-By JOHN WALLIS

Ostensibly As Tears Go By takes the Mean Streets blueprint, an older, gaining sensibility gangster looking out for a reckless and wild younger cohort, and turns the idea into a character study of low level Chinese gangsters and the pressures of being on the bottom rung in the criminal underworld. So, although both roughly share the same premise, they each reflect their own distinct culture- Mean Streets is very New York, As Tears Go By is very Chinese. And, like Scorsese’s film, Wong Kar Wai’s debut shows all the signs of a new director with style, flair, and vision. While many Chinese gangster films are usually pretty romantic about the underworld lifestyle , like A Better Tomorrow, As Tears Go By takes a more squalid, dirty, realistic approach.

Wong Kar Wai is one of the few directors whose expressive style does not overwhelm the actors. In his best films, like In the Mood for Love, Happy Together and Chunking Express, as explosively slick, dreamy, stylish, or frenetic as Wong’s camera work is, his actors are equally explosive internally with their emotions, and Wong usually keeps his actors comfortable in their characters skin. READ MORE

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