. His role as Xu Wenwu (aka "The Mandalorian") in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings has been praised as one of the McU's most complex and interesting villains. However, with a filmography that has spanned over 40 years, Leung also has quite several credits that have yet to be discovered by the average movie watcher. One of his greatest films also happens to be one of John Woo's best.

Director John Woo has amassed a couple of well-known directorial efforts in Hollywood, including Face/Off and Mission: Impossible 2. However, it...

During an online Ama this past Friday, Francis Ford Coppola shared some factoids about his recently released sci-fi epic “Megalopolis,” including a list of influences he posted on Letterboxd. The list includes films adapted from the works of H.G. Wells, historical epics, erotic dramas, and many more. Upon examining each individually, it’s easy to see how they all had effect on Coppola’s ultimate vision on a new Roman Empire and an architect trying to bring about change.

Starring Adam Driver and featuring performances from Aubrey Plaza, Jon Voight, Nathalie Emmanuel, Shia Labeouf, Talia Shire, and Giancarlo Esposito, “Megalopolis” premiered at Cannes, where it received a mixed reception. In IndieWire’s review of the film, David Ehrlich wrote, “After more than 40 years of idly fantasizing about the project (and more than 20 years of actively trying to finance it), Coppola is bringing ‘Megalopolis’ to screens at a moment when his...

It suffered at the box office and failed to win any Oscars, but the 1994 prison drama is still seen by many as greater than The Godfather

The Shawshank Redemption is not the greatest film ever made. Heck, it’s not even one of best films of 1994 – the year of Pulp Fiction, Hoop Dreams, Chungking Express, Exotica, Quiz Show and the last two entries in Krzysztof Kieślowski’s Three Colours trilogy. And yet it continues to sit at or near the top of IMDb’s top 250, currently a shade above The Godfather and The Dark Knight, despite opening to polite reviews, middling box office and a resurgent Oscar campaign that nonetheless yielded zero awards. That’s an incredible comeback story, a video-and-cable-fueled long game as steady and methodical as, say, spending two decades chipping a hole in the prison walls with a rock hammer.

Much of the film’s standing in...

There is a great misnomer when it comes to Wong Kar-wai's only English feature film, My Blueberry Nights, and that is that it wasn't any good, despite having a stellar cast in Norah Jones (in her acting debut), Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Rachel Weisz, and David Straithairn. It is easy to dismiss the film as paling in comparison to the filmmakers' other works such as Chungking Express and In The Mood for Love, but to be fair, putting any other film side-by-side with those two would almost always get the short end of the stick. Despite the criticisms, if My Blueberry Nights was to be viewed under its own merit, one would easily see a lot of desirable things. It carries the signature Wong flair and tenderness and transplants them into the Western zeitgeist, resulting in a striking and enigmatic mood piece that delves deeply into hope, despair, and...

We love seeing which films rank among our favorite directors’ list of best ever — the ones that left a mark and steered them in the path of becoming some of the most renowned artists of the medium. But let’s face it, we don’t mind a little conflict, either. But Park Chan-wook wasn’t going after his fellow directors in a physical way but rather in a much more damming way — attacking their work!

In a recently unearthed slam session from 1999, Park Chan-wook called out 10 films that he considered the most overrated ever. Keep in mind that by this point, the South Korean director only had two features to his credit. So what’s on the list and what did he have to say? Let’s check it out:

Park Chan-wook primarily took issue with American films, opening the list with Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers, which can...

Not all martial arts stars were trained fighters, relying on illusion, intense training, or transferable skills from dance. Some actors initially untrained built up martial arts skills over time, impressing in martial arts classics and Hollywood blockbusters. Talent, commitment, and adaptability allowed actors like Tony Leung and Maggie Q to excel in martial arts roles despite lacking formal training.

Martial arts cinema was full of incredible performers capable of awe-inspiring feats of human ingenuity, but some viewers would be shocked to learn just how many stars were not actually trained as fighters. With the power of illusion, intense training packed into a few short months, or transferable skills from dancing, some actors convinced the world that they were true martial artists. Of course, martial arts cinema has greatly benefited from the varied skills of its performers, and actors dont always need to take a traditional approach when it comes to becoming a martial arts star.

With Wong Kar-wai being one of the names that are always mentioned when people all around the world refer to Asian cinema, we thought it would be interesting to do another ranking, and having his movies, a number of which are definitely masterpieces. As such, we asked Amp writers who have seen at least 8 of his features to rank them from worst to best. Notably, the two first titles got the same amount of votes and the third had just one vote less. In case you are wondering, the number one was the one who got most first places in the vote. Here is what the votes of Adriana Rosati, Rhythm Zaveri, Rouven Linnarz, Panos Kotzathanasis, Andrew Thayne and Jean Claude resulted in.

11. My Blueberry Nights (2007)

A young lonely woman takes a soul-searching journey across America to resolve her questions about love while encountering a series of off-beat characters along the way.

Tony Leung will serve as the president of the international competition jury at the 37th Tokyo International Film Festival, organizers announced on Friday.

The Hong Kong acting icon, who gave a masterclass at the festival last year, will return to Tokyo to head up a jury that will be announced at a later date. Leung has a long history with Tokyo Film Festival and had attended the event for the screening of his 2013 film The Grandmaster.

Leung is widely considered one of the greatest actors Asia has produced. Best known globally for his work with Hong Kong auteur Wong Kar-wai, the pair have worked on seven films together — Days of Being Wild (1990), Chungking Express (1994), Ashes of Time (1994), Happy Together (1997), In the Mood for Love (2000), 2046 (2004), and The Grandmaster (2013). Leung has also starred in three films — A City of Sadness (1989), Cyclo (1995) and Lust, Caution (2007) — that have won the Golden Lion prize...

Over the long history of cinema, the police and detective genre has remained one of the medium's most reliable genres. Across generations, audiences have been fascinated by the world of crime as well as by those who solve the mysteries and fight to bring criminals to justice.

Spurred on by the success of Lethal Weapon and Die Hard in the late 1980s, the police and detective movies of the 1990s blended high-energy action with their mysteries. The explosion of the buddy cop genre saw the lone detective fallout of fashion, but there was still room for every classical version of a detective movie to receive a '90s overhaul.

Bad Boys was a Fresh Take on the Buddy Cop Formula

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Post Lethal Weapon, Hollywood was scrambling to find the next great buddy cop duo. Of all the pretenders to the buddy cop throne,...

“In the Streets” is the first edition of the Notebook Insert, a seasonal supplement on moving-image culture. For the Multiplex column, we ask filmmakers, critics, and artists for short-form responses to the topic in question.Illustration by Lale Westvind.Martine Syms (Los Angeles)Artist; director, The African Desperate (2022)1.I’m shopping with **** and *** at a high-end store. I have a rare jewel up my butt. We’re looking for gifts. I run into Alex ****. She works at the store now. I try to remember lyrics to a punk song I wrote in high school. I jump up and I’m on a glider, gliding around town. I see a sign for legal services. Her & Her Feminist Law Office. The ad is a giant pair of pink panties. I decide to land there and check out their services. I have two Rimowa suitcases with me. I attempt to walk down the steps to the elevator,...

One of Hollywood's most frustrating recent news stories is that Francis Ford Coppola is having trouble finding distribution for his self-funded passion project, "Megalopolis" (via The Hollywood Reporter). In a just world, making "The Godfather" would grant Coppola a lifetime blank check, but that has never been the world we've lived in.

What you may not be aware of is one of Coppola's influences for his magnum opus. Like his friend "Star Wars" director George Lucas, Coppola looked to Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa. While Lucas took after Kurosawa's Jidaigeki (historical) films, Coppola looked to one of the director's contemporary-set films: "The Bad Sleep Well."

Released in 1960 and starring his go-to leading man Toshiro Mifune, the movie is one of Kurosawa's (comparatively) more obscure ones. It was especially overshadowed by "High and Low," the masterful kidnapping thriller that Kurosawa and Mifune released in 1963. Both movies are set in the world of...

Oof, "Madame Web." Critics have savaged the latest Spider-Manless Spider-Man spin-off from Sony Pictures (read /Film's review here). Unlike the Sydney Sweeney picture I'm actually looking forward to this year, "Madame Web" is not "Immaculate." It's a hackneyed joke that in bad movies of this sort, the best part is when the credits hit. In "Madame Web," that's doubly true because you'll get to hear some nice music: "Dreams" by The Cranberries.

Released in 1992, "Dreams" is the Irish band's debut single, part of their first album "Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can't We?" Dolores O'Riordan, The Cranberries' late singer, and guitarist Noal Hogan wrote the song about the experience of love. O'Riordan's whimsical brogue becomes a melody played against the soft rock instrumentals from her bandmates. It's not just a great love song, but a song about how it feels to be in love: the floating excitement, how...

Somebody stop me! Alamo Drafthouse is taking a trip back 30 years to the Clinton-era and the year 1994 for a two-month long repertory slate of classic film screenings. And IndieWire can exclusively reveal the full lineup of films as part of the Alamo Time Capsules 1994 series.

Beginning the week of March 1 and running through the end of April, Alamo Drafthouse locations across the country will screen 29 different films all released in 1994.

Among them are some blockbusters and fan favorites, including “Pulp Fiction,” “Dumb and Dumber,” “The Mask,” “Interview With a Vampire,” “Forrest Gump,” “Little Women,” “The Shawshank Redemption,” and the live-action “The Flintstones.” There’s some cult classics like “Clerks,” “Drunken Master II,” “Reality Bites,” and “The Crow,” some art house darlings like “Chungking Express” and the “Three Colors” trilogy, and there are even some obscure deep cuts such as the bizarre Martin Short film “Clifford” or a special “Gore Cut...

Wong Kar-wai's films like Chungking Express and In the Mood for Love are highly respected and regarded as some of the best movies ever made. Fallen Angels, though less recognized, deserves more credit and should be considered among Kar-wai's greatest works. The visuals, cinematography, and soundtrack in Fallen Angels are visually inventive and contribute to its stylish and atmospheric storytelling.

Perhaps the greatest filmmaker in the illustrious history of Chinese cinema is Wong Kar-wai. He's known for various recurring methods of filmmaking, from nonlinear narratives and slow-motion camera shots to off-center frames and saturated color palettes. Near the end of the 1980s, he debuted with As Tears Go By (1988). It received widespread praise upon release and is still held in high regard today.

His next project was Days of Being Wild (1990), followed by two films in the same year: Chungking Express (1994) and Ashes of Time (1994). The former landed the...

Cinema chain Alamo Drafthouse is launching Alamo Time Capsules, a retrospective film series, to kick off the new year. With screenings slated throughout the entirety of 2024, this will be the chain’s largest retrospective series yet.

Starting Jan. 5, each of Alamo Drafthouse’s forty locations across the U.S. will screen a selection of approximately 150 different films from the years 1999, 1994, 1989, 1984, 1979 and 1974 — chosen for being landmark years in cinema history. Each rotation will last six to eight weeks, with the first year, 1999, slated to run until February. 1999 films include “The Matrix,” “Cruel Intentions,” “She’s All That” and “Being John Malkovich.”

The year 1999 has personal significance to Alamo Drafthouse senior film programmer John Smith, who developed the retrospective along with programmers Jake Isgar and Jenny Nulf.

“My first job was making popcorn and tearing tickets at a second run movie theater in 1999, and I was lucky enough to get to see everything...

Here is another gem by Kar-Wai Wong, the master stylist from Hong Kong.

The story or, rather, stories of Chungking Express talks about love– true love, abruptly-ended love, unfinished love, doomed love, happy love, disturbed love… a whole lot of them. It delineates how a relationship is built up and how it is broken. How two persons, all of a sudden, come closer, and then, eventually, drift apart leaving a permanent mark on each other’s memory. How time, our very own individual time, is shaped through our memories– memories of love, affection, relationship.

But the real beauty of the film lies in the extremely rich visuals; the superb camera-work and the typical Wongish blend of music with the striking visuals. These alone hold together the two apparently disconnected stories. Sometimes the scene is blurred except for the main character; sometime there is intentional time lapse between shots; sometimes the...

Three times make a tradition, right? It is (now) a holiday tradition of sharing a poster variant for Stanley Kubrick's final film, an alternate Christmas movie classic. Modern movie lovers may go to The Apartment, Die Hard, Gremlins, or Chungking Express (perhaps even Ronin) as an unorthodox bit of viewing for the season, but my choice for over two decades has been Eyes Wide Shut.  Below is a poster variant by artist Jean-Sébastien Rossbach and published in 2016 by Lady Lazarus Press. At the top of the design is the dollar bill pyramid at the top light rays emanating from its all seeing eye giving off general Illuminati vibes. At the bottom, the classic poster iconography of Nicole Cruise & Kidman, pre-coitus, in front of the mirror. And in the middle,...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

The title of Fruit Chan’s Made in Hong Kong cheekily references a phrase you might have seen printed on the packaging for an action figure way back in 1997, the year of the film’s original release. But it also refers to the young, wannabe triad member with the unlikely name of Autumn Moon (Sam Lee), as well as to the production circumstances of the film itself. Its declarative label is somewhat excessive, though, as there’s no mistaking where and when Moon’s misadventures take place: Chan’s quirky, gangster-adjacent flick, so infused with washed-out and blue-filtered imagery, presents a portrait of Hong Kong that bears more than a passing resemblance to Wong Kar-wai and Christopher Doyle’s early collaborations.

From its handheld shots racing through open-air markets, to its use of expressionistic step-printed slow motion, to the way its perspectives on the city take inspiration from the cramped...

Many films – even classics such as Eraserhead and Chungking Express – remain surprisingly unavailable online to UK audiences. We asked film-makers from Martin McDonagh to Charlotte Wells to pick their favourites

In theory, there has never been a better time to be a movie fan. The ubiquity of streaming platforms means that films are more accessible than ever before. One click, and we can be transported to any country, genre or period. Or at least, that’s the idea. In practice, it’s not quite as simple as all that. Despite the wide choice of mainstream modern titles offered by big hitters such as Netflix, Disney+ and Prime Video; and the sterling work done by bespoke platforms such as Mubi, Curzon, BFI Player and regional specialist Klassiki, numerous films remain unavailable to be streamed by UK audiences (legally at least). And we’re not just talking about obscure arthouse titles: a...

Ten years after he attended the Tokyo International Film Festival for the screening of The Grandmaster, Tony Leung returned to the festival on Thursday to conduct a masterclass.

The Hong Kong acting icon, dressed in a black tailored suit and fashion-forward Kolor sneakers, was met with warm applause at a packed house at Tokyo’s Hulic Hall. Festival programmer Shozo Ichiyama began proceedings with Leung’s early years as an actor, namely his work with Taiwanese filmmaker Hou Hsiao-hsien on the classic A City of Sadness, which Ichiyama considered one of his personal favorites. A City of Sadness was notable as it was set in Taipei, and Leung, at the time, had no experience working outside of Hong Kong and couldn’t speak Mandarin.

“It was the start of my career, and I wanted to challenge myself,” Leung said through an interpreter on why he took on the role, given...

Oscar winner Bong Joon-ho’s 2006 monster movie “The Host” is among Paris-based distributor The Jokers Films’ recent releases, made available for the first time ever as a 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray edition.

The Jokers’ other new French release, the 4K restoration of Bruce Weber’s 1988 Chet Baker doc “Let’s Get Lost,” also screened at the Lumière Festival in Lyon with Weber in attendance.

Describing the film’s sound and 4K restoration as “sublime,” The Jokers head Manuel Chiche says, “‘Let’s Get Lost’ is now a timeless classic not only about life but also about art and creation.”

“Let’s Get Lost” is due to hit French theaters in summer 2024.

“The Host,” meanwhile, premiered earlier this year in France with a special screening, along with the Oscar-winning “Parasite,” and master class by Bong at Paris’ famed Grand Rex theater and also unspooled at the Institut Lumière in Lyon as part of a Bong retrospective.

[This story contains spoilers from Afterparty season two, episode seven, “Ulysses.”]

Peter Atencio’s Hollywood chops have mainly been planted in the garden of comedy for his more than 20-year career — Key & Peele, the Jean-Claude Van Johnson series and this year’s satirical mobster film The Machine, to name a few.

But when old friends Phil Lord and Christopher Miller invited the 40-year-old helmer to direct what he was told would be one of the most complex and challenging episodes of the second season of The Afterparty — Apple TV+’s whodunnit murder mystery series — he tells The Hollywood Reporter that a more dramatic approach was needed to get to the core of the funny.

How serious can directing comedy get? Atencio breaks it down for The Hollywood Reporter in a recent Zoom interview.

***

How did you find your way to The Afterparty team?

I’ve known [creators] Phil [Lord] and Chris [Miller], for some time. I want...

Tony Leung Chiu-wai has starred in three movies that have scooped the top prize Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, and today he is receiving his very own Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement.

The 61-year-old Hong Kong actor and singer is one of Asia’s most successful and internationally recognized stars. Among his major global credits are Wong Kar-wai’s 2000 romantic drama In the Mood for Love, for which he won the Best Actor prize in Cannes. His other collaborations with Wong include Chungking Express, Happy Together and The Grandmaster.

Leung also starred in the Academy Award-nominated film Hero by Zhang Yimou, and the box office hits Hard Boiled by John Woo and Infernal Affairs by Andrew Lau and Alan Mak. The latter trilogy formed the basis for Martin Scorsese’s Oscar winning The Departed.

Talking with the press today, Leung beamed of the Lifetime Achievement Lion, “Finally I can have it for myself,...

Romantic tales of lovers bound by fleeting moments are a major part of cinema history. From David Lean’s Brief Encounter through to Wong Kar-Wai’s In The Mood For Love, these stories evolve and their settings change but their emotional resonance has always remained the same. Director Olivia J. Middleton brings her imagining of this age-old story to the short film format with A90, which sees a disenfranchised roadside cafe worker come in contact with a customer with whom she forms a deeply intense attraction. Middleton conveys the momentary longing shared between the pair with subtle, withdrawn cinematic language that echoes the classical stories from which she was inspired. Now, as the film begins its journey on the festival circuit, Dn caught up with Middleton for a chat about how it all came together, talking everything from the choice of a roadside cafe setting to the pinpoint precision that...

We’ve never been really far away from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Since they first arrived as comic book characters in the early 1980s, there has been a steady supply of comics, TV shows, games and films that celebrate the canon of Cowabunga. And Tmnt fandom, once experienced, can almost never be forgotten. Is it the masks? The pizza? The ooze that made them who they are? It’s nearly impossible to single one thing out.

When lifelong Turtle enthusiasts Seth Rogen, Jeff Rowe and Evan Goldberg started working on “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem,” which arrives in theaters this August, they knew they wanted to update the characters for a new generation while also telling a relevant story. They were also interested in using a CG animation style that looked less than perfect and would remind audiences of their own doodles they might have done in a...

Australian Adaptation

The BBC has acquired the Australian version of hit gameshow “The Traitors” for broadcast and streaming this summer.

“The Traitors Australia,” which sees contestants compete for a prize of Aus $250,000 in a luxury hotel in the Southern Highlands, is set to drop on BBC Three and iPlayer on July 9. It is hosted by Rodger Corser.

“’The Traitors’ is an addictively fiendish format and I am so pleased that viewers can get their summer fix of treachery and suspicion as we head Down Under for the Australian version of the show on BBC Three and iPlayer,” said Nasfim Haque, head of content for BBC Three.

The Australian version follows the U.K. and U.S. adaptations of the Dutch series, which have both been a hit for the broadcaster. All3Media International reps global rights to “The Traitors.”

Documentary

Sky News is set to release the second in its three-part series “Women at War.

The '90s were an exciting but strange time for cinema. More franchise films were being made, more chaotic filmmaking styles were being employed, and there was a resurgence in the indie film scene with many promising new artists rising up. Many great movies came out during this period from great filmmakers, but one director had an exceptional run of films that could be considered some of the greatest of the decade. That director is the Hong Kong auteur Wong Kar-wai.

The films made by Kar-wai during this decade would define his unique style of filmmaking and cement him as one of the greatest artists in filmmaking. They include such masterpieces as Days of Being Wild, Chunking Express, Fallen Angels, and Happy Together, each film bearing his iconic style and moving storytelling. To further prove how important he was to the decade, here are four reasons why Wong Kar-wai was...

“Devdas,” the 1917 novella by Bengali author Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay, is one of the most commonly adapted stories in Indian cinema, and the tale's star-crossed romance and harsh critique of contemporary social mores have served as an influence for countless books and films. By the time then up-and-coming auteur Anurag Kashyap began conceiving his own take on “Devdas,” there had been at least fifteen movies directly or indirectly based on the novel, and the wildly popular Shah Rukh Khan version had recently been released in 2002. Not wanting to merely copy what came before, Kashyap decided to alter the story to reflect 21st-century social issues. This resulted in 2009's “Dev. D,” a bold adaptation that brought an arthouse style to general audiences.

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The basic plot outline stays loyal to the source material. A rich young man named Dev (Abhay Deol) is...

Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI, and sign up for our weekly email newsletter by clicking here.NEWSNon-Fiction.The Writers Guild of America went on strike Tuesday; this is the first major Hollywood strike since 2007. Michael Schulman of the New Yorker speaks with several screenwriters about the conditions they are advocating to change, highlighting the ways in which streaming has transformed their livelihoods.Olivier Assayas is cooking up a new project with his current muse Vincent Macaigne, titled Hors du temps, per the actor’s Instagram. Macaigne wonderfully held the center of Assayas’s limited-series rewiring of Irma Vep (2022), and brought a similarly melancholy pathos to Non-Fiction (2018).The Cannes Film Festival has announced that John C. Reilly will preside over the Un Certain Regard jury—a worthy recognition of his Mvp status in Claire Denis’s Stars at Noon (2022). Alongside...

Wong Kar Wai's Chungking Express (1994) is now streaming on Mubi in Latin America, India, the Netherlands, and many other countries.Shot on a shoestring in six wild weeks, Chungking Express (1994) is the movie that put legendary Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar Wai on the international map—along with his star, pop diva Faye Wong...and her Cantonese cover of The Cranberries's hit "Dreams."Host Rico Gagliano learns how the song, the director, and the singer all came together to capture Hong Kong at a moment of anxiety and hope—and how the tune still unites people in karaoke bars across Asia. Featuring Cranberries guitarist Noel Hogan, Hong Kong-born indiepop star Emma-Lee Moss (aka Emmy The Great), and NPR critic-at large John Powers—the author, with Wong Kar Wai, of Wkw: The Cinema of Wong Kar Wai.Listen to episode 4 below or wherever you get your podcasts: Apple PodcastsStitcherSpotifyGoogle PodcastsMore...

Wong Kar-wai isn't a filmmaker particularly known for his sense of humour. His work is many things: romantic, sumptuous, sensual, atmospheric. When he does attempt comedy, it's often tied to one character, an oddball outlier who provides a humorous foil to one of his stony-faced protagonists. The last thing you would expect his name attached to is a wacky parody wuxia movie less in line with King Hu and more on the same page as a Zucker Brothers production, and yet, from the spare change of the enormously expensive and troubled production behind his own “Ashes of Time”, “The Eagle Shooting Heroes” exists.

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Jet Tone Films was established after the release of Wong's first two sensitive tough guy movies (“As Tears Go By” and “Days of Being Wild”), and its initial efforts went towards adapting Jin Yong's classic wuxia novel,...

The Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings brought a whole range of new characters to the MCU, as well as featuring several returning cast members — here is the Shang-Chi cast. Telling a story of a family fractured by loss, as well as that of a long-feared supernatural enemy, Shang-Chi has been praised by critics for its heartfelt story and the ways it expands the MCU into new territory. It also features a cast of mostly Asian actors, both new and legendary, bringing welcome diversity into the canon of Marvel superheroes.

The collected Shang-Chi cast is a true gamut of talent. Given the focus on king fu and martial arts, the inclusion of Asian cinema legends Michelle Yeoh and Tony Leung Chiu-wai is a boon for Marvel. Simu Liu's and Meng'er Zhang's martial arts finesse and Awkafina's comedy truly add their own elements to the movie. There...