With Ronny Yu's 1995 movie The Phantom Lover you have to discuss two specific aspects first and foremost; cinematography and direction. For once I'm starting with the former since it's that the viewer first will first encounter during the first frames of this movie.

Academy Award Winner (for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) Peter Pau is the man responsible for the cinematography and what a marvelous job he's done here. Peter have always been able to make even the smallest films look great and a big costume drama like this is no problem for him either. There's a lot of challenges for him and it mostly has to do with the two distinct looks of the film. For the 1930s setting, that opens and closes the film, Peter desaturates the colours (almost creating a sepia tone look) and for the flashback to the romance 10 years earlier, the colours are bold and beautiful. In itself the desaturating wouldn't have worked in an entire movie but by having it as a contrast to past events, it become more powerful. The 1920s segment, where the romance takes place, is extremely colorful which matches the feelings of the main characters there.

In the flashback, Peter uses, in tune with the music and the romantic mood, a very sweeping camera work and it almost feels like you're on an moody amusement park ride. To contrast again, Peter shoots the 1930s segements more straightforward but still catches some amazing images. The cinematography doesn't take over the narrative despite so much going on which is a testament to Peter's skills. I would rank this among one of the best movies Peter Pau has ever shot and not many Hong Kong 90s productions were blessed with this professional look.

Director Ronny Yu went to Hollywood after this movie and while he hasn't done visual pieces up to the standard of this or The Bride With White Hair, I quite enjoyed his work on Bride Of Chucky (also shot by Peter Pau). Ronny is a very professional director who here faces the challenge to tell, on paper, a very clichéd love story. When we get to that in the movie, he doesn't give us more background to the lovers than needed. We meet Danping and Yuan at the height of their love and it's a story about forbidden love, which doesn't really need big expository dialogue to work. Their happiness is shown to us but it contains a good deal of cheesy dialogue and a big emotional score that somehow works in the hands of Ronny Yu. Since the film takes the themes from Romeo & Juliet and The Phantom Of The Opera, you can guess that a tragic turn will follow. It becomes a fairly painful experience to watch since we do care about these two and want no harm to come their way. I talk a lot about how the best filmmakers can take clichés and do them in a way that no one even mentions the word itself. Ronny Yu is definitly one of them, with this picture at least.

After 50 minutes, Danpin and Yuan's backstory is over and if the movie was predictable before this point, it's now very unpredictable. Ronny now has another challenge and that is to maintain the audiences attention while he develops this story even more. There's still romance in the movie but the desaturated look enhances the tragedy and sadness it now is about. Having talked about the movie, I do have to say that it's not the most refreshing love story ever told but a competent one nonetheless.

The score by Chris Babida (who worked on Operation Condor and Peter Pau's directorial debut Misty) meets the requirements of the genre. What that means is that it's a big emotional musical experience filled with violins to the max. That is also a challenge, to make yourself heard and Chris does that. He takes the emotions created by Peter and Ronny and delivers a diverse score that manages to stand on it's own feet. Leslie Cheung composed the songs and besides one overused number, his musical sequences didn't bother me at all. It may, or may not, be a little too connected to modern canto-pop but I feel it fits the period The Phantom Lover takes place in.

The work by the award winning art direction and costume & make up-team is pretty jawdropping considering it's a Hong Kong production. There's so much detail on and around the actors that makes you wonder where they found the energy to work on such a big movie. A lot of their work probably isn't fully seen but what they've done is taken us back many years and that is the sign of a job well done.

Leslie Cheung doesn't seem to have aged a bit since his impressive turn in A Better Tomorrow. He has to provide singing and music as well as acting and overall do a very nice job. There's not much to the character in the flashback but he becomes more interesting when he turns up in the 1930s segment. There's anger in the character that is played in a way that seems to suit Leslie more. He is upstaged though by beautiful Wu Chien-Lien. She still impresses after her debut in A Moment Of Romance and she and Leslie are a good couple on screen. Just like Leslie, she shines more in the later parts of the film and performs some truly sad scenes that ranks among the highlights of The Phantom Lover.

Huang Lei is does have to carry the movie at certain points and does that well in the end. At the start, the character seemed a little wimpy but grows as the film rolls on. Huang Lei displays maturity in his acting and is part of why the movie as a whole works. Philip Kwok (from Hard Boiled) has a cameo as well as being co-action director on the film.

Ronny Yu's The Phantom Lover is not a classic romantic drama but comes off as pretty terrific thanks to the thoroughness of everyone involved. This is what Ronny Yu is capable of...in Hong Kong.

The film tells the story of Song Danping (Leslie Cheung), a daring singer who is determined to bring Western theater arts to China. He is building a large theater in the middle of the Chinese countryside and stages Western plays. His progressive behavior is not welcome by all, however, despite the fact that every night all his theater seats are sold out. The simple folks are concerned about their traditions, the fact that Danping is luring their children – mostly the girls – to listen to decadent Western operas and to adore him. Especially in his role as Romeo in Shakespeare’s "Romeo & Juliet", Danping shines and his reputation is making its course through the country, attracting even more visitors from afar.

At the same time, Danping has a secret relationship with Yun Yan (Wu Chien Lien), the daughter of a highly respected local family. She is forced into an arranged marriage with a man she doesn’t love and when he learns about her relationship with Danping, the disgruntled husband sets fire to the theater and abandons his own wife. What remains is the lore of Danping, who died in the fire, and Yun Yan, who has gone insane by the loss and often returns to the ruins of the theater to remember her lost love.

And so years pass, until one day, a broke troupe of stage artists move into the abandoned ruins of the theater. Wei Quing (Lei Huang) is a young aspiring singer who is very intrigued by the mystery surrounding the building and tries to learn everything about Danping. On his search he stumbles into the unexpected. Danping is alive and living in the theater still! Disfigured by the flames he does not dare to show his face, which also prevents him from contacting Yun Yan, the love of his life, while he sings to her on rainy nights from a hidden retreat every time she somberly visits the theater. To help Yun Yan overcome her pain, Danping decides upon a plan. He teaches the young singer and soon the theater is once again filled with people who are eager to witness the glorious presentation of "Romeo & Juliet." Wei Quing is such a good scholar actually, that even Yun Yan is fooled into believing, he is Danping, who finally returned to her, to sweep her off her feet. But how long can they keep up the charade?

"The Phantom Lover" is a mix between "Romeo and Juliet" and "The Phantom of the Opera" with a little bit of "Immortal Beloved" sprinkled in. It is a film that plays like a fairy tale, rich with stunning visuals and vivid images, as well as a hauntingly beautiful sound track. It is a true romance with many heartfelt moments that are heavy with emotions and tragedy as we watch two lives that are ultimately destined for each other, miss each other as a result of personal pride and social barriers. Director Ronny Yu captures the atmosphere of the story with images that are artistically framed while Peter Pau weaves a tapestry of color palettes that is beautiful and rich. Parts of the film are shot in monochromatic sepia tones, giving it a vintage quality, replacing the footage with bold color images as the story progresses so that the viewer literally feels the emotions depicted. Only few romances have managed to convey emotions with such an eloquent visual vocabulary and although the film lacks slightly in the story department, the hauntingly beautiful cinematography and direction easily makes up for it.