Rating: 
Summary: Unforgettable
Review: Some scenes from certain movies just stay in your head forever and ever. I don't think I can ever forget the two tango scenes, one in the middle involving the lovers and the other near the end. WKW is one fantastically nutty dude, and I love him for it.
Rating: 
Summary: Seen it, love it and buy it...
Review: The best Hong Kong film ever made. What can be more boring than to see another Hollywood movie about relationships such as _You've got mail!_, _While you were sleeping_, _Something to talk about_. Here, in _Happy Together_ the outpouring of emotion is subtle, artistic but unpretentious. The plot is smooth, somehow expected, or generic, universal, yet both the director and actors handle it in a refreshing and capitavating way with the great company of cinematography and music. A film about gay couple from Hong Kong traveling to Argentina to renew their relationship is no easy task, because the travel motif, and the (gay or any) relationship thing are not original by any standard. However, Wong Kar-wai manages to put the pieces together seamlessly. Viewers are also pampered by the use (as well as the lack) of colors...
Rating:
Summary: I love this movie
Review: The first time i saw this movie, I have to admit, I fell asleep. And the second time I saw "HAPPY TOGETHER", I fell asleep again. But each time, I just wanted to slap myself because I had been told and knew deep down inside, it was a great movie. And finally, the third time I saw it, the movie just captured my heart. "HAPPY TOGETHER" is a love story in it's most darkest and bittersweet form. Two gay lovers venture out to Argentina from Hong Kong and the idea of them being happy together is seriously tested. One lover (I can't remember the name) is stable, diligent, and so giving while the other one is just simply a selfish gay slut. They try several times to start over, but each time, the selfish lover wants to eat his cake too. Like all of Wong Kar-wai's films, this one has little dialogue and the story is told mainly through visuals. The waterfall is a major theme running through the movie. The beginning opens up in black and white and later on, when the lovers start over again, color (in a very Wong Kar-wai-esque cinematic sense of it) comes in. And the soundtrack (mostly Astor Piazola) is just an unforgetable part of the movie. I heard that before making this film, Wong Kar-wai was reading a lot of Manuel Puig (gay Argentine writer of "KISS OF THE SPIDERWOMAN"). Puig dealt with mainly the themes of unrequited love, impossible love, the love that hurts you more than gives you pleasure. And often, his characters where pretty much society's castoffs, whether because they were gay, revolutionaries, or just plain freaks. You can see a lot of these same themes in many of Wong Kar-wai films, but it hits the hardest in this one. The plot is rather simple, but Wong Kar-wai seems to be the master of capturing those feelings people don't talk about-- those feelings that show up only on our faces. In the end, I cried. Not because I had my heart broken in the same fashion, or because I'm one of those people uncapable of attaining love. I cried because the movie just eats away at your heart little by little and anywhere within the last 15 minutes of the film, the tears come and you don't know if you're crying because you're sad or you're happy.
Rating:
Summary: I love this movie
Review: The first time i saw this movie, I have to admit, I fell asleep. And the second time I saw "HAPPY TOGETHER", I fell asleep again. But each time, I just wanted to slap myself because I had been told and knew deep down inside, it was a great movie. And finally, the third time I saw it, the movie just captured my heart. "HAPPY TOGETHER" is a love story in it's most darkest and bittersweet form. Two gay lovers venture out to Argentina from Hong Kong and the idea of them being happy together is seriously tested. One lover (I can't remember the name) is stable, diligent, and so giving while the other one is just simply a selfish gay slut. They try several times to start over, but each time, the selfish lover wants to eat his cake too. Like all of Wong Kar-wai's films, this one has little dialogue and the story is told mainly through visuals. The waterfall is a major theme running through the movie. The beginning opens up in black and white and later on, when the lovers start over again, color (in a very Wong Kar-wai-esque cinematic sense of it) comes in. And the soundtrack (mostly Astor Piazola) is just an unforgetable part of the movie. I heard that before making this film, Wong Kar-wai was reading a lot of Manuel Puig (gay Argentine writer of "KISS OF THE SPIDERWOMAN"). Puig dealt with mainly the themes of unrequited love, impossible love, the love that hurts you more than gives you pleasure. And often, his characters where pretty much society's castoffs, whether because they were gay, revolutionaries, or just plain freaks. You can see a lot of these same themes in many of Wong Kar-wai films, but it hits the hardest in this one. The plot is rather simple, but Wong Kar-wai seems to be the master of capturing those feelings people don't talk about-- those feelings that show up only on our faces. In the end, I cried. Not because I had my heart broken in the same fashion, or because I'm one of those people uncapable of attaining love. I cried because the movie just eats away at your heart little by little and anywhere within the last 15 minutes of the film, the tears come and you don't know if you're crying because you're sad or you're happy.
Rating:
Summary: Dysfuctional Relationships 101
Review: This film is about two Chinese men (from Hong Kong) who are codependant on each other, in their dysfuctional relationship, on a road trip to see a certain waterfall in Argentina. Their car breaks down and are forced to reside and work in the city.
The one man (more stable) seeks employment as the other just drifts from one disaster to another; getting beat up and depending on the other characther for support; until he (the more stable man) just gets fed up and seeks friendship in another chinese man from the place of his employment who is about to leave and go back to China and lends his tape recorder to the main charatcher to record his sadness ( a very touching scene) which he will take back to his homeland (in an attempt to remove his sadness from him).
What inpressed me about this film was how the director drew me into the various scenes; like when the one characther was falling down drunk on the street corner in front of a bar in the early morning hours; or the rundown Argentine apartment with the ratty mattress etc. and finally the drive to the waterfall or when the helpless lover realizes that boyfriend has left him for good add to a nuance that moves you past of any obvious plot.
This is a different film to be sure, but one that stands out in its own style and you appreciate, in the end what the director and the screenwriters meant to deliver; that there are dysfuctional relationships in this world, and not every story has a happy ending.
One negitive point I wish to point out is that sometimes it was diffficult to read the subtitles due to the background color of some scenes.
Thankyou for reading my review, I hope it was of some help.
Jerry Balmes
Rating:
Summary: painfully incisive about modern alienation
Review: this is a beautiful film, period. But one of the great things is that the gay couple in the film are just that---a couple--going through the boredom and the tensions of a relationships, the communication barriers that even years of familiarty do not eradicate. ' It captures the tragic and overwhelming isolation in contemporary society with a graceful beauty that is perhaps symbolized by the waterfall. Anyway, if you want more than popcorn in your movies, see it.
Rating:
Summary: brilliant
Review: This is about a tumultuous, sad relationship that just happens to be between two men. It's superbly acted and with yet another exquisite performance by Leslie Cheung. One is the destructive loser while the other tries to keep the pieces of their lives together.."I had no regrets 'til I met you, now my regrets could kill me". Wong Kar-Wai has a way of filming decadence, and the confusion and pain that surrounds it in such a compelling way...filmed in Argentina, the sounds of the country are captured so well it's as if I was there..which brings me to one of my favorite scenes, when the young Chang (Chang Chen, he's wonderful !) explains how you can see better with your ears. This marvelous film is so real, that if you have had a failed relationship in your life, you'll find one or more scenes that will make you think "I remember that...".
Rating:
Summary: Well worth the trouble
Review: This is an excellent film by an exciting director. The cinematography is exciting, breath-taking at times; the soundtrack is absolutely delightful. I was so impressed with Happy Together, I rented the only other film by Wong Kar-Wai I could find, Chungking Express, which is also excellent. I wish it also was a gay film. Happy Together is not an easy film, however. It depicts a drawn out and very messy breakup of two desperately in love young men. There is the expected difficulty of it being a foreign language film and I was put off by the sometimes very poor subtitling (it shouldn't be that hard to find someone in Hong Kong who speaks good English, should it?) Besides stupid grammatical errors, the words sometimes do not seem to match the tone of voice or actions on screen, more so for Ho Po-Wing than for Fai Yui-Lai; I kept wondering what was being lost in the translation. On many subsequent viewings I have come to appreciate the musicality of the language and it is part of my enjoyment of the film. When I replay the scenes in my mind, I hear them as well as see them -- perhaps the influence of Chang? But I am still irritated by the subtitles. I was also put off by the intensity of Fai's anger, which it took me a long time to figure out. Despite these difficulties, I loved the sound track and cinematography and they were enough to keep me watching while the story was leaving me cold. The opening scenes in Argentina are reminscent, for me, of Hud, a film I saw at an impressionable age, the memory of which still blows me away. But I was not really engrossed in the film until the scene of Fai with Chang's recorder at Tres Amigos. Once I finally got clued in to the emotional story line I watched with total attention and in no time Happy Together has become one of my favorite gay films. When these two are in love - the dance scenes in the tenement kitchen are particularly well done - they are a joy to watch. When they are fighting, I can't take my eyes off of them. The anguish which the two feel, particularly Ho, when they realize it's really over, is very powerful. Fai's visit to the night market at Taipei sets off some very loud chimes in the back of my head. I've done something like that in pursuit of a not-quite-available crush. I highly recommend this film. Visually it may immediately draw you in, as it did me. On other levels, it may be more difficult to appreciate, but give it time and you will be rewarded with a great, if not happy, love story. Since most of us have gone through at least one messy breakup, it's a story that's not hard to relate to.
Rating: 
Summary: Stunnigly made, but a story??
Review: This is one of the few movies that i can easily forget about the plot, and concentrate on the visual experience (Belly being another). I find Wong Kar Wai's movies intriguing, and chris doyles camerawork and photography amazing. This film was beautiful, it just lacked a lot in the plot department. But it didn't seem to matter. The things I find best about Wong Kar Wais films are that you never understand them fully until they are over, and he can say so much more without dialogue that any other director, ever.
Rating: 
Summary: On my 10 WORST list
Review: This is one of the worst movies I have ever seen. If I hadn't read the reviews posted here I would have had NO idea what was going on. Actually I STILL have NO idea what was going on. TOTAL waste of time and money.
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