After reading In Search of the Ghostly in Context by Fruit Chan, I had more thoughts toward the relationship between Hong Kong urban context and movies.
First of all, ghosts in Chan’s films most likely represent despair and disorientation. One of his movies, Made in Hong Kong 1997 was released in 1997, which was around the time of the Handover of Hong Kong, thus, Hong Kong people at that time were feeling lost, they either moved away, or the Chinese mainlanders moving in to look for economic opportunities. Therefore, ghosts in Chan’s movies most likely relate to the negative emotions from the Handover of Hong Kong.
Then, Chan likes to focus his narratives on lower-middle-class individuals rather than the wealthy side of Hong Kong, because he wants to show where most Hong Kong people truly live, rather than showing the cyberpunk where people imagine we live, Chan prefers to show something different and realistic to the audience.
Student Name: Lam Ho Yin
UID: 3036108391
I appreciate your dual perspective of viewing ghost(s) appearing in Chan’s realistic film. However, I would encourage you to expand more potential meaning(s) of ghosts as metaphors shaped differently in Chan’s handover trilogy. Also, Abbas’ Hong Kong: Culture and Politics of Disappearance would shed light on your discussion in terms of contextuality. Moreover, please note that In Search of Ghostly in Context is an analytic essay on Chan’s film written by Cheung, E. M. K.