Compared to the USA and Canada – and even Japan and Taiwan --– Hong Kong is, as the title of this film has it, a city without baseball. Still, as the intriguing, if at times overly indulgent and complex movie from co-directors Lawrence Lau (Gangs; Queen of Temple Street; My Name is Fame) and debutant Scud shows, the game does have its fans and representation here.

Cobbled together from a combination of fact, fiction and – in the words of Lau – “poetic licence”, City Without Baseball stars members of the Hong Kong baseball team (including their charming Taiwanese coach, John Tai), all of whom come across as admirably natural and uninhibited, along with a smattering of professional thespians (for example, Monie Tung (Whispers and Moans; Single Blog)). The film is a dramatic offering with markedly independent vibes, whose story builds up to the fateful 2004 Asia Baseball Cup tournament in Pakistan. During the tournament, which sees the Hong Kong sporting representatives compete against teams from other countries one hardly associates with baseball (like hosts Pakistan as well as Iran and Sri Lanka), key personal struggles, particularly involving pitchers Ron (Ron Heung) and Chung (Leung Yu-chung), come to light.
 
Although movies and baseball are not one-man shows, it’s also true enough that certain individuals invariably get more attention as well as accolades than others in both this film as well as the game in general. In City Without Baseball, star pitcher Chung and the less popular team-mate Ron emerge as the most compelling characters in a packed work about a diverse group of people who, for the most part, love and play baseball but also have quite a lot more going on in their lives.
 

Early in the movie (which premiered at this year’s HK International Film Festival) the question is posed as to “Who would watch a baseball movie in Hong Kong?” Maybe in part because this was something the film’s makers really wondered about, City Without Baseball doesn’t have that much to do with baseball, even if it does with the concerns of individual members of the Hong Kong baseball team. Additionally, perhaps in a bid for gender balance, some effort is made to include females – in the forms of a mother, a sister and various girlfriends – into overall mix.

That notwithstanding, the film contains far more male nudity, and homosexual content, than is usually seen in a Hong Kong movie. It is one thing to know that athletes can be comfortable in one another’s naked presence but quite another to be presented with shower and locker room scenes as the film’s extended opening credits roll! Similarly, it’s one thing to see grown men hugging and kissing one another when celebrating a victory or successful completion of a key play but something else entirely to be privy to conversations about an individual’s increasing sexual confusion or change in sexual preference.
 
All this aside, in an interview with bc, City Without Baseball’s co-helmer Lawrence Lau talked of his “hope that people will watch the film and remember that Hong Kong not only has a baseball team but we actually have quite a number of professional baseball players”. My feeling is that viewers of this specialist movie will come away with strong impressions of a group of men whose winning ways extend to their efforts in front of the camera as well as out on the baseball field. 

Yvonne Teh