Full Clarity

如果你願意　我可以 永遠像現在般美麗
因為我　生而為愛癡迷
如果你有情　這世界 可以不需要再有四季
我的心　早已經色彩分明

《我和春天有個約會》

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Dear Kate,

I could hardly imagine such is the thematic statement the filmmakers had in mind, but this is what I was thinking while the movie unveiled itself again last night after all these years: There are many types of love, only one sort of hate.

I watched it once before probably right before I left Hong Kong, most certainly on VHS at my uncle's place, because I didn't have the money or, for that matter, the knowledge/liberty to visit a theatre on my own.  My uncle would take me and my brother to his place, somewhere that felt to me then faraway from the monotonous grind of my daily reality (study, sleep, repeat, church on Sundays), into the dreamland of celluloid, one magnetic tape at a time, often up to five a night, three nights in a row over a weekend.  That was my hardcore film education, one of the experiences I am most thankful for, this life or next.

The movie, called《伴我闖天涯》in Chinese, subsequently I learned, is a remake of Peter Weir's Harrison Ford movie "Witness," though with a more expository and evocative title which summons the audience to Go with Me to the World.

The "world."

The  world is an ugly place, full of strife.  Only because we so wanted to love in so many splendid ways but failed at all of them just as so very spectacularly.  If you so willed, the singer whispers in today's quote, I shall stay beautiful, like now, forever, because I am born to be intoxicated by love.  Then she discloses her secret: If you do love me, then this world needs no longer her four seasons, because all colors have revealed fully to my heart their splendid clarity.  (Like reading Psalms from the Bible, you will need to listen to the music, sing her words to know, apprehend their meaning.)

I won't spoil the movie, but am asking you to pay attention to the reverse shot of what the characters were looking at (as shown in this poster), which, I think, is the most poignant image out of the many in this movie.

I need to get ready to work, for the world, now.  I haven't written one fifth of what I intended to write today.  Love is a many-splendored thing.

Yours, Alex