Love Will Tear Us Apart

The directing début of Yu – previously cameraman on Jia Zhangke’s Xiao Wu (Rotterdam 1999) – focuses on the new underclass in Hong Kong: immigrants from the People’s Republic who work in the sex industry or do other less desirable jobs. Ah Ying is a ‘Madame from the Great North’, as prostitutes from the mainland are called disparagingly. She has entered Hong Kong on a visitor’s visa. She does not exist as far as the city is concerned and the city does not exist for her. She has met three other immigrants. Quin, once a dance teacher, works as lift attendant in a large restaurant, after losing her son and a leg in a car accident. She lives with Ah Jian, a failed crook who works in a porn shop on the verge of bankruptcy. Ah Chun is an introverted and disciplined lift mechanic, whose only hobby is to tell bad jokes on talk radio programmes. Yu did not choose a sociological-documentary style. Unlike the sallow photography of Xiao Wu for instance, Love Will Tear Us Apart is beautifully composed. The film is filled with details with which Yu investigates why his protagonists are not able to change their situation. Surprisingly enough, Yu does that with great humour and warmth. The cast is a mixture of great stars (Tony Leung and Lü Liping) and newcomers (Wong Ning and Rolf Chow).