Love Battlefield by Coi CHeang Pou Soi (2004)
13 August 2007Damn this is a really good film, and one I would have completely missed out on if not for the Kung Fu Cult Cinema Message Boards, I would have totally missed out on this one if not for them. Previously I had never really like Eason Chan in anything, but he is really good. This is what Hong Kong cinema is all about, or at least used to be. And with this film if you hadn’t seen photos from it, or a trailer, you would really be in suspense because for the first 20 minutes I really thought I had picked up the wrong film, but with a quick twists this film goes completely someplace else, and goes there with aplomb. This film is really an absolute must see, with some great performances and a well done story. It even ends how it should. And I must say I think this film is much better than Cheang’s later Dog Bit Dog, which was stylish, but not this well done throughout.
Yui (Eason Chan Yik Shun) is a male nurse who lives with his lovely girlfriend Ching (Nicki Chow Lai Kei in a great emotional performance), but their relationship is not doing so well. He never learned to swim, so they can’t go where they were supposed to on vacation, and he leant a bunch of money to a friend (Kenny Kwan Chi Bun) who used it to buy a car, so he can’t even pay for his part of his vacation. Still they agree to go on vacation, but when they are about to leave, they go downstairs, and Yui’s car has been stolen, and he freaks out, while Ching still wants to go, and they end up breaking up. He heads for the police station to report his missing car, while she packs her stuff in the apartment to leave. On the way, he looks into his bag, and finds 2 wrist walkie talkies which he has seen with her, and she bought for their trip, and he decides to go back, but as he gets close to the apartment he sees his car, and jumps out to get in, but when he opens the trunk he finds a man who has been shot, and is quickly surrounded by a mainland Chinese gang led by Wah (Wang Zhiwen), and they know he is a nurse and take him with them to work on their wounded friend.
REVIEW CONTAIN SPOILERS…
This is a group of drug smugglers, and when the cops show up in a PTU, they quickly dispatch them all and steal all their weapons. THey decide to go back to Yui’s place, and he attempts to make sure that Ching isn’t home, and buys her enough time to leave, though she goes to their friends, who are trying to convince them to get back together. Yui works on their wounded buddy, though can’t do too much for a gun shot wound. And Ching calls, and says she is coming back, so Wah and them leave, but Ching finds blood, and a the bag with the other walkie watch. Yui is using it to try and show his position and they hear the screams of the wounded man, and run out, and Ching sees Yui kidnapped, and working on the wounded bloody men.
They head to the police station to see their friend (Raymond Wong Ho Yin), who doesn’t believe Yui, but when he gets a photo showing Yui with them, he intends to arrest Ching, but Kenny helps her escape so she can find and help Yui, and she takes his car, and uses the walkie talkie to try and find his position.
The guy dies that Yui was supposed to help, and the drug dealers head to the rendezvous, but they are double crossed, and Wah and his friend are shot, so they still nee Yui to help take care of them. Yui almost escapes, but he finds a pregnant woman (QIn Hailu) who turns out to be Wah’s wife, and they are off again. Yui throws the drugs out the window on the freeway, and the wounded guy gets out, but is hit by a car and killed. And now Yui is in deep. Now they need money, so they drop off the wife, and go to rob an armored car and force Yui to drive into it and kill a cop. Just then Ching catches up them and sees that Yui is in fact tied up to the steering wheel, and she tries to help him, but she is slashed by Wah’s wife, and they take Yui away again, but a dyeing security guard shoots Wah and the other guy with a shotgun.
Now they need blood to survive, so Wah calls Ching to get blood, and to give it to his wife. Ching manages to turn the tables on her though Yui asks her to just leave, but as Wah wants, she wants to go with the wife. WHen Yui hears that Wha is bringing CHing, he freaks out and attacks Wah, and then his surviving friend, and gets his machine gun, but he allows Wah to reload and is shot, before he shoots him, and just as Ching pulls up with his wife sees it, so she drives the car into the water, leaving Ching, and comes up and shoots Yui in the shoulder, and then cradles her husband and shoots herself.
Yui then crawls to the water and drops in and manages to save Ching, but then he drowns. Ching tries to save him, but she can’t and he gets caught under the car and dies. Only Ching and the baby survive, and we see Ching’s remembrance of when she met Yui in mainland China.
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Sure some of the film is contrived, like the walkie talkie watches, and their friend instantly believing Yui is evil, even though Ching has already tried to report him kidnapped, and then her finding them by randomly driving around is a little ridiculous, but still this film is really enjoyable. And what a brutal ending. Youch. A good film.