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Have a Nice Day (Hao Ji Le): A Review

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Have a Nice Day (Hao Ji Le)

Some of the best movies are the ones that feel familiar while telling new stories. Goodfellas is thoroughly distinct from any other mafia film but by including familiar themes about “made men”, it allows us to approach the film from a feeling of familiarity. Revionist Westerns also set new interpretations of stories within a familiar setting. And, of course, it’s even possible to take a fairly similar story and place it within an entirely new landscape (such as Avatar).



Have a Nice Day is one of those films that seem as though you’ve seen it before and also, remains like nothing you’ve ever seen before. With a storyline that seems to have been heavily influenced by Tarantino (Reservoir Dogs, in particular) and an animated style that brings to mind Waltz with Bashir, this is a movie that certainly springs out of familiar territory. But influences are only tangential, and the final product is wholly original.

It’s a film set in a bleak industrial town, dominated by construction and factories where the only sparks of light are flashing store signs and headlights. The characters move into the film with breakneck speed, all seemingly united by their lack of money or lack of happiness. In summary, it’s a crime film about a stolen bag of money that keeps changing ownership. But, it’s not exactly that straightforward of a film. With characters such as a technology-obsessed hitman who wants to use the money to start a business as an inventor to a driver who wants to take his girlfriend for plastic surgery in Korea, it’s as interesting to hear why the characters want the money as much as to see them try to get it.



The film also has some pretty unusual departures from the standard storyline that’d be expected; with a musical piece about going to Shangri-La stuck into the middle of the film and frequent philosophical discussions about entrepreneurship and freedom by side-characters who barely enter the film’s main story.

Bleak and extremely violent, this world of small-town China that’s depicted is bleak and seems to be a place that everyone wants to get away from. In that sense, it’s a bit like the films of Jia Zhangke but a lot more brutal in its depiction. Needless to say, I’m surprised it got past the censor board in China but I’m pretty happy it did as it’s one of the most interesting things I’ve seen in a while.
To make it even more impressive, director Liu Jiang did almost the entire film himself over the space of three years.



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