An Autumn's Tale

Sean Gilman4.0

One of the more underrated New York movies. A film that really believes in the city as a place where people come from all over the world to invent themselves. Also part of a cycle of films about leaving Hong Kong that sprouted in the wake of the Joint Declaration. A fairy tale about leaving home and finding all the best things about it somewhere else, without the looming threat of authoritarian takeover. Chow Yun-fat and Cherie Chung make such a gorgeous couple, even with him constantly unshaven and disheveled and her buried under wool scarves, sweaters and skirts. Mabel Cheung is so great at capturing these two other-worldly movie stars in the run-down, pre-gentrification city, finding pockets of beauty that almost match their own. Shots of the bridge call out to Woody Allen, but the images are closer to Michael Powell.

Northernlion4.5

It's peak -- funny, lively, beautiful shots, and they went demon mode on the score. Literally a better ending than The Shawshank Redemption.

danne

so lovely!! stories about asian diaspora going through a cultural change in the west has a special place in my heart. the variation of one's day-to-day rituals expiring, morphing, becoming something else entirely new, we find looking at ourselves the same, but something’s changed hasn’t it? we grasp to the familiar in an ocean of the unknown; yet it’s as simple as opening our hearts to new connections that we uncover the gifts life has to offer; like a table for two, and happiness that follows. my cinematic journey was severely lacking of cherie and i need to remedy that. i can’t overstate how refreshing it’s to see chow yun-fat as a sweet mumbling fool compared to coolness he exuded in his HK action flicks. he really can do it all.