My only complaint about the DVD of Chungking Express is that it uses the American cut of the film rather than the Hong Kong cut that I originally came to love, which means that some of the music is different, a few scenes are cut, and one major scene (where Brigitte Lin kidnaps the Indian girl and buys her an ice cream) is new. Not a huge deal, but when you've convinced yourself that a movie is perfect in the form you've already come to know, any definitive change is bound to be somewhat annoying. (Are there die-hard fans of the original cut of, say, Blade Runner who feel the same way about Ridley Scott's endless fiddling?)

Granted, these cuts and changes were surely made by Wong Kar-Wai himself, who probably likes the American version better. And the subtitles in the DVD release, especially of the very last line in the movie, are far superior to the Hong Kong version. The changes that I really miss are so minor that anyone who hasn't seen the movie at least ten times wouldn't even notice them. (I do, however, regret their decision not to play The Cranberries' "Dreams" where it first appears in the Hong Kong version, in the slo-mo shot where Tony Leung is drinking his coffee and Faye Wong is looking at him silently while slumped on the lunch counter.)

If I were forced to choose one version for someone to watch once, I'd probably go with the DVD, I guess, rather than with the lousy two-video pirated Hong Kong copy that I bought at Amoeba Records in Berkeley all those years ago. Ideally, of course, I'd have them watch the DVD version first, and then the Hong Kong version, because the version of Chungking Express that I carry around in my head now is some sort of idealized amalgam of the two. But that's just obsessive behavior, I guess. Still, it's my favorite movie, and I figure I'm allowed an obsessive moment or two. (Not to mention an excessively long post discussing the matter in great detail, of course.)