The Oscar Hammersteins, Bernie Taupins and Tim Rices of this world would admire this endearing Hong Kong movie, which focuses on the missed determine of the lyric-writer – right here, particularly within the Cantopop business. Norris Wong’s initially gentle and scampering comedy drama is counterbalanced by a cynicism that warns of the emotional hazards of dreaming massive on this ego-crushing melody manufacturing facility. Within the phrases of the movie’s swansong: “Success is nice, however nobody talks about being annoyed.”
Sze (Chung Suet Ying) is a part of a high-school posse of aspiring Cantopop lyric- and songwriters. Insisting that her ardour and her work needs to be the identical factor, she is decided to go all the best way. Undaunted by her tutor’s warning that “nobody makes a dwelling as a lyricist”, she learns the fiddly artwork of matching the Cantonese tone system to music; after which a breakthrough into the Asian Tin Pan Alley appears imminent when a Taiwanese firm takes discover of her work. However the actual lesson she should study is how far to take a masochistic tolerance for disappointment.
Wong applies a journal-style aesthetic right here, throwing in cute animations and slapping decals on to stay motion. This delicate model extends to an intimate consciousness of how music opens up inside vistas, with Sze gazing in awe at soundwaves on her laptop computer, or getting snagged by a track on the radio whereas out procuring. Simply because the lyricist weighs phrases to sharpen the underpinning melodies to a finer level, Wong houses in on the bittersweet motif that defines this drama: the protagonist’s concern that she may not make it. In a enterprise by which lyrics are secondary, and topic to the arbitrary whims of producers and stars, writing a jingle for a ride-sharing app turns into Sze’s final shot.
With the movie trapped virtually utterly inside Sze’s artistic bubble, the encircling solid – her comic-relief Era Analogue mother and father (Eric Kot and Luna Shaw), fickle boyfriend (Yukki Tai), songwriting companion Mak (present Cantopop dreamboat Ansonbean) – don’t register a lot. However this self-absorption enhances the sentiment, songs flowing seamlessly out of her head on to the soundtrack, making the movie as a lot of an oddly touching contrivance as the standard Cantopop banger.
