by MATTHEW MARSH
30 September 2003
The Strait Times (Features), Malaysia

Every summer, some of the finest motorcars ever made converge in Paris, France, for the Louis Vuitton Classic. MATTHEW MARSH steers through a parade of the bold and beautiful that's enough to make even Hong Kong star Chow Yun-fat reassess his priorities.

IT'S surprising to hear Chow Yun-fat confess that he hates travelling. Recently, the Hong Kong movie star flew to Paris to present a prize at the Louis Vuitton Classic - an annual event that celebrates automotive design and highlights the luggage maker's historical connection with travel.

"You can hang me from a wire, 100 feet in the air, swinging around with my sword," confided Chow, in reference to his action films like the 2000 hit Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, "but I get really scared when a plane hits turbulence." Surely this can't be true? "Yes, yes, yes," he assures me with a tap on the arm, "flying east-west across the Pacific, it can sometimes last for an hour."

Chow's disarming honesty is an effective tool and contrasts with his onscreen two-guns-blazing style. He's a good actor then?

"If people think you are a good actor, then you are, I suppose," he says simply. "I don't make movies to win awards - it's my job, it's how I make a living."

Despite it being his third language, after Cantonese and Putonghua, the 48-year-old seems almost relieved to speak English. He gives the impression of thinking about the subjects being discussed but not "creating" the answers.

Displaying honesty once again as we discuss which of the more than 70 cars on display might be his favourite, Chow says, "I'm not a g-force man. You need to be physically strong to drive a sports car and I prefer a relaxing ride." He talks about the beauty of line that characterised cars designed in the 1950s and Ô60s and remembers the old Alfa Romeos he owned as a youngster.

Now the most important things in choosing a car are "comfort and " (with a pause for humorous effect), "price!" His Singaporean wife Jasmine smiles at this: it's clear that they are a team, that she plays an important almost managerial role for him. He grins. "If I owned a classic car, my wife would look after it most of the time". Later, at lunch, Chow walks over to my table, pinstriped jacket over black turtle-neck top, and ruffles my hair with his hand. "How's the food?"

We get to talking about cars again. The Lamma Island-born Taurean admits to hankering after the famous 1954 Gullwing Mercedes and displays an impressive knowledge of its attributes. He remembers resisting the temptation to buy one that was on sale in Hong Kong once.

"They brought it over from Europe, but it was left-hand drive of course, so you would have to apply for a special permit each week to drive it. And it cost HK$4.5 million (RM!2.2 million)."

Surely a man of his wealth could keep a classic car secretly? Chow laughs. Jasmine is out of earshot now and he leans forward conspiratorially: "I could own something in Shenzhen perhaps, but not a car". His reference to the habit of Hong Kong businessmen keeping their mistresses just over the border might seem reckless. In fact it just reinforces the point that Chow is a man content with who he is and what he has to say. He's not worried that his joke will be misunderstood. His confidence is charming.

"People in Hong Kong don't trouble me," he says. Perhaps this explains why he is so relaxed. "I take the bus and train a lot, sometimes the ferry. I've been popular for 30 years now and I'm treated like a big brother, I suppose. There's a lot of waiting in the movie business and I'd rather do that at home than in the United States." His honest and logical answer continues with the Chow trademark suffix: "and if you spend too many days in the US, they tax you!"

This year's Louis Vuitton Classic moved from its regular Parc de Bagatelle venue to the Domaine National de Saint-Cloud which overlooks the city of Paris. There's a historical connection with Louis Vuitton here too: the estate was the 19th century home of Napoleon III and his wife Empress Eugenie, who was one of luggage-maker's first customers. "I knew it was the perfect place," says Vuitton's Francois Delage, now Asia-Pacific executive director. "When I worked in Paris, I owned an E-type Jaguar and often drove here for lunch."

It was another Jaguar - a rare XKSS model owned for more than 20 years by screen legend Steve McQueen which caught Chow's attention when he was welcomed to the impressively manicured gardens by Vuitton's CEO Yves Carcelle. The car's present owner, Richard Messer, did not immediately recognise Chow and was slightly alarmed when he hopped in, to a chorus of camera shutters. Was he just creating a photo opportunity, being a professional? "Steve McQueen is in my soul," protests Chow. "The Great Escape was the most fantastic movie - I was moved and stunned by his performance."

Chow was clearly impressed by the car too, and paused to hear Messer describe its history. Jaguar only built 16 examples of the XKSS - a road-going version of its famous D-type which dominated sports car racing in the late 1950s, including a hattrick of wins at the Le Mans 24-hour race. Messer suggests that McQueen bought the car in reaction to being banned from racing by his movie studio. "We lived nearby his house on Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles and you'd sometimes hear him roaring off to work in it." The myth continues that McQueen had the Jaguar repainted from white to British Racing Green and had California craftsmen create more comfortable leather seats - and special storage for his sunglasses.

These practical considerations would impress Yves Carcelle who, like Chow, keeps his passion for classic cars under control. "At the moment I have a tendency to consider cars as things that go conveniently from one point to another." The father of four uses a Range Rover when in Paris and has an ex-British Army Land Rover for use in the country. He likes the idea of having a collection of cars to suit different moods. "... just as men choose their tie in the morning, or a woman selects a handbag."

"The owners of these cars are usually very wealthy," says the elegantly suited Carcelle. "They have everything in the world, but they also have this passion for showing their cars to other people. I find it very rewarding to organise these events."

He sips his morning coffee from a plastic cup as we speak. "I love to see the children's eyes, even the adults', as these cars go past. My friend, who owns a Bugatti, drove it here from Switzerland - that's 650km, in conditions that are not entirely practical. This differentiates the car owners from other collectors."

Alongside the classics were some concept cars - design studies that manufacturers had displayed at motor shows. Carcelle was fascinated by the Stout Scarab which, like the Renault Espace of the 1980s, featured a seating area around a table. "We thought the Espace was a big innovation, but this idea already existed with the Stout in 1935," says Carcelle. "Looking at prototypes and classics together is very symbolic of what we do at Vuitton."

The 55-year-old deftly segues to a topic that he clearly enjoys: what he describes as "the arrival of fashion in a house that had only a tradition of travel and leather goods for 140 years." He credits this to Bernard Arnault's (LVMH's principal shareholder) idea of hiring Marc Jacobs to be artistic director. The question, says Carcelle, was "how to be creative and modern whilst respecting this tradition." He explains that, "working within this constraint requires, in fact, greater creativity. We innovate, but are respectful of the history of the company so that with any bag or suitcase, you buy a little bit of the myth of travel from the 19th century."

It was fitting then that the prize for the "Best of Show" went to a Bentley Speed Six around which legend swirls. Wealthy racing driver Captain Woolf Barnato's dinner discussion in Cannes sometime in the 1930s resulted in him racing his Bentley back to London - against a train. His mission was to get there before Le Train Bleu arrived in Paris. His success (with four minutes to spare) prompted Bentley to name their next version of the Speed Six, "the Blue Train." Unlike the car, the steam train no longer exists, of course, but its history is celebrated in the opulent surroundings of a renovated restaurant of the same name at the Gare de Lyon station in Paris.

"We still manufacture the trunks that we became famous for," says Carcelle, "trunks that travelled on those trains and on ships. But travel has changed now. It was reserved then for a minority and for long periods -now it is for everyone and can be a mere 24 hours. Even when we go to the office, we carry things so, according to the need or to the mood, one chooses a different bag. Luxury is now available to more people."

His telephone rings and he glances quickly at his (Louis Vuitton, of course) wristwatch - a reminder that running a global corporation consumes time. With so much of it involved in his work he must - like Chow - find travel tiresome. "No," is the immediate answer, followed by a chuckle. "It sounds strange and people ask why I still travel for my holidays, but I think it is addictive: meeting new people, having new experiences. Every time we open a new store, go into a new market, we are forced to understand new cultures. Negotiating with people, in a funny way, is more enjoyable that merely visiting a place. Even on holiday I continue it - reading a country is more interesting that reading a book."

©2003 The Strait Times. All rights reserved.