Happy Together

Wong Kar-Wai's Hong Kong classic "Happy Together" was made during a period between a series of eclectic portraits of contemporary Hong Kong - mixing coolness with melancholy - and the delicate melodrama about unrequited love "Made for Love". "Happy Together" forms a kind of bridge between these two styles.

Wong left Hong Kong and set his portrait of a turbulent love affair between two young men primarily in Argentina, where the Hong Kong couple initially went on a trip together but eventually became stranded without money. The film's core consists of brilliant performances by Leslie Cheung and Tony Leung in Wong's characteristically loose style, which relies on impressions rather than a rationally constructed plot. The main narrative dissolves into subplots, with the story developing through impulsive turns dictated by the central couple's regular separations and reunions.

Wong here, as in his previous films, is fascinated by the dynamics of love and loneliness as well as the transience of time - reflected in his typical stylistic elements such as manipulation of recording speed or the construction of narrative from various variations on the same situation. For "Happy Together" he won the directing prize at the Cannes Film Festival, confirming his status as an internationally recognized auteur. Due to its subject matter, the film also ranks among the key works of so-called new queer cinema - the movement within independent and art cinema at that time focused on the representation of queerness.