"That peasant has gone mad" A Tsui Hark film that feels very much like an extension of some of the Hui brothers' work. Extremely political but not in a way that is didactic or forceful, Working Class instead utilizes farce to elucidate the absurdities of this system and its false promises towards labor; serfdom hasn't been abolished by merely repositioned - sworn loyalty to a lord is merely replaced by the same expectations from the managerial class in a rapidly booming Hong Kong. The anarchical nature of our main protagonists, their actions represent an implicit refusal to conform to the social order presented in front of them, is not a rejection of labor or hard work but a rejection of the inequalities and subjugation which the newly formed managerial class wields. In many ways, Samuel Hui's character intro says so much about the film's intentions in the opening few minutes. Arriving to be the hero at a competitive soccer game in the streets of Hong Kong, His chiseled physique illustrating his life is one of constant action, movement, and work; The vast skyscrapers brought by capital in a booming economy lurk in the background, hanging over the workers as they compete. I know a lot of people consider this to be a lesser Tsui Hark, and perhaps it does feel out of character in some ways for the filmmaker, but Working Class really does align with the filmmaker's familiar conceptions related to the anarchism intrinsic to living and rejection of the status quo or social order defined through authority, Tsui just deploys farce to make his point this time around.
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AuthorLove of all things cinema brought me here. Archives
June 2023
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