Wong’s rather conventional debut feature is a ‘Mean Streets’-esque gangster thriller that provides cursory pleasures with the odd heady rush of romance, and backed by a trio of committed performances from Andy Lau, Maggie Cheung and Jacky Cheung. 

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Finally, I’m Wong Kar Wai complete after seeing his debut feature, As Tears Go By. 

While his sophomore work, Days of Being Wild (1990), would mark his artistic breakthrough, and as he slowly but surely became the auteur that we now know with each passing feature, As Tears Go By occupies a unique spot in his filmography—it is Wong before Wong, and probably his most commercial-leaning genre work. 

Some of the hallmarks of his latter style may be seen, albeit elusively, such as the poetic transition shots of the Hong Kong skyline, the heady rush of romantic moments, or his exploratory use of the ‘step-printing’ effect, most noticeably in the raw fight scenes. 

Having said that, As Tears Go By is far from the dreamy, evocative works of latter-day Wong; in fact, some might describe it as his Mean Streets, a reference to the early signature gangster film of Martin Scorsese. 

At times violent, with characters making painfully regrettable choices, Wong’s film stars a trio of actors who are already household names hoping for more street cred, namely Andy Lau, Maggie Cheung and Jacky Cheung (who won his only acting HK Film Award for this film). 

“People like us don’t have tomorrows.”

Lau plays a small-time gangster with the desire to go straight, motivated further by his unwell cousin (Maggie C.), who temporarily resides at his place to recover and sparks something more than just an infatuation. 

However, his loose cannon partner-in-crime (Jacky C.) continues to spiral into self-destruction with his antagonising ways in the streets, relying on Lau’s character to bail him out each time. 

A work that tests the limits of sworn brotherhood as it careens headfirst into a bad case of karmic inevitability, As Tears Go By should entertain most audiences in a modest way. 

I can’t say I really enjoyed it, except its cursory genre pleasures, but it is not difficult to see how Wong would treat this as a testbed (a kind of ‘get it out of the system’ exercise) before expanding the genre artistically and existentially with the superior Fallen Angels (1995).     

Grade: B-

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