Another one of the great films from Johnnie To Kei Bung and Wai Ka Fai, but this one directed by Wai Ka Fai. This is a black comedy about some idiot triad members, particularly one played by Lau Ching Wan who is given 2 choices to try and make it big in the triad world, and we learn that maybe he shouldn’t have taken either choice. Not only is this film really well written and acted, but it really has it’s own completely unique shooting style. My lovely girlfriend probably couldn’t handle it and would probably be motion sick, as most of the film is handheld with incredibly wide angle lens and extreme close ups with huge depth of field. It even has a scene where the camera is in the center of a tiny table spinning around and showing all the idiot members of the gang. There are shots that seem to be up on a plank in between 2 ladders, and the car passes under and the camera tilts down and actually goes upside down following the cars. In fact in one scene while robbing a massage parlor the camera actually turns upside down, literally turning the place upside down, until the camera tumbles down the stairs and rights itself. Their is a scene with Lau Ching Wan lit only by gun shots all around him as he kind of twitches, but is never hit. There are also incredibly long shots, and all sorts of canted angles and the like. Even the score is absolutely top notch I wish I could get it on CD! This film is amazing. I have to admit this is the crime movie I would love to make, with a very similar camera style, though maybe slightly more stable if I could pull that off. Hmm, maybe it is time to get writing.

REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS…

I even have Lau Chin Wan’s autograph on my DVD! Nice!

This film is the story of Kau (Lau Ching Wan) who we see getting his fortune told, and he walks out. He is a 32 year old Triad whose life hasn’t really gone anywhere, and he is currently selling flower wreathes for funerals. He runs into Po (Cheung Tat Ming) who has a job for him bringing stolen Mercedes to a gang in Mainland, China. They meet at a restaurant to discuss the plan with Matt (the great Francis Ng Chun Yu), Elvis Tsui Kam Kong as an idiot strong man who robs with bricks, Joe Cheng Cho, Matthew Chow Hoi Kwong and one other younger fool. They leave to go to a massage parlor and Kau is stuck with the bill. At the massage parlor Kau doesn’t have enough money to pay, so they literally turn the place upside down robbing the place, but on the way out Kau loses the money, and they steal a car and run Po over. They bring the dyeing Po back to an apartment and try to revive him, but other than running around and spitting blood like a chicken he dies, so they burry him in the stove, and burn the car. Then Po’s pager goes off, but it is already buried in the stove, and the guys at the massage Parlor show up and attack them, but they escape and decide to go to Mainland, China on their own. On the way the youngest drowns, and the Kau can’t drive one of the Mercedes, so they must leave it behind, and they all beat Ko and act like he is a jinxs. They go to the gang who informs them that Po owed them money and gives them his wife played by Ruby Wong Cheuk Ling but takes the cars. They all get in a fight, and Wong gets the gun and makes them swear allegiance to her and they are to rob the gang once the gang robs the communists. She buys them new clothes, all the same, except Kay who she gets a red suit, and they go dancing and she grinds on him, but won’t let him touch her, then she has sex with him, but he can’t touch her or move, and then she dies. And finally Kau takes over and they decide to follow the gang and rob them. They follow the gang, and the gang gets slaughtered by the Communists and slaughters the whole gang. 30 minutes into the movie and they are all dead!

We cut back to Kau leaving the fortune teller and we see things happen slightly differently, he beats Po and takes all his clothes off when Po gives him shit. Kau still pays the bill at the Restaurant, but he hits on the massage girl played by Carman Lee Yuek Tung, and ends up paying all the money he can, and giving over his watch, and the girl leaves with him and sleeps with him. She asks him to see her off to the airport because she is going to Taiwan for work, and he says no, but he goes and she gives him a replacement watch which he throws out, or seems to, but keeps it and it turns out to be his cracked watch he gave at the parlor. Then Matt shows up and chases him down, saying he quit out on the other guys and took a hitman job in Taiwan but wants Kau to go, Kau refuses, but goes anyway, but Matt forgot the info at home, so Kau takes control and they head to a Taiwanese Traid, but while they are drunk Matt takes a hit from them, and that night also took the hit from the other gang. Both turn out to be different divisions of the same gang, in fact hits on the 2 leaders, both brothers and twins Brother’s Black and White. And at the same time Carmen Lee is sent to the hotel as a whore for the triads, Kau stops Matt from the kill, but Carmen Lee is shot as is Matt, and Kau manages to get them out of there, but leaves his gun and the two brothers shoot each other. Kau gets his friends to the hospital, but the Triads show up too and then Brother’s die, and Kau is handcuffed in a car with both right hand men, who on the way to the police station attack him, and the car crashed and he ends up getting free of them and eating shit. In jail he is bailed out by the gang, and gets the gang to bail out his friends. The boss likes him because his loyalty to his friends and he meets the big boss with Matt at the Hospital after finding the original gang in jail. At the hospital the big boss is there for his wife who had her head bashed in by someone with a brick and Kau thinks it was Matt’s doing so he cuts their fingers off, but it turns out to have been Elvis Tsui Kam Kong who did it and a huge mess transpires with the boss beating Kau’s friends and accidently shooting Matt again. Then the boss accidently shoots Kau who is protecting his friends in the back of his head with a ricochet and now wheelchair bound and unable to move and with thick glasses on he becomes a successful triad boss.

We then cut back to Kau at the Fortune tellers getting told he will have 2 oportunities to go over see, one will lead to death and other to richness and fame, depending on the man Kau decides to become, so he walks out and runs into Po and beats him up, starting over again…

What an absolutely amazing film this is. Totally bad ass. So well done, and seemingly without a huge budget, and indie crime drama with a great cast. The DVD is unfortunately out of print, but this is a film that any film fan should not miss.