Media Review: She Remembers, He Forgets (哪一天我們會飛)

 
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      “She Remembers, He Forgets” is a Hong Kong movie released in 2015. It is about a couple to regain their passion for dream. The whole film adopts plane to articulate the identity crisis of Hong Kong people and mainlanders, political ideology and the chase of dream.

 
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        In 1992, the characters had to establish a detail plan for their future when they were secondary students. The female protagonist, Yu Fungchi (YU) was not only thinking about her future, but also struggled in between two boys, Pang Shingwah (PANG) and also So Bokman (SO). Here, the decision contains political implication: SO implies “Immigrant” and escaping the reality. Whereas, PANG implies “Remainder”, staying in Hong Kong as a protector. Finally, YU chose to be with PANG and accepted Hong Kong’s return to the Motherland. The contextual definer enables the existence of Dominant-hegemonic Reading since Hong Kong people are regarded as active audience. They all had undergone the same situation as YU. Due to the social and cultural circumstances, it is more effective for Hong Kong people to decode the message which the director wants to deliver. Most of Hong Kong people chose to stay in Hong Kong at that time but the result is the threat of mistress, which implies the invasion of mainlanders. Therefore, YU felt regret and intended to contact SO as a fantasy to get rid of the current situation. However, it is too late, just like Hong Kong people are no longer have second chance anymore.

        In addition, Director WONG depicts a negative image of mainlander illustrated by two scenes, which are the troublesome and willful mainland client and also the mainland mistress. Although Director WONG did not emphasize on constructing a positive image of Hong Kong people, he strengthened that outsiders (mainlander) are poor of everything except rich. The character of client indicates how luxurious the mainlanders are. It is a demonstration of Blame Gossip which refers to the stigmatization of outsiders. It is undoubtedly that the cultural identity of mainlander is naturalized further by this movie. On the other hand, it can definitely arouse the resonance of audience, especially for those who need to work for mainlanders.

        Besides, Director WONG usually produces works focusing on one genre, which is the chasing of dream with adding nostalgic iconographies such as Dragon Balls Comic, Gameboy, YES! Magazine, Lion Rock and Kai Tak Airport so as to attract audience. It is because of the popularity of his previous movies for example “The Way We Dance”. Those iconographies contribute a lot on recalling the collective memory of Hong Kong people and symbolizing the spirit of Hong Kong people. Director WONG also arranged himself to be a classmate. Some of classmates wrote down “Dancer”, “Soccer” on their dream proposal but it was hindered as a result of suiting the modern world’s taste. The aim of adding Director WONG is to encourage audience that we can do what we want to be as long as we persist. Just like the ending of movie, PANG and YU run to the Lion Rock with holding a big plane. Director WONG delivers the theme of this movie: Never give up and try your best to chase your dream.

(532 words)

LO Shuk Yee, Susie

(10559353/21619812)

(Asian Studies, Year 3)

Reference:

Assmann, J., & Czaplicka, J. (1995). Collective memory and

       cultural identity.New German Critique, (65), 125-133.

Chandler, D. (1997). An introduction to genre theory. Media

       and Communication Studies: http://www. aber. ac.

       uk/media/Documents/intgenre/intgenre1.html.