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Runaway Blues (DVD) (Multi-audio) (Hong Kong Version)
Andy Lau (Actor)
| Lu Hsiu Ling (Actor)
| Blackie Ko (Actor)
| Tanny Tien (Actor)
Runaway Blues was originally released back in 1989 and was directed by David Lai, who was also responsible for the classic Saviour of the Soul as well as a number of 1980s Hong Kong genre favourites such as Spiritual Love, Lost Souls, and Possessed. The film is another of the gangster dramas that were so popular at the time, and features the immortal Andy Lau in the lead, appearing just before his acting and singing careers launched him to superstardom. Interestingly enough, the film's theme song, "Do I Really Have Nothing at All", was performed by Dave Wang rather than Lau, and became a popular hit on its release. Here Lau plays Kwong, a Taiwanese gang member who flees to Hong Kong after... [read more]
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Nobody's Perfect (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Stephy Tang (Actor)
| Kary Ng (Actor)
| Patrick Kong (Director)
| Sammy Leung (Actor)
Patrick Kong takes a break from back-up lovers and unnecessary plot twists for Nobody's Perfect, his third film of 2008 and the first that qualifies as an intentional comedy. Nobody's Perfect does feature two-timing and crappy boyfriends, but those details are minor compared to the main theme of the film. What is the main theme? Probably a prosaic lesson about being a better person, but the film is far more notable for mercilessly savaging Hong Kong-specific pop culture and engaging in crass promotion, courtesy of twin bankrollers Gold Label Music and the Neway karaoke chain. At every chance, the film makes reference to Gold Label's contingent of singers (e.g., Ronald Cheng and Justin Lo),... [read more]
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If You Are The One (DVD) (English Subtitled) (US Version)
Shu Qi (Actor)
| Ge You (Actor)
| Feng Xiao Gang (Director)
| Vivian Hsu (Actor)
Feng Xiaogang takes a break from movies featuring war, martial arts or Andy Lau for If You Are The One, a commercial romance that hearkens back to Feng's days as China's number one purveyor of popular comedies. Starring Feng's usual leading man Ge You, If You Are The One was inspired by the 1998 Taiwanese film The Personals (that film's writer-director, Chen Kuo-Fu, serves as producer and co-writer of If You Are The One) and proves entertaining and unusually smart for a commercial film aimed at the masses. A laggy third act and an anticlimactic ending bring things down a notch, and the film isn't as forthcoming as it could be, with more said than is actually shown. However, Feng Xiaogang's... [read more]
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Rule#1 (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Ekin Cheng (Actor)
| Shawn Yue (Actor)
| Stephanie Che (Actor)
| Fiona Xie (Actor)
Rule#1 is the latest offering from young Singaporean director and former critic Kelvin Tong, who has quickly established himself as one of the more interesting and quirky film makers working in Asian cinema today thanks to the likes of Love Story and The Maid. Although he has dabbled in the horror genre before with the comedy Men in White, here he thankfully takes a far more serious and downbeat approach, managing to temper his eccentric sense of humour with genuine chills and surprising unpleasantness. The result is his best effort yet, and what is probably one of the most accomplished and indeed effective genre films to have come from Hong Kong in recent years. The film opens in suitably... [read more]
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4 Bia (AKA: Phobia) (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Banjong Pisonthanakun (Director)
| Parkpoom Wongpoom (Director)
| Yongyoot Thongkongtoon (Director)
Horror anthologies can be rather hit and miss affairs, ranging in quality from the excellent Three to the rather shabby Black Night. The awkwardly titled 4 Bia (apparently playing on the word "Phobia" though causing no end of problems with pronunciation and search engines in the process) from Thailand is the latest film to take a stab at attempting the difficult task of delivering a package of consistently entertaining and sufficiently original short shockers. In its favour, the film does showcase the talents of four of the country's most promising new helmers, most prominently Banjong Pisanthanakun and Pakpoom Wongpoom, whose Shutter and Alone have ranked among the very best Asian horror... [read more]
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Storm Rider - Clash of Evils (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Nicholas Tse
| Richie Jen
| Raymond Lam
| Hins Cheung
If you can't wait for the live-action sequel to Storm Riders, you can satiate your Wind and Cloud lust with Storm Rider - Clash of Evils. Directed by Dante Lam (Beast Cops), this animated feature functions as almost a de-facto sequel to the 1998 Andrew Lau blockbuster. Clash of Evils basically starts where the live-action Storm Riders left off, with orphaned martial artists Wind and Cloud taking on Conquer, the man who murdered their parents in order to make them his disciples and secure his rule of the martial arts world. Wind and Cloud defeat Conquer, but afterwards Wind is possessed by the Kylin Blood, which he obtained when he previously slew the Fire Kylin, a fierce fire beast. The... [read more]
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True Women For Sale (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Prudence Liew (Actor)
| Anthony Wong (Actor)
| Race Wong (Actor)
| Sammy Leung (Actor)
Director Herman Yau revisits Whispers and Moans territory once more with True Women For Sale, except this time he has a little more fun. Taking place in local Sham Shui Po, the film details an assortment of lower class characters muddling through situations that are unique to Hong Kong and its people. Anthony Wong is Lau Fu-Yi, an insurance salesman who caters to working class stiffs, including temporary construction workers, one of whom cashes in his chips after an accident. Lau is charged with delivering the meager insurance payment to the widow, Wong Lin-Fa (Race Wong), a Mainland immigrant with one daughter and one more child on the way. Like many girls from the Mainland, Lin-Fa desires... [read more]
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Come Drink With Me
Ngok Wah
| Cheng Pei Pei (Actor)
| Chen Hung Lieh
| King Hu (Director)
Come Drink with Me was made in 1966. It was King Hu's first attempt at Wuxia genre, as well as Cheng Pei-pei and Yue Hua's debut in a Wuxia movie. Before the release of this film, Wuxia was not a popular genre in Hong Kong. In some senses, it is not inappropriate to say that Come Drink with Me was the first movie to arouse the attention of Hong Kong audience to new style Wuxia film. King Hu was also known as a synonym of Wuxia genre later. The story begins with the kidnap of a government official by the notorious "Five Tigers". In response to this case, Golden Swallow (Cheng Pei-pei), the sister of the government official, starts her rescue mission. Being pure and inexperienced, she does not... [read more]
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The Beast Stalker (DVD) (US Version)
Nicholas Tse (Actor)
| Nick Cheung (Actor)
| Zhang Jing Chu (Actor)
| Liu Kai Chi (Actor)
2008 has been a rather underwhelming year for Hong Kong Cinema, which is why it's great to see The Beast Stalker. Director Dante Lam's action thriller isn't a special film, but it's solidly entertaining, possessing of action, suspense, appropriate emotions and some well-drawn characters. Nicholas Tse leads the cast as Sergeant Tong, a super-serious cop whose stern demeanor edges dangerously close to overacting. In the film's opening action sequence, he engages in a car chase with evil bastard Cheung Yat-Tung (Keung Ho-Man), but the pursuit ends in a spectacular slow-motion smash-em-up involving four vehicles and multiple individuals, all whose lives change in seconds. Dazed from the crash,... [read more]
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Red Cliff (Blu-ray) (Hong Kong Version)
Tony Leung Chiu Wai (Actor)
| Takeshi Kaneshiro (Actor)
| Vicki Zhao (Actor)
| Hu Jun (Actor)
I can say little of a positive nature about John Woo's career in Hollywood. It seems to me that after the success of Face Off, the director became the go to guy for outlandish thrillers. A succession of worthless B-movie scripts have been given the Woo kitchen sink treatment that could not prevent them from being rank awful. When he decided to return home to make this historical epic on review, it felt like an intervention had taken place and I was relieved that a fine artist may get the chance to create something of value again. It hasn't been plain sailing though. Casting difficulties, rumours of all sorts of problems, and dead stuntmen have given the impression that Woo may be heading for... [read more]
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Winds of September (DVD) (English Subtitled) (Taiwan Version)
Tom Lin (Director)
| Chang Chieh (Actor)
| Wang Bo Chieh (Actor)
| Modi Chiu (Choc7) (Actor)
Produced by Eric Tsang and Hong Kong-based Big Pictures Limited, Winds of September - The Taiwan Chapter is the first of three films from three different Asian countries, each telling the same basic story of youth and friendship, and how good intentions can't stop the inevitable, sometimes tragic end of innocence. Director Tom Lin Shu-Yu (Parachute Kids) is the originator of this concept, as all three films are based off his original script, which follows one year in the school lives of seven boys as they come to grips with change and conflict within their ranks. The Taiwan Chapter takes place specifically in 1997 in suburban Hsinchu, a medium-sized city south of Taipei, at the peak of the... [read more]
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Deadly Delicious (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Francis Ng (Actor)
| Jiang Yi Yan (Actor)
| Yu Nan (Actor)
| Zhu Yu Chen (Actor)
Although Deadly Delicious opens with the same quote from Confucius that provided Ang Lee's Eat Man Drink Woman with its title, the two films present very different depictions of modern relationships and of the battle between the sexes. Certainly, the film from first time writer director Zhao Tianyu is a much darker and more cynical affair, dealing with infidelity, obsession and murderous revenge. The film was produced by Zhang Yi Bai, whose Curiosity Killed the Cat was arguably one of the best modern suspense thrillers to have come from Mainland China in some time, and it serves up a similar line in contemporary thrills thanks to a clever script which keeps viewers guessing right through to... [read more]
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Painted Skin (2008) (DVD+Postcard) (Director's Cut) (Limited Edition) (Hong Kong Version)
Donnie Yen (Actor)
| Vicki Zhao (Actor)
| Zhou Xun (Actor)
| Aloys Chen (Actor)
One of the biggest Asian cinema events of 2008, Painted Skin is the latest film to draw inspiration from Pu Songling's classic of Chinese literature Strange Tales of Liaozhai. Although the legendary King Hu actually directed a film back in 1993 with the same name and based upon the same material, Gordon Chan's new version is more of a re-imagining, being more in the vein of other recent big budget costume epics, boasting an all-star cast and luscious production values. The film has certainly proved popular, having topped the box office in both China and Hong Kong and despite some mixed critical reviews has been chosen as Hong Kong's official entry for the Best Foreign Language Film category... [read more]
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Mismatched Couples (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Donnie Yen (Actor)
| May Lo (Actor)
| Wong Wan Si
| Shang Shan An Nuo
Mismatched Couples is an unusual proposition in that despite starring current genre favourite Donnie Yen and being directed by the legendary Yuen Woo Ping, it is not actually a martial arts film, focusing instead on some very 1980s style break dancing. This having been said, the film certainly gives Yen and Yuen plenty of chances to show off their considerable acrobatic and athletic skills, albeit in a very different manner. An energetic, youthful affair, it works both as a madcap action comedy and as an amusing nostalgia piece, featuring plenty of outrageous fashions and bouncy synth pop music which were no doubt on the cutting edge of cool during its original release back in the heady year... [read more]
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Lost, Indulgence (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Karen Mok (Actor)
| Jiang Wen Li (Actor)
| Eason Chan (Actor)
| Eric Tsang (Actor)
Zhang Yibai (Curiosity Killed the Cat) directs the curiously-titled Lost, Indulgence, a delayed Mainland drama made notorious by cancellations at both the Hong Kong International Film Festival and the Udine Far East Film Festival. The film finally premiered weeks later at the Tribeca Film Festival after getting approval from SARFT (State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television), but its multiple false starts give it an air of loaded expectation. Is there something going on in Lost, Indulgence that makes it problematic for China's notoriously prickly film approval board? Having seen the film, I would say "possibly" - but that thought comes with the multiple caveats that I don't... [read more]
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Dark Night (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Cheung Kwok Chu (Actor)
| Su Ming Ming (Actor)
| Xu Ming (Actor)
| Lo Wai (Producer)
Originally released back in 1986, Taiwanese drama Dark Night was based upon a novel by noted feminist writer Li Ang and was directed and scripted by Fred Tan, who previously worked as an assistant director for the legendary King Hu on the likes of Raining in the Mountain and Legend of the Mountain. Interestingly, the film was not Tan's only literary adaptation, as in 1988 he brought Lust, Caution novelist Eileen Chang's book Rouge of the North to the screen. Given the source material, it should come as no surprise that the film deals with themes of adultery and sexual repression, offering up a scathing depiction of the role of women in modern relationships. The film centres on Lee (actress... [read more]
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Drifting Flowers (DVD) (2-Disc Edition) (Taiwan Version)
Lu Yi Ching (Actor)
| Fang Si Yu (Actor)
| Zero Chou (Director)
Director Zero Chou impresses with Drifting Flowers, her follow-up to the attractive but frustratingly abstract Spider Lilies. A trio of interrelated Taiwan-set stories detailing homosexual relationships, Drifting Flowers is unoriginal yet engaging, and features sympathetic characters and situations. The first segment tells the tale of eight-year-old May (Pai Chih-Ying), who lives under the care of her blind sister Jing (Serena Fang), a singer in a three-person lounge act. One of her colleagues is the tall Diego (Chao Yi-Lan), whose boyish haircut and butch manner of dress signal her sexual orientation like a bright red flag. Diego becomes close to the two sisters, and May becomes attached to... [read more]
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The Vampire Who Admires Me (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Sam Lee (Actor)
| Roger Kwok (Actor)
| Zhang Jia Lun (Actor)
| Li Man Yun (Actor)
It's been nearly six months since My Wife is a Gambling Maestro, so of course it's time for another Wong Jing lousy cinema special! However, The Vampire Who Admires Me throws a wrench in the works by not being as bad as one might expect. The credit should go to director Cub Chien, whose horror omnibus scare 2 die was a well-directed exercise in visceral thrills. Echoing that, Vampire Who Admires Me is better directed than your average Wong Jing-produced cheapie, and Chien manages some effective laughs and energy. Still, despite the film's amusement factor, it possesses a routine story and gags that are as throwaway as anything from the Jingster's fun factory. The fun here has an asterisk... [read more]
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The Forbidden Legend: Sex & Chopsticks (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Lam Wai Kin (Actor)
| Qian Wen Qi (Director)
| Hasekawase Rina (Actor)
| Wakana Hikaru (Actor)
Oh, how you've waited for this day. Maybe. It's been years since that former staple of Hong Kong Cinema - the ancient costume Category III sexploitation flick - has reared its soft-focus head, but the wait is now over. The Forbidden Legend: Sex & Chopsticks returns that hallowed genre to Hong Kong Cinema, bringing with it the fleshy beauties, questionably attractive leading men, softcore couplings, and game silliness that have so enchanted midnight movie audiences worldwide. Action, crime, and arthouse films have more international cachet, but do audiences in Europe and North America care more about opulent softcore pornography than a well-written, acted and directed romantic comedy? I'm... [read more]
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When Taekwondo Strikes (DVD) (Hong Kong Version)
Angela Mao (Actor)
| Jhoon Rhee (Actor)
| Sammo Hung
| Carter Huang
When Taekwondo Strikes is another classic martial arts film which has been unearthed and re-released on DVD by Joy Sales, this time from back in 1973. The film is a real treat for martial arts fans, serving up an incredible array of talent, including top female genre fighter and international cult favourite Angela Mao (also in the likes of Broken Oath, Hapkido, and The Stoner) in which she was originally set to star with Bruce Lee before his untimely death), Carter Wong (known for The Blazing Temple, The 18 Bronzemen, and other hits), Korean martial arts master Rhee Jhoon Goo, here making his one and only cinematic appearance, and even Sammo Hung in an early villainous role. It was directed... [read more]
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