Chinese Box

Chinese Box (1997) is a drama you can watch online on iFILM — set against the final six months of British Hong Kong, tracked in real time from New Year's Day to the handover on June 30, 1997.

John, an English journalist played by Jeremy Irons, gets a terminal diagnosis. A month, maybe less. He stays anyway and turns his camera on a city in the middle of becoming something else. His attention fixes on Vivian, played by Gong Li — a woman whose past carries weight she hasn't put down. Maggie Cheung appears as Jean, a secondary thread in the same unravelling city.

Director Wayne Wang, who made The Joy Luck Club, shoots here with a documentary looseness that fits. What stays with you isn't the love story but the sensation of watching a place say goodbye to itself on a deadline. Stream Chinese Box (1997) on iFILM.