Reveries on Old Shanghai

In 1993, Chen Yifei finished his first film - Reveries on Old Shanghai, which took about one year to complete and cost at least three million yuan (US$375,000). In the very beginning, Chen wanted to shoot a short film for his serial painting of the same name. However, persuaded by his friends and prompted by his love for film art, Chen made it into a complete film and thus began his career as film director.

The film brings the audience to 1842, the year when Shanghai was first established as a port city. Within a short time in history, Shanghai had developed into one of the most beautiful cities in East Asia, melting various cultures, languages, fashions and values on the Pacific.

Evening Liaison

Instead of focusing on a certain event, the film is a show of many historical scenes based on social context, stringing together many life scenes through its continuous theme and emotion.

Aiming to sketch a cultural background for his paintings, Chen adopted his usual style in characters designing and color setting. In fact, with the deepened and extended theme, the film is in many ways more of a poetic film.

In 1995, Chen promoted his second film masterpiece-Evening Liasion, representing another exploration by him in film art.

Adopted from the novel "Ghost Love" by Xu Jie, a Shanghai writer, the film Evening Liasion is in the same artistic strain with Reveries on Old Shanghai. The director again turned his lenses to Shanghai in the 1930s and 1940s, highlighting the city's prosperity and vicissitudes, which happened within quite a short time.

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