What is After Hennessy?

Crossing Hennessy

When Loy (Jacky Cheung) and Irene (Tang Wei) stand on different sides of the Hennessy Road, and do not fall in love “at first sight” accordingly to the match-making plan of their overbearing guardians, you would think it's a gonna be one funny comedy—Wrong! The two of them are less Adam and Eve than any other couple, as the film never truly invests in this pair of odd couple “falling in love”. Rather, images of the titular backdrop—Wan Chai keep on coming as if a touristic propaganda.

Instead of focusing on their romance, Director Ivy Ho tries to make her movie to fit in all quadrants—slapstick comedy, relationship comedy, and sanctimonious ode to family values. A jumble of genres, tones, and styles, Crossing Hennessy ultimately strains to be a film about a serious love story. In a great romantic comedy, sex is the subtext of all conversation. In Crossing Hennessy, the conversation is bland, the sex is left for their respective former lovers, and the subtext? That’s apparently not right to ask of two innocent people who just enjoy walking on Hennessy, reading detective novels, and sitting at a Cha Chaan Teng.

The daily and ordinary life creeps into the foreground and upstages the love story. The elements of Hong Kong-ness seen in the neighbourhood become far more interesting. This could be a problem for audience who is hoping to see a love story. But Ho’s films have always been characterized by a lack of one. Loy's character, a middle-aged, middle-class single man with a lot of Daddy issues, and his wacky family, including a Danny Lee who plays an accountant with a very small dog, is far more intriguing but given the least attention to.

Cheung’s performance is as superb as he is associated with dramady that is fast-paced, cerebral, and laden with cultural references. Tang is adorable however hurt by the transition from Lust,Caution to HK-style comedy. The real discomfort comes from watching Tang being forced to laugh out “Ha Ha Ha”. Or when her Cantonese becomes more intriguing than her acting skill. Ivy Ho’s latest effort, though not as stylized and unique as her earlier work Claustrophobia, is as simple and cute for the people who grew up crossing Hennessy. What is after Hennessy would be all the other interesting things that Ho is unable to pick up about Wan Chai.

(Hong Kong, 2010)