Wong Kar Wai

Happy Together

Happy Together

One of the most searing romances of the 1990s, Wong Kar Wai’s emotionally raw, lushly stylized portrait of a relationship in breakdown casts Hong Kong superstars Tony Leung Chiu Wai and Leslie Cheung Kwok Wing as a couple traveling through Argentina and locked in a turbulent cycle of infatuation and destructive jealousy as they break up, make up, and fall apart again and again. Setting out to depict the dynamics of a queer relationship with empathy and complexity on the cusp of the 1997 handover of Hong Kong—when the country’s LGBTQ community suddenly faced an uncertain future—Wong crafts a feverish look at the life cycle of a love affair that is by turns devastating and deliriously romantic. Shot by ace cinematographer Christopher Doyle in both luminous monochrome and luscious saturated color, Happy Together is an intoxicating exploration of displacement and desire that swoons with the ache and exhilaration of love at its heart-tearing extremes.

Film Info

  • Hong Kong
  • 1997
  • 96 minutes
  • Black and White/Color
  • 1.85:1

Available In

Collector's Set

World of Wong Kar Wai

World of Wong Kar Wai

Blu-ray Box Set

7 Discs

$159.96

Happy Together
Cast
Leslie Cheung Kwok Wing
Ho Po-Wing
Tony Leung Chiu Wai
Lai Yiu-Fai
Chang Chen
Chang
Credits
Director
Wong Kar Wai
Producer
Wong Kar Wai
Written by
Wong Kar Wai
Executive producer
Chan Ye Cheng
Coproducer
Jacky Pang Yee Wah
Cinematography by
Christopher Doyle
Production designer
William Chang Suk Ping
Edited by
William Chang Suk Ping
Wong Ming Lam
Music by
Danny Chung

Current

World of Wong Kar Wai: Like the Most Beautiful Times
World of Wong Kar Wai: Like the Most Beautiful Times

By marrying the glamour of golden-age Hollywood to a quicksilver formal daring influenced by a wide range of artists, the Hong Kong auteur became one of the coolest and most beloved filmmakers in the world in the 1990s.

By John Powers

Ray Yeung’s Top 10
Ray Yeung’s Top 10

The director of All Shall Be Well chooses a selection of films that reflect the joys and sorrows of life and explore themes of love, grief, ambition, and sacrifice.

Sebastian Meise’s Top 10
Sebastian Meise’s Top 10

The writer-director of Great Freedom shares a list of provocative and stylistically daring films that have long lingered in his mind.