A humble courtesan and the wayward heir to a wealthy family fall in love in the opulent teahouses of 1930s Hong Kong - and when his family refuses to accept the match, they make a suicide pact to reunite in the afterlife. Fifty years later, her ghost returns to modern Hong Kong, still waiting, and enlists a young couple's help to find the lover who never showed up. That's the premise of Rouge, Stanley Kwan's supernatural romance opening this run of Broken Hearts Club, starring Cantopop icons Anita Mui and Leslie Cheung. The film swept the Hong Kong Film Awards - Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actress for Mui - and remains a defining work of Hong Kong's golden age, though watching it now carries added weight: both stars died within six months of each other in 2003, forever preserved here in their youth. Rotten Tomatoes called it one of the best films ever to come out of Hong Kong, a triumph of style and drama, while the Criterion Collection described it as an exquisite elegy for lost love and vanishing history. Broken Hearts Club: Rouge (1987) Wednesday, August 5 | Doors: 6PM | Film: 8PM | TicTic, Phnom Penh Free Entry & Popcorn - Arrive early for sofa, bed, or beanbag seating.
