Coming from the duo that brought us An Autumn's Tale and Painted Faces, it's certainly not unfair to expect the bar to be set high when approaching City Of Glass. However, despite excellent music, cinematography and correct subtle flavors, Mabel Cheung and Alex Law has created somewhat of an emotionally empty romance.

Comparisons to Comrades, Almost A Love Story and the recent Leaving Me Loving You (both of which star Leon Lai) are unavoidable as the narrative is epic, visuals constantly elegant (Jingle Ma employs his trademark angelic, soft light to many scenes) and Cheung lets us know that the desire is to go places with this genre entry. City Of Glass therefore doesn't fail to technically rank high but problems arise in the actual core storytelling. Alex Law's script wants to be epic and places the events in real life timelines (mainly political) to achieve greater arcs and scale but the problem is, elements are merely featured and frankly doesn't really matter for the on and off romance between Raphael and Vivian.

This approach was nailed in Comrades, Almost A Love Story but Cheung and Law rarely manages to connect with their audiences. Never overbearing, never too subtle, the instincts on display are still absolutely nigh on perfect and it gets increasingly frustrating to figure what the flaws actually are. In the end, I also found myself drawing comparisons to Cheung's 80s classic An Autumn's Tale that, while less grand visually and in scale, had performers that could greatly elevate the sincere, heartfelt and simple aspects of the good old fashioned romance.

Leon Lai and Shu Qi are definitely likeable also and looks good together but, and it's unfair to compare, but they are no Chow Yun-Fat/Cherie Chung pairing despite all the odds being in their favour. Cheung achieves sporadic movie magic with subtle emotions but we're also not that thrilled about their long, ongoing sporadic relationship, despite the Jingle Ma's cinematography and Dick Lee's music trying to convince us otherwise. For their counterpart in the present day, the next generation, Cheung definitely faces problems as well.

Two not so seasoned performers in the form of Daniel Wu (alternating between Chinese and English but due to a purpose in the script at least) and Nicola Cheung turns City Of Glass briefly into a loud romantic comedy that annoys before Mabel Cheung late finds a subtle act that her young actors are in tune with. Their moments together actually become more favorable over Leon Lai and Shu Qi's story for a while and the movie finally go out on a more emotional high. It's not enough to save the disappointing, attractive end product however.

Talking Leon Lai and Shu Qi again, the former has had quite fair comparisons made with Keanu Reeves as they both are the epitome of wooden most of the time. Lai did prove with Comrades, Three: Going Home and now with City Of Glass that that negative trait can be defeated. Rarely expressive as such but Lai does shine in a minor way for some of the quieter, telling moments. However, Lai still does flip back and forth in his acting in general so it's only sporadically we see him do well. Shu Qi was at this time on a definite high, having gained numerous awards and nominations for her work. She brings the trademark, bubbly and lovely presence to her younger side of the character while also transforming suitably to the adult Vivian with the hidden longing emotions underneath. She probably is the performer that works best throughout but most of the time, she also works alone and that is a tough job. Elaine Kam, Vincent Kok and Eason Chan provides support.

Mabel Cheung's City Of Glass thoroughly succeeds in weaving magic on a visual and audio level but disappointingly only churns out a fairly watchable romance that rarely finds its way into the heart of the viewer. No fault of the content beforehand and while blame is a harsh word to use, the casting and an uninteresting main core of the script hinders Cheung and Alex Law's grander intentions.

Amid the wreckage of an accident in London, the police finds the bodies of an Asian couple locked in an embrace. It turns out both were married with families of their own overseas. When the news of their deaths reaches the couple's respective families, they refuse to fly to London to identify the bodies, but finally consent to send a son and daughter over instead. It's during the meeting of these two youths that the story unfolds in flashbacks.

From feuding families, the boy and the girl predictably don't get along very well once in London, each blaming the other's parent for the tragedy. However, on their flight back to Hong Kong (to settle the property jointly-owned by their deceased parents), they read through the police reports and discover the past their errant parent had withheld from them -- a past which changes the way they see each other.

City of Glass, simply put, is about an extramarital affair. Although Cheung tries to inject some authenticity into the film by bringing in the Diaoyu Islands disputes and the handover of Hong Kong to Chinese rule, this insipid film still fails to rise to the occasion. Cheung appears to have dispensed logic while trying to have us empathize with Leon Lai and Hsu Chi's affair. For instance, both Lai and Hsu are happily married with children before their reunion, yet have no conflicting thoughts about leaving their families for each other once they've rekindled the flame. Even the adulterous pair in Yoshimitsu Moria's Lost Paradise was more conscientious. Frankly that's as much reality as you will see through Cheung's tinted spectacles.

Lai and Hsu take on characters aged between 20 and 40, and although both gave convincing performances, they are handicapped by their age differences. Hsu Chi, only 22, is wonderful as a bubbly university student in the film, but struggles when put into the shoes of a woman in her forties. Vice versa when it comes to Lai. Still, Lai's performance earned him a nomination for the Best Actor category in the 35th Golden Horse Awards and the Berlin Film Festival, so that speaks volume of his acting in City of Glass. New faces Daniel Ng and Nicola Cheung are commendable themselves as the lovers' children -- they would've shone in the film had the script given them more opportunity.

As a cinematic showpiece, City of Glass has its moments with some dazzling art direction, particularly in capturing the nostalgia of the sixties and seventies. Whether it's in the lighting or cinematography, Ho Dong Lau has never looked this beautiful.

With 11 nominations at the 35th Golden Horse Awards, Chueng's City of Glass has set an otherwise glum Hong Kong film industry alight. But whether it can go on to rival Peter Chen's Comrades, Almost a Love Story, we can only wait and see.