Ann Hui is one of the foremost auteurs in Hong Kong cinema, the filmmaker behind some of the territory’s most thoughtful and touching productions about immigrants and social outcasts. But over the years she has also directed more commercial films, including “Love in a Fallen City”, produced by major studio Shaw Brothers. The film stands out in her filmography as more commercial and traditional than her usual fare, but it also paves the way for some of her later masterpieces.
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The story centers on Bai Liu-Su (Cora Miao), a divorcée living in Shanghai in the early 1940s and having to face the pressure of her declining aristocratic family, who shame and despise her for her failed marriage. Encountering the charming and womanizing businessman Fan Liu-Yan (the irresistible Chow Yun Fat), she follows him to Hong Kong to escape her spiteful siblings. But history will soon catch up with the two would-be lovers, as the Japanese are about to invade the British colony.
“Love in a Fallen City” could easily have been a typical historical romance and melodrama, with star-crossed lovers from opposite social backgrounds caught in the turmoil of history. Thankfully, the film is more surprising and substantial than what a quick description of the story might lead to believe. The movie, after all, is adapted from the eponymous novella by Eileen Chang, a major Chinese novelist who also wrote the more famous “Lust, Caution”, popularized by the 2007 adaptation by Ang Lee.
The author was 23 when “Love in a Fallen City” was published in 1943, and there is a strong autobiographical flavor to the story: Chang was herself part an aristocratic family from Shanghai, was living in Hong Kong at the time of the Japanese invasion in 1941, and met her first husband at the same time. This makes the story one about strikingly contemporary events, but also one about the difficulties encountered by many women: the pressure of the traditional family hierarchy (Bai is a sixth sister), the power of men (fathers, brothers or husbands) over women, sexual politics, and the sheer cynicism underlying the marriage market. This should give the film, told from the point of view of its female protagonist, great insights into the mindset and personality of its heroine, a woman physically abused by her first husband and who longs for freedom and happiness. Unfortunately, a major issue with the movie is its inability to make audiences truly empathize with her.
This should give the film, told from the point of view of its female protagonist, great insights into the mindset and personality of its heroine, a woman physically abused by her first husband and who longs for freedom and happiness. Unfortunately, a major issue with the movie is its inability to make audiences truly empathize with her.
Cora Miao (who already shined in Hui’s previous feature, “Boat People“) is a gifted actress, but she is stuck playing Bai as a reserved, self-effacing woman who, as the self-confident Fan Liu-Yan remarks several times, keeps looking down at the floor. This is required by the nature of the character, but the camera never finds ways of circumventing her introversion and expressing visually her repressed feelings and longings.
Instead, the film belongs to Chow Yun Fat’s Fan, who has a more complex and flamboyant personality: coming back from years of education in Britain, he has been partly Westernized, as his elegant costumes show, and is looking for a traditional Chinese woman like Bai. What he means by that is not always clear, but he seems to be looking for a submissive wife who would embody the traditional Chinese values he feels are lacking from his own background.
This sets up a deeply unhealthy dynamic between the two characters, as Fan is in a situation of dominance over Bai, knows it and relinquishes it. At times, he seems to express genuine feelings for Bai, and sympathy for her unfortunate situation, but at other times the misogynistic Fan seems to be mocking and teasing her, or to only be wanting sex from her and nothing more. This ambiguity is ideal for Chow Yun Fat to shine in this early role in his career, and he oozes with charm and charisma in every single scene. But he also stands out in darker moments of self-introspection as his soulful character reveals more depth behind his apparent dandy cynicism. He recites poetry or waxes lyrics about the passage of time and the transient nature of civilizations, and will ultimately prove his uprightness in the last act by sticking to Bai and marrying her during the occupation (in what feels at points like a rushed conclusion).
Yet next to the scene-chewing Chow Yun Fat, Miao is stuck in the role of the constrained woman who is so inexpressive as to be bland and who seemingly only thinks of marriage. This is meant to express the plight of such women, doomed to marry to have a chance to contentment, but how can audiences empathize with such a withdrawn, understated character? The film never finds the answer to that dilemma.
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Where it succeeds, however, is in its visual depiction of the era, especially the scenes set in the Repulse Bay hotel, a legendary luxury resort of the colonial era which was destroyed two years before the film was released. The interior and exterior sets, the costumes and props used by the cast are all stunning, while the gorgeous cinematography by Anthony Hope bathes the characters in superb diaphanous light. The camera does an excellent job at filming the splendid sets, as well as the destruction brought about the invasion inside the hotel.
Although it was nominated for several Hong Kong awards and was a modest box office success, “Love in a Fallen City” was almost instantly eclipsed by “Hong Kong 1941”, released three months later. This is ironical, since that film has a similar setting and storyline and features the same charismatic Chow Yun Fat, who won his first Golden Horse Award for Best Actor thanks to that film.
As for Ann Hui, she would return to Eileen Chang’s works, first in 1997 with “Eighteen Springs”, then in 2020 with “Love After Love”. Although the latter was a mixed bag, the former did justice to the works of the brilliant writer Chang was. It also showed how adept Hui is in adapting the writer’s works, something which was only intermittently visible in “Love in a Fallen City”.
