Kitchen

Banana Yoshimoto's fey novella about a psychologically damaged girl falling in with a nice young man and his transsexual father-turned-mother was first filmed - wretchedly - by Yoshimitsu Morita in 1989. Yim Ho sensibly rethinks the book, transposing the setting to Hong Kong and focusing on the boy rather than the girl. He also opts to shoot much of it in underlit close-ups, paving the way for a real visual coup in the final scene. But he can't do anything about the fundamental lack of energy in the characters and story; elegant languor inexorably slides towards torpor. Jordan Chan is excellent as the terminally tongue-tied 'hero', but has to cope with one of the worst haircuts in screen history.