76. Ashes of Time

Although each of Wong Kar Wai’s films has a distinctly different flavor, they all draw, in varying degrees, on a similar pool of ideas. These ideas include a stylish manipulation of time, a fascination with violence, a penchant for tangled romantic relationships and a preference for alienated characters. With Ashes of Time, Wong offers an elegiac, art house take on the traditional Hong Kong martial arts epic. He defies genre expectations with his complex plotting and melancholy voiceovers, and delivers a genre-bending period actioner that simply takes your breath away. Working with Australian-born cinematographer Christopher Doyle, Wong creates a striking visual style that relies on evocative sepia tones and an expressionistic blurred slow motion. Veteran star and director Sammo Hung provides the action choreography that is carefully tailored to each character’s personality.

In an interview, Wong explained that Ashes of Time is “like my whole experience about martial arts movies, the entire genre, so I want the music to be very much like Ennio Morricone.” And Frankie Chan’s score does pay homage to Morricone and highlight the influence that Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns have on this film. Like Leone, Wong manages to pay his respects to a genre while also slyly commenting on the conventions. The result is visually stunning and stylistically audacious. It also boasts a delicious all-star cast that includes Brigitte Lin Ching-hsia, Leslie Cheung, Tony Leung Kar-fai, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Jacky Cheung and a breathtakingly gorgeous Maggie Cheung. This film offers that rare combination of eye candy and substantial food for thought. Savor it. (Beth Accomando)