Guilty (2015) (DVD) (Hong Kong Version) DVD Region 3

Chau plays Kit, an unfortunate man whose life has been ruined by the giant tumour on the side of his face, reducing him to skulking in a shack filled with trash and taking on jobs as a low-ranked hitman. His life changes when he meets a young prostitute and compensated dater called Ting Ting (actress model Liddy Li, recently in the headlines for all the wrong reasons), who he buys from her pimp, promising to take care of her and give her a better life. Although things start off promisingly, Kit soon realises that Ting Ting is not the most balanced of girls, and their relationship develops into a twisted mix of the familial and sexual. With Kit struggling to keep his job a secret, her behaviour becomes stranger, and when she appears to have been kidnapped, the poor guy is pushed over the edge.

Devotees of old school Hong Kong category III cinema haven't had much to get excited about for some time now, most films with the rating having been (admittedly often amusing) sex comedies or erotic dramas. On this score, Guilty is definitely a welcome throwback, complete with the look and feel of the lurid and perverse thrillers of the early 1990s. Wong Pak Kei certainly seems to be familiar with what genre fans are looking for, and he packs in plenty of violence, grotesquery and perverted behaviour - Wong further shows his dedication to the form through a brief scene in which two characters go to the cinema to watch a category III gore. Although the plot doesn't really make much sense, it's enjoyably crazed, with some odd twists and turns as it builds towards a neatly nihilistic, if not exactly unpredictable conclusion. Wong handles the sleaze and sickness with a fair degree of assurance, making great use of shadows and some appropriately off-key lighting to give the film a queasy and foreboding feel throughout, mostly being shot in rundown buildings, trash-heaps and filthy alleyways.

There's a humanity to the film as well however, and though Wong's view of the world here is a dark and depressing one indeed, both Kit and Ting Ting make for interesting if not exactly sympathetic protagonists, thanks in part to strong, committed performances from both Pakho Chau and Liddy Li. Their shifting relationship is a compelling one and helps to anchor the narrative and to provide a solid amount of suspense as well as some surprising emotional depth during the final third. The script, from first time writer and producer Chan Pang Chun puts more effort into character development than might be expected for this kind of thing, and themes of loneliness, trauma and self-loathing combine to make the film an effective piece of outsider cinema that recalls Soi Cheang's fantastically bleak 2006 thriller Dog Bite Dog.

Guilty does have its flaws, chiefly some uncertain pacing and a few moments when the low budget becomes rather obvious, undermining the impact of some of the action set pieces and shootouts. Thankfully, these don't really detract too much from its overall quality, and it impresses as one of the few category III shockers to manage to combine engaging characters with the usual depravity. As a result, though it's nothing truly special the film does suggest Wong Pak Kei as a director with some degree of vision - or at least more than he displayed with S For Sex, S For Secrets.

by James Mudge - EasternKicks.com