Two mainlanders fall in love, one a naive wide-eyed country boy, the other a ambitious opportunist. The film follows the arrival and induction of Leon Lai's character to HK and his befriending of Maggie Cheung's character. The movie spans more than 10 years of their lives as they gradually acclimate themselves to becoming "Hongkies". CAALS's weakness is it's tendency to overdramaticize, but it's strength is in showing the viewer how coincidence conspires against people, but ultimately brings them together; how the love of our life may be someone you haven't even met yet. Cheung and Lai are terrific! A lot of the movie focuses on close-ups of them and their reactions, so this film could have easily been botched with bad performances. Maggie Cheung's expression as pushes her way through a crowd to find Eric Tsang's character has died is heartbreaking. If you liked Chungking Express watch this! Also the Teresa Tang song that's used a couple times in the movie (I dont' know the title) is very relevant to the story, lyrically speaking. Unfortunately the version I saw did not subtitle the song, hence the non-mandarin speaking viewer will lose a bit in the lack of translation. If you want to see the translation, the lyrics are subtitled in Prison on Fire. 8.5/10