Radiance Films: Romancing in Thin Air (2012) - Reviewed

Images courtesy of Radiance Films

Johnnie To’s 2012 mountainous countryside dramedy Romancing in Thin Air coming to Blu-ray disc in the West for the first time outside of Hong Kong and released the same year as his action crime epic Drug War represents a side of the director few if anyone outside of the country has glimpsed.  Ordinarily working within the action thriller subgenre with some occasional comedy, the award-winning Running on Karma director offered up perhaps the most impassioned and heartfelt meditation on the overarching power of cinema and its connections to love, loss and grief since Cinema Paradiso or Goodbye Dragon Inn. 
 
A movie-within-a-movie premise that mashes up the fast-paced glib lifestyle of celebrity against that of the ordinary civilian growing up enjoying celebrity aura, the Hong Kong-Chinese co-production finally takes its rightful place in Western cinephile libraries as a contemporary romantic classic palatable across many filmgoing circles.  You don’t have to be a studied fan of Johnnie To or Hong Kong cinema in general for this one to tether its hooks into your heartstrings. 

 
Hotshot Hong Kong movie star Michael Lau (Louis Koo) has just won the Best Actor award for his latest film alongside his costar Ding Yuanyuan (Gao Yuanyuan) and is about to propose marriage to her as a star-studded engagement when she instead elopes with her first love, coal miner Zhang Xing (Wang Baoqiang).  Leaving him heartbroken, he begins a self-destructive alcohol binge and avoiding paparazzi stows away into the back of a Shangri-La Country bound truck to the remote mountainous countryside Deep Woods Hotel. 

 
Falling ill from altitude sickness given the location, he reawakens under the care of Sau (Sammi Cheng) a widowed woman still grieving the loss of her husband who disappeared several years prior into the sea of trees.  At first Michael is a big problem, stealing and wrecking Sau’s piano, truck and motorcycle on a drunken effort to get back home.  Over time however, the two start forming an unlikely bond as he learns more about Sau’s past as an art student in Hong Kong and Michael soon discovers there’s far more to their relationship than either of them initially realized.
 
One of Johnnie To’s most nuanced and emotionally powerful films, a tender-hearted meditation on the inextricable link between personal trauma and cinematic catharsis and how one medium can impact the life and outlook of another, Romancing in Thin Air is a wonderful romantic dramedy that deftly mixes comic melodrama and unadorned emotional weight.  From its evocative score by Guy Zerafa to its scenic panoramic scope widescreen cinematography by Cheng Siu-Keung, the picture has a soft loveliness to it with occasional tranquil vistas of the high-altitude hotel. 

 
Featuring gifted and heartfelt performances from the two leads, Louis Koo as the hot shot actor forced to slow down his routine and get some much needed perspective and especially Sammi Cheng as the grieving widow who has hit the pause button on her own life into a status quo of melancholic mourning her husband’s eventual “return” from the sea of trees.  Supporting performers are strong like Li Guangjie as Sau’s late husband Xiaotian glimpsed in emotional flashbacks as a man caught in the middle of meeting his wife’s expectations while also dealing with her own obsession with movie star Michael before he one day unknowingly stumbles upon her domain. 
 
Released in the Winter of 2012 in both Hong Kong and mainland China prior to his return to the crime film with Drug War, Romancing in Thin Air was one of the director’s few pictures that did not secure international distribution for over a decade.  Thankfully now with the proliferation of boutique labels like 88 Films, Arrow Video or Eureka Entertainment who have been pumping out Hong Kong films like no tomorrow, audiences now finally have a chance to give Romancing in Thin Air its proper due course. 

 
Radiance’s Blu-ray disc presented in scope 2.35:1 widescreen featuring both Cantonese 5.1 surround or 2.0 stereo audio is housed with plentiful extras including an audio commentary with Dylan Cheung, video essay by Sean Gilman, behind-the-scenes footage with a making-of featurette, collector’s booklet and reversible sleeve art with the time-honored OBI spine.  One of the action director’s very best movies showing him working far outside of his usual genre, Romancing in Thin Air is a pitch-perfect little romantic gem and testament to the lasting power of the movies on human relationships for better or worse. 

--Andrew Kotwicki