The 77th edition of the Cannes Film Festival runs from today, May 14, to May 25. Among the many excellent films that the festival will honour, this year, a Hong Kong production will be screened as part of the Cannes Classic sector. Hong Kong filmmaker Tsui Hark’s 1984 romantic comedy Shanghai Blues is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, and the film has now been restored to 4K quality specially for Cannes.
Set in Shanghai in the late 30s, Shanghai Blues tells the story of a young woman named Shu (played by Sylvia Chang) and a young soldier Tung (Kenny Bee) who happen to shelter under a bridge together when the city is bombed. Though unable to see each other properly, they form an immediate attraction to each other and vow to meet after the war. A decade later, the pair cross paths again, unaware that they have already met each other in their youth.
Tsui and producer Nansun Shi, co-founders of the production company Film Workshop, personally supervised this meticulous digital restoration project from the original negative with film restoration laboratory L’Immagine Ritrovata, and the soundtrack was remixed by One Cool Sound. While the original film only had Cantonese and Mandarin dubs depending on their respective markets, this new version will come with new dubbing, featuring each character speaking in their native dialects of Cantonese, Mandarin, and Shanghainese, for more authenticity. The English subtitles will also be improved so non-Chinese speakers can better grasp the context and intricacies of the script.
Shanghai Blues was screened at the 1986 International Film Festival in Rotterdam, as well as the Berlinale in 1987, during its initial run. It’s great to see this representation of the heyday of Hong Kong cinema now being honoured at the Festival de Cannes – hopefully this remastered version of the film will later be brought home to be screened to Hong Kong audiences.
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