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Fallen Angels: Wong Kar-wai on casting Leon Lai, Michele Reis, Charlie Yeung and Karen Mok against type in 1995 film
- The auteur Hong Kong filmmaker cast Leon Lai as a hit man, and Michele Reis’ and Karen Mok’s characters were the opposite of their normal girl-next-door roles
- The idea that became Fallen Angels was originally intended to be part of Chungking Express, but Wong decided it could stand alone
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Fallen Angels is probably the least discussed of Wong Kar-wai’s early films.
Originally intended to be a part of the director’s previous film, Chungking Express, the 1995 film instead saw Wong use a criminal milieu to explore his then-favourite themes of urban confusion and the difficulty of communicating and forging meaningful relationships.
The big thing at the time was the casting. Michele Reis, then known for her “nice girl” roles, played a sexually frustrated criminal, teen idol Charlie Yeung Choi-nei was aggressive and dominating, and girl-next-door Karen Mok Man-wai portrayed a crazed man-eater.
Canto-pop king Leon Lai Ming also played heavily against type as an introspective hit-man, and Takeshi Kaneshiro played a mute.
This interview with Wong was conducted by this journalist in 1995, just before the local release of Fallen Angels.
Wasn’t Fallen Angels originally conceived as a sequel to Chungking Express?
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