The latest from Johnnie To follows the relationship between a TV talent show singer and an MMA fighter…
A new film from the legendary Johnnie To is always cause for excitement, whether it be another of the stylish thrillers with which he made his name in the west, or the kind of offbeat, ditzy romantic comedies which he’s proved himself equally deft at handling over the years. Chasing Dream, his latest offering, and his first since 2016’s Three, falls into the latter category, billed as a romantic drama following an MMA fighter and a TV talent contest singer, and sees him working again with long-time collaborator and writer Wai Ka-fai. Released in late 2019 in China, the film is one of his more Mainland-focused productions, headlined by actress-dancer Wang Keru (Youth) and Jacky Heung (League of Gods).
The film opens with Wang Keru’s Du Xiaojua working as a ring girl at an MMA match involving fighter Lu Hu (Jacky Heung), whose loan shark manager Gao Qiang (Bin Zi) recognises her as a wayward debtor. Gao agrees to let Lu Hu take Du Xiaojua home and to watch over her while she tries to make enough money to pay off her debts, taking on jobs washing cars and pole dancing. Her dream though is to become a singer, and the kindly Lu Hu, who by now has taken a bit of a shine to the plucky young woman, agrees to help her audition for the TV talent show Perfect Diva. Although talented, Du Xiaojua has a tough time on the show, not least since her ex, the song-stealing Qu Fengfeng (Ma Xiaohui) is one of the judges, and Lu Hu does his best to support her while pushing on with his own career as an MMA fighter and trying to fulfil his ambition of opening a hotpot restaurant.
It’s hard not to feel like Chasing Dream is two films in one, being part inspirational Chinese TV talent show underdog story, and part motivational MMA drama, two themes which have been very popular in Chinese cinema and television of late. It’s fair to say that fans hoping for action will be disappointed, as the film spends most of its running time on the talent show, with lots of singing and practice sequences, and with most of the focus being on Du Xiaojua and her battles with the other contestants and her ex. Lu Hu’s story very much takes a backseat, as does the burgeoning romance between the pair, though this isn’t really a bad thing, since their relationship is generic, join the dots stuff, progressing from initial awkwardness through to flirtatious bickering and misunderstandings before the inevitable coming together. Thankfully, both Wang Keru and Jacky Heung are likeable leads, and there’s at least some chemistry between them, enough so to make their dynamic somewhat entertaining, if not exactly moving, and while the film lacks any emotional payoff, its melodrama is relatively inoffensive.
Unfortunately, though while inoffensive is a pretty good word to describe the film general, banal is probably closer to the truth. Johnnie To has done this kind of genre-blending romantic comedy-drama many times before, usually to solid effect, though here there’s sadly no trace of his usual style or personality, and Chasing Dream feels at all times like it could have been made by almost any other filmmaker. Looking at the script with a cynical eye, the two stories feel distinctly as if they were chosen for Chinese commercial audience box-ticking, and the film doesn’t even really try to work in the kind of drama or character development which might have woven them together into a more interesting whole – if so, it was a move which didn’t pay off, with the film having failed to make an impact at the Chinese box office. It’s all very predictable, and the film lurches around from familiar scene to familiar scene, without even having the kind of odd tonal shifts that might have given it some sense of originality. Matters are not helped by the fact that the pacing is off, and the two-hour running time makes it feel desperately bloated, apart from perhaps for die-hard fans of Chinese television talent shows.
Chasing Dream really isn’t the Johnnie To film that many audiences would have been hoping for, and it certainly ranks as one of his lesser efforts. Nothing To does is wholly without merit, and the film does have a likeable cast and is technically sound, though it’s difficult not to feel disappointed by its sheer blandness and lack of ideas or heart.