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THE MOVIE
It is 1960 and York (Leslie Cheung) is an angry young man without any real sense of his identity. Drifting through life, York is bankrolled by his rich adoptive mother and embittered by his status as an adoptive child. The one thing that he yearns for is the identity of his real mother but that is the one thing his adoptive mother refuses to give him.
York meets and seduces Su Lizhen (Maggie Cheung), but their relationship founders when York refuses to marry her and he moves on to Leung Fung-Ying (Carina Lau), continuing to express the rage that he feels with his own life by tormenting his lovers.
Su however refuses to completely let go and soon turns up on York’s doorstep asking without success to be taken back. In her lonely vigil Su finds some comfort in Tide (Andy Lau) a police officer who is happy to be a shoulder for Su to cry on and soon finds himself falling in love with her but it is unrequited.
Soon after York discovers that the answer he has been looking for lies in the Philippines and he abandons everything to go there.
Days of Being Wild was Wong Kar Wai’s second film as writer/director and was the first of his eight collaborations to date with cinematographer Chris Doyle. The film is very much an exploration of love, particularly unrequited love and like Wong Kar Wai’s first film, As Tears Go By, it has a lead protagonist who is unable to sustain a proper relationship. Critically lauded on its release I must confess I found the film had dated and was not a patch on Wong Kar Wai’s more recent efforts. At this stage his story telling skills, particularly his visual narrative skills were still developing, though this is a definite improvement on his directorial debut three years before with As Tears Go By. The film does suffers from some poor acting, particularly on Carina Lau’s part, and an initially confusing narrative. Chris Doyle’s work on the film makes a big difference, though it is clear his skills were also still developing at this point, though the poor quality of the transfer does not do his work any favours.
THE TRANSFER
Video:
The video transfer is a poor one (bit rate 4.5-5.5). There is extensive print damage, grain and video artefacts throughout. The print is quite dark in places and colours are somewhat muted. Details are at best ok.
Audio:
A serviceable 2.0 soundtrack is provided (bit rate 224 kbps). The dialogue is in Cantonese with English subtitles. The score and other effects are a little on the thin side. There are no lip syncing issues.
THE EXTRAS
There are no extras provided apart from a trailer for Wong Kar Wai’s latest film 2046. The UK edition of the film includes a booklet with film notes by David Parkinson, while the Hong Kong edition has a 5.1 audio track.
SUMMARY
Days of Being Wild was Wong Kar Wai’s second film as writer/director and was the first of his eight collaborations to date with cinematographer Chris Doyle. Critically lauded on its release the film has dated somewhat and its release on DVD is less than spectacular, with a poor video transfer, a serviceable audio transfer and no extras. This will be a film that will appeal to mainly Wong Kar Wai’s completists and film historians. |
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