Before Wilson Yip directed Donnie Yen in the IP MAN series the two had already done a bunch of movies together. Their first collaboration was the 2005 crime movie SPL: SHA PO LANG. The title has to do with Chinese mythology and every man’s capacity for both good and evil. That’s hard to translate for Americans so the Weinsteins called it KILL ZONE. It’s about a zone of killing.
(more…)
Posts Tagged ‘Hong Kong action’
Kill Zone (SPL: Sha Po Lang)
Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011
Exiled
Tuesday, February 22nd, 2011
After VENGEANCE heroically bloodshedded me in the face it was obviously time to check out some of these Johnnie To movies that I’ve been ignoring even though everybody and their blood brother has been recommending them to me over the years. It’s nice to see that while Hong Kong action cinema has lost the worldwide attention it had in the ’90s there’s still been some people keeping it alive. Mr. To definitely has a modern take on the types of emotions and style we love from that era. So here’s another one of his more recent ones, 2006’s EXILED.
(more…)
A Better Tomorrow III
Saturday, October 16th, 2010
After their disagreements over A BETTER TOMORROW 2, John Woo and Tsui Hark weren’t able to work together on part 3. But they both wanted to do a Vietnam war era prequel, so Woo took his and made it BULLET IN THE HEAD, Hark made A BETTER TOMORROW III: LOVE AND DEATH IN SAIGON. As far as artistic success I’d say Woo definitely won that battle, but at least Tsui got to clean up in the getting-to-hang-out-with-Chow-Yun-Fat department. (more…)
A Better Tomorrow 2
Friday, October 15th, 2010
A BETTER TOMORROW II is a crazy fuckin sequel. The story is incredibly convoluted, the plot (or plots) divided between Hong Kong and New York, continuing the story of Ho, Kit and Jackie, but also following a new character called Uncle Lung (Dean Shek) in conflict with the police and with two unrelated crime syndicates. The weirdest (and best) part is that they actually used the gimmick that’s always joked about but almost never actually done: Chow Yun Fat plays Ken, the never-mentioned-before-twin-brother of his deceased part 1 character Mark. I probly don’t have to say any more than that to convince you this movie is stupid. I liked it though. (more…)
A Better Tomorrow
Thursday, October 14th, 2010
If you look for pictures from John Woo’s 1986 breakthrough A BETTER TOMORROW you’ll mostly find Chow Yun Fat lighting a cigar with a burning counterfeit American $100 bill, or wearing a real nice suit holding two guns. That’s from the beginning of the movie when his character Mark is a big shot in a Hong Kong syndicate. That’s not a better tomorrow, that’s a more financially stable yesterday. Most of the movie takes place years later, when Mark has been shot in the leg and has to wear a metal brace, so he’s now just an errand boy instead of a Big Brother. (more…)
