Blossoms Shanghai (Season 1)

Blossoms Shanghai (繁花, 2023) is a Chinese drama series you can watch online on iFILM — the first television project from filmmaker Wong Kar-wai.

Shanghai in the 1990s: A Bao crawls out of a crowded communal apartment and a troubled past to become one of the self-made fortunes thrown up by China's first decade of market capitalism. Four women orbit his rise, each standing for a different drive — risk, honour, love, innocence. Hu Ge heads the cast opposite Ma Yili, Tang Yan and Xin Zhilei across thirty episodes. The series is based on Jin Yucheng's celebrated novel of the same name.

Wong Kar-wai brought here the same precision he used in In the Mood for Love and Chungking Express: narrow alleys lit just so, a jazz score underneath, shots that carry what dialogue leaves unsaid. The Shanghai he builds is a city caught mid-turn, where new money arrives daily and everything that came before slips a little further away. Stream Blossoms Shanghai (2023) online on iFILM.