review: leslie's RTHK productions (pt. 1)

i recently obtained an out-of-print box set of leslie's RTHK productions from ebay; it contains four 23-minute shorts, one feature-length film, and also an anti-smoking film that leslie directed in 2000 and features all the big stars including anita mui, karen mok, and wang leehom (omg??).. i finished watching all of the films save for the last one and i want to do a  review of them because they were all so cool and interesting and hard to find!

under the same roof: teenagers (1978) / plot summary: it describes secondary school students' curiosity about the opposite sex. leslie cheung plays a secondary school student with an open-minded attitude about the opposite sex.

overall impressions: oh my god.. the 70s.. those were some TIMES!! 

from what i can gather the under the same roof was a series of family-oriented short films that all aimed to teach some sort of message. this one, teenagers, features ah chung/peter, a teen boy with strict parents who begins dating a girl named connie. his best friend joe, played by a 22 year old leslie (a.k.a. a BABY!!), is quite the opposite. joe has had a lot of girlfriends, seems to know a lot about sex, and (maybe a bit too eagerly?) wants to see his friend embark on his first relationship.

the first few minutes of the film consist of joe and peter hanging out, going to the movies, eating food, and chatting about girls and dating.

this opening scene was funny. i felt like i was transported to the 70s!

 

ffjfdjgsgkl god.. i wish i were a teen in hong kong in the 70s.. i'd go to the movies all day..

the dynamic is clear from the start: joe is brazen and confident, whereas peter is meek and content with eating wonton noodles every time they go out.

 

leave him alone, leslie!! he likes those noodles!

and there was this suspicious scene..

peter doesn't want to eat the ice cream that joe ordered him. he retaliates with this. hmm....

Haha, okay!

peter and joe go on an outing together, and peter meets a girl named connie whom he immediately develops a crush on.

apparently it was popular to take buses like these to go on outings with friends in the 70s.. bbqs and such.. fun!

I Love the 70s!

anyways, peter wants to ask out connie. joe aggressively gives him advice because he's experienced (and in love with peter). in one scene, peter goes to joe's house and joe lends him a stack of playboy magazines. joe's sister, played by teresa mo (!!!), also happens to like reading playboy. and so does their dad. weird!!

nice boots! also can i just say.. leslie was so suited for this role

connie being lectured about not dating while in school

peter tries to ask out connie but she ends up bringing her friends along to the date. lol!

they're disappointed in peter.. also check out that hair

joe resolves to help his friend get the message across to connie. 

peter calling connie on the phone for the first time

remember when leslie proposed to teresa? lol i love her

god he's so young

on peter and connie's  next date, joe and his friend tag along because they assume it's another group date.. but this time connie comes alone. lol..

fjgfdjkjglf

out on the town.. i love the 70s!

just being good friends

finally getting the picture, peter and connie manage to go on a few more dates alone (at last!), where they start to admit their feelings for each other. connie invites peter over to her place to meet her dad and peter is taken aback by how serious connie seems to be about this relationship, and he's probably also afraid of her dad, because all the dads on this program are scary and weird. he goes back to joe for advice, and admits to joe that after all this time he still hasn't even kissed connie yet. 

look at that stance...

 bb

peter struggles with deciding what his next move should be with connie, and joe shakes his head at him. "you have to be bold!" i think peter is a cancer venus. 

dramatic..

in the end peter finally arranges to go on a "real" date with connie. there's a weird scene where he tries to kiss her, she runs away, and he tries to follow her but ends up in this ominous looking bathroom, where he splashes his face with water. get it together!!

i thought something trippy was about to happen.. idk

ultimately this film was a simple story about teenagers trying to navigate the world of dating and parental restrictions. it ends on the bus, where a group of teen girls on their way to an outing discuss the proper ways to go about dating. ah, youth! peter apologizes to connie, and blames all of his poor decisions on joe. hey, that's not fair!

now i'm confused. are they friends or are they dating? 

peter and connie reconcile and agree to move on with their ambiguous relationship.

damn i wanna be on that bus

an eerie synth melody plays over the ending credits, which left me feeling a bit unsettled. what just happened? it was kinda fun though.

under the same roof: dead knot (1980) / plot summary: leslie cheung plays a handsome young man who is the third party in a triangular love relationship.

overall impressions: i felt like this had a bit more substance than the previous film. also i think this was leslie's first appearance with glasses which increases the value of this film by 10000%.

(!! mild spoilers!!) in this dramatic tale of ups and downs, winnie is a young girl who is in a relationship with a guy named ah sing, but falls in love with ah kit (played by leslie), a boy she meets one night at a convenience store. they have a fling, conflicts ensue, and there's a really shocking twist at the end..

the birth of leslie's delicate nerd look!

in this opening scene in the convenience store, winnie's friends introduce her to ah kit as "innocent wai", because she's innocent and one of the characters in her name is the same as momoe yamaguchi's (also i just remembered this but i think this actress was actually leslie's girlfriend for some time..? or at least it was rumored to have been the case. lol leslie must've dated all his co-stars at RTHK at some point..)

anyways, ah kit and winnie meet again not long later at an outing on a beach. winnie is with ah sing, her glum boyfriend. why is he so glum! ah kit is sitting across from them with a group of people, cutely cradling a guitar. so he's a nerd.. and he plays guitar? i don't really get what they're trying to go for here but okay! 

lol his squint

the group is doing this random gift exchange thing and winnie happens to get ah kit's gift, which is a necklace. winnie is really happy and clearly taken with ah kit, and ah sing isn't too happy about that.

 

ah sing is all gloom and doom, plus he receives a roll of toilet paper as a gift, which makes things worse. but then we find out why he's like this - it turns out that ah sing lives with his grandpa, whom he seems to be quite close to and loves dearly, and that his mother had an affair and abandoned the family. ah sing's dad lives in brazil and wants ah sing to join him there. ah sing is a troubled boy! he tells grandpa that he doesn't know if he believes in love anymore.

meanwhile, ah kit is at home building model airplanes like the nerd he is.

can i just say i love seeing images of hong kong home interiors from the 80s.. that wallpaper.. those fancy white draped things on the couch (i forgot what they're called).. that poster of a baby?! there's so much going on

winnie calls ah kit and they strike up a conversation. 

this makes me want to buy a gray crew neck sweater so i can match them

winnie's home life is also super strange; she lives with her overly trusting grandpa who gives her money and believes everything she says, and her uncle, whom she hurls insults towards every time they see each other as if they were schoolyard enemies. i think the point is that winnie is having all these relationships with boys to make up for her unstable family dynamic as well. oh winnie!

i love this so much 

winnie later breaks his plane lol

ah sing finds out about winnie's little love affair soon enough, and as expected, he's mad!! winnie struggles with making up her mind about what to do.. but she decides to continue hanging out with ah kit because he's just more fun! 

haha! too cute!!!

winnie and ah kit continue having a great time together, but ah sing finally catches them in the act.

ah kit and ah sing get into a fight. scary stuff!! i hate violence.

poor babe.. he just wanted to have some fun

what would momoe do, winnie?

(!!spoilers for ending below!!)

after a period of reflection, ah sing decides to invite winnie to one last get-together before he leaves for brazil to join his father. ah kit comes along too. ah sing takes out a bottle of champagne, and pours a glass for the two of them each. this doesn't bode well.. 

LMAO

it turns out that ah sing poisoned their drinks!! winnie falls to the group, choking and foaming at the mouth. ah kit follows suit moments later. regret shines in their eyes as they slowly pass out. ah sing, with a wicked look on his face, lies down on the bench and finishes off the bottle. "i said that if you left me, i'd die with you!" the scene fades to black.. a tragedy for all!!!

........but there's a twist!!!!!! a voiceover explains what happened afterwards. it turns out that before he left to meet up with winnie, ah sing wrote a note to his grandpa explaining what his plans were. grandpa freaked out and called the police, who arrived at the scene just in time to save the kids. after the whole ordeal, winnie and ah kit's parents learned the importance of caring better for their kids. as for ah sing....

 um. wtf??

i guess this movie was trying to send out a message about the importance of having stable and nurturing family dynamics? otherwise your child might end up like ah sing.. uh.. i don't know about that last part tbh. but overall i was really invested in the characters and i was honestly so shocked by that twist at the end - i really didn't see it coming!

okay this ended up taking way longer than i thought so i'll leave things here for now.. i'm not even gonna proofread this. stay tuned for the rest of my reviews on leslie's RTHK productions, which will be coming very soon! this was a lot of fun!