Stars: Chow Yun-Fat, Alex Man, Guk Fung, Wu Ma, Yu Sin, Cecilia Yip

Director: Po Chih Leong

Summary: The story of three friends who escape Hong Kong in 1941.

When a refugee (Chow Yun-Fat) from the war-torn North arrives penniless in Hong Kong, he discovers love and sorrow in a friendship with a coolie and an acquaintance with a lovely woman. Yun-Fat was awarded a Taiwan Golden Horse Award for Best Actor for this role.

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Hong Kong 1941is a film from the former Crown Colony uniquely focusing on the Japanese occupation during the Second World War. Starring Chow Yun-Fat, shortly before A Better Tomorrow(1986) made him a superstar, this is a war drama far removed from the usual action fare expected from Hong Kong cinema. The English title deliberately evokes Spielberg's 1941, though the content anticipates the same director's Empire of the Sun, even to the extent that the hymn "Suo Gan" is used in both movies. The story of two friends in love with the same woman may call to mind Pearl Harbor, though this comparatively low-budget feature offers an infinitely more convincing account of the horrors of war than Michael Bay's glossy big-budget epic, with some of the most harrowing sequences since The Deer Hunter.

The film does not shy away from the moral complexities of collaboration with the enemy, and likewise presents the main characters as fully three-dimensional. Chow Yun-Fat inevitably dominates (he won a Golden Horse award for his performance), yet Cecilia Yip Tong makes a strong impression as the heroine whose terminal illness does not result in the expected sentimental clichés. Alex Man is memorable as the third corner of the triangle, but what makes Hong Kong 1941genuinely notable is its emotionally charged evocation of WWII from a rarely seen perspective.

On the DVD:Hong Kong 1941is presented in an anamorphically enhanced transfer at 1.77:1, cropping just a little of the original Hong Kong Critics Award-winning cinematography. The picture is excellent, with no blemishes, fine detail, rich colours and barely a hint of grain. The sound is offered in stereo in the original Cantonese, with optional English subtitles, or in a Dolby Digital 5.1 remix and dubbed into English. Both tracks have occasional distortion on the music. The original version preserves the performances much better, though some of the subtitles are wildly inaccurate--references to living in the 21st century and to Japanese jet planes--while the dubbed track offers better than average voice acting but with many of the cultural references Westernised. The multi-channel remix adds only discrete ambient effects and is barely noticeable.

The main special features are an information-packed commentary by Hong Kong movie expert Bay Logan, and two interviews. Chow Yun-Fat speaks rather nervously in English for 12 minutes on a variety of topics, concentrating on his work with John Woo. The interview with Cecilia Yip Tong, specific to Hong Kong 1941, is in Cantonese with English subtitles, runs 27 minutes and is anamorphically enhanced with excellent image quality. Also included is a routine photo gallery, the original theatrical trailer and 12 Hong Kong Legends DVD trailers. --Gary S Dalkin

Aspect Ratio:	16:9 Anamorphic Wide Screen
Main Language:	Cantonese
Region:	Region 2
Special Features:	Feature Length Audio Commentary With Bey Logan, Trailers, Biographies, Interview Gallery With Director Po Chih Leong And Chow Yun Fat And Cecilia Yip
Subtitles:	English
Year:	1984
Release Date:	January 21, 2002
Runtime:	101 minutes
Certification:
Catalogue Number:	M D V 587
Label:	Hong Kong Legends
Keywords:	Kong, General, Dawn, Wide, Screen, Dubbed, Waiting, Drama, Cantonese, Hong
Genre:	Drama