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12018-12-03T18:34:20-08:00Conor Fairtlough88a78d52a1e4f599c6e366a237dffff1617ab4f4322761plain2018-12-03T18:34:20-08:00Conor Fairtlough88a78d52a1e4f599c6e366a237dffff1617ab4f4Infernal Affairs and Hong Kong Hong Kong suffers from an identity crisis that is unique to Hong Kong. Being a British colony up until 1997 Hong Kong was extremely different from its Chinese neighbor culturally (capitalistic, free speech, Cantonese being the lingua franca). After the Handover to China, Hong Kong dealt with the issue of being under the rule of a people who considered their land their own, but not being able to identify with their new ruler. Watching Infernal Affairs I felt the that Hong Kong’s identity crisis seeped into the entirety of the film. The constant anxiety that was felt in the movie over the traitor I thought represented the anxiety that the Handover represented. Now there are people in Hong Kong who are like the traitor in Infernal Affairs, they look like “one of us.” They have a new ruler who is known to be against free speech and capitalism now living silently among them, inducing this anxiety. This is especially shown through the Chinese title, relating to the lowest level of Hell in Buddhism, one of “constant suffering.” Their identity crisis of trying to figure out what Hong Kong is without China or Britain is one of “constant suffering” this anxiety that seems endless like hell. Much like the tension in Infernal Affairs, the tension in Hong Kong is a direct influence on Infernal Affairs and its themes.
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12018-12-03T18:33:08-08:00Conor Fairtlough88a78d52a1e4f599c6e366a237dffff1617ab4f4Conor Fairtlough's Final PortfolioConor Fairtlough16Intro to East Asian Pop Culture 2018plain2018-12-14T21:19:30-08:00Conor Fairtlough88a78d52a1e4f599c6e366a237dffff1617ab4f4
