Healing Hearts

Perhaps more reflective of the current state of HK cinema than any other release out there, this film will smack of deja-vu to followers of HK TV serial dramas. In a reversal of Hollywood trends of high budget big screen permutations of small screen characters, this is the pilot of an upcoming TV serial, testing waters in the guise of a movie. Part ER, part soap centered on the lives and loves of young professionals (medics mostly), it topped box office records in its release run - reflective of HK tastes. Its success is but part of a current transmigration of cinematic talents back to the small screen - where the cash seems to be. From $$ID=Wong Jing$$'s production company (immersed in recent TV productions, recall he got his break penning scripts for TVB) it boasts the stellar likes of Cannes award winner (and serious thespian) $$ID=Tony Leung Chiu Wai$$ and $$ID=Michelle Reis$$, both of whom emerged from TV to movie stardom - and now back again.

Helmed by ex TVB director Gary Tang, responsible for the (very) similar serial "Healing Hands", Tony Leung is in fine form as Lawrence, a skilled brain surgeon, whose personal life is in withdrawal from the death of his girlfriend in a hit and run accident. Still passionate about his job and helpful to his colleagues, his reticence and idiosyncracies make him seemingly aloof. In true melodramatic manner, it takes Jackie (Michelle Reis vacillating between luminously pretty to cutesy naivete), the recovering (from a comatose state) girlfriend of his colleague Paul (Kenny Bee), to draw him out of his shell. In a love triangle, which seemingly disappears into Bermuda - Jackie falls for Lawrence and vice versa, though it is initially a love refrained until Paul nobly (and complacently) drops out. The characterizations are interesting - although seemingly stunted in development - after all it's only a pilot.

As their relationship develops, the film morphs into further melodrama as Jackie's cancerous illness relapses - she bleeds profusely and faints outside Chanel in Central, HK and Lawrence decides in vain to perform surgery on her. In the cliffhanger, Jackie leaves with a forlorn Lawrence guessing "what it would have been like" in a melancholy voiceover. To be continued as a serial.....

The many romantically nuanced sequences make this an ideal date film. The cast is fashionably attired and the sets stylish in true yuppie form. The performances are consistent with cameos (probably to be developed) by $$ID=Kristy Yang$$, $$ID=Stephen Fung$$, $$ID=Esther Kwan$$, $$ID=Valerie Chow$$ and $$ID=Jackie Lui$$. If box-office performance is a barometer, this film is recommended to fans of the genre - think TV melodrama only big budget and glossier!