Beyond the Dream

I stumbled upon the 2019 Hong Kong romantic drama titled "Beyond the Dream" from writers Kiwi Chow (whom also directed the movie) and Chun Wing Tsang. Now, I had never heard about this movie prior to watching it, but it being a Hong Kong movie was more than enough to make me sit down and watch it.

And I managed to endure a painstakingly boring 51 minutes of the two hours the movie ran for, because I succumbed and gave up on this boring heap of a movie. The pacing of the narrative was insanely slow, and nothing worthwhile happened as the movie trotted on and on. And I have to say that the character gallery was so flaccid and bland that it just took away from the movie.

I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in "Beyond the Dream", but it was just a struggle to watch them bringing boredom to life on the screen.

"Beyond the Dream" from director Kiwi Chow came and went without leaving a lasting impression on me. And come next week, I am sure that all memory of this swing and a miss of a movie will have faded into oblivion.

I was by no means entertained by this movie. And as such, my rating of "Beyond the Dream" lands on a two out of ten stars.

This film navigates the mental and psychological voids, discussing a certain possibility of love within the diagonal tension between patients and others. On the surface, it's about the patient's fantasy of love and the doctor's entanglement in unspeakable taboos with the patient. However, this fantasized love becomes the start of self-healing for the doctor as the 'other'. When the film speaks through the female lead's recounting of the past, it also expands the perspective from the patient's societal exploration to a broader public context, sparking a conversation about love. What is love? Is it a fantasy? Do we need love, or are we just indulging in the fantasy of it? Like a warm consultation room on a sunny afternoon, it's a refuge where no one can abandon themselves, and love cannot be demystified. The audiovisual design is very intentional, and the director's skill is fully realized in depicting the onset of illness, complemented by the actors' performances, immersing the audience in certain scenes. However, the overall story structure is loose, with transitions and changes not serving the narrative well, becoming more of a storytelling demand. The film's last half-hour inevitably leads to the male and female leads being separated by external forces, with the male lead falling into role flaws and the female lead into professional and social moral judgment, making me feel a lack of overall coherence.

I am still positively shocked by how good this film is. From the acting up the production to the story, everything is very well done. The story is deeply engrossing, and I feel for the chargers every step of the way. I honestly think this film is a must see for everyone, especially if you know someone who is affected by psychosis.

Now you have to stick with this because the start is not very enticing. We see the usual pretty boy, floppy-haired, HK lad "Lok" (Chun-Him Lau) meet and fall in love with the rather preppy "Yan Yan" (Cecelia Choi) who lives with her abusive father in an apartment upstairs. The writing looks set on the wall for a rather procedural romance until we discover that "Lok" - an outgoing man who coaches sport to young kids - is a recovering schizophrenic and that not everything in his world is neccessarily real. He is an honest lad at heart, and when he decides it is only fair to alert his gal to his illness, he suffers from a relapse that pits his love for "Yan Yan" against his growing affection for a psychiatry student "Yip" who is trying to use his case to finalise her qualifications. We are slowly drawn into his world of fantasy and confusion; affection and disaffection and I have to say that I was impressed with the strength and subtlety of Chun-Him Lau's really quite intense and plausible performance. I'm no clinician, so cannot comment on the authenticity of the portrayal here from any medical perspective, but this young actor does engage - and that keeps this all but two hour exploration of this flawed human psyche interesting. Sure, it drifts into melodrama a little now and again and the style of direction actually gives away a little more of the story (especially at the beginning) that I would have preferred to have garnered from the storyline, but this is a great deal more substantial than I was expecting and I rather enjoyed it.

This is a really good movie, starting from the plot as it tackles serious issues, to the direction and great cinematography and ending with beautiful performance of the lead actors especially the ML!