The Hidden Blade, Starring “Little” Tony Leung

You know this film must be propaganda, when it is the third installment of the so-called “China Victory Trilogy,” especially when the first two films magically transformed disasters into “victories.” In Chinese Doctors, the doctors of Wuhan bravely battle the spread of Covid-19, whereas in reality, the authorities did their best to cover it up. Then came The Battle of Lake Changsin, rewriting the history of the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, in which 120,000 PLA troops surrounded 30,000 UN Forces, who managed to slip through their encirclement to fight another day. At least the Japanese really did lose WWII, but it is highly debatable how much Mao’s Communists contributed to their defeat. Of course, that is not how director-screenwriter Cheng Er tells it in The Hidden Blade, which opens today in New York.

The Japanese think Mr. He is the director of their Shanghai counter-intelligence operation, but he is actually a double agent truly loyal to the Communist Party’s Special Branch. One of his duties is eliminating traitors like Liang, whom he meets with in the prologue. Eventually, the film will catch back up to this scene, as it flashes backwards and forwards. It almost seems like Cheng deliberately fractured his narrative to obscure the film’s didactic implications.

Regardless, it seems only Mr. He’s chief enforcer, Mr. Ye ever starts to wonder about him, even though his behavior is highly suspicious. Mr. He certainly has his Japanese military boss Watanabe fooled. The stakes are certainly high for him, since He’s lover, Ms. Chen is active Communist agent.

Frankly, if it were not for Cheng’s narrative gamesmanship and obfuscations, the story here would be pretty straight forward. Naturally, it still slavishly follows the Party Line. Cheng is much more successful as a visual stylist than a burnisher of national myths, because the film has a strikingly noir look. It makes you think Shanghai during the war couldn’t have been so bad, judging from all the late night cafes that were operating.

Shunji Iwai’s Last Letter

Paper letters seem old fashioned these days, but they have their advantages, like being hack-proof (but they do leave a literal paper trail). They certainly played a significant role in the lives of Yuan Zhihua and her recently deceased sister Zhinan. In fact, letters from the past might even provide some closure to her family in Shunji Iwai’s first Chinese language film, Last Letter (trailer here), which opens tomorrow in New York.

Yuan Zhinan struggled with poor health, abuse, and depression throughout her life, so her sister and parents were not shocked by her suicide, but they still passed it off as the tragic result of an unspecified illness. Rather conveniently, it happened during the school break leading up to Chinese New Year, so Zhihua’s preteen daughter will temporarily move in with Zhinan’s teen daughter Mumu, while her little brother stays with her aunt and uncle.

As fate dictates, notice of a middle school reunion comes soon after the funeral. Zhihua attends with the intention of informing her former classmates of Zhinan’s death, but she panics when everyone mistakes her for her sister. Yin Chuan is especially eager to renew their acquaintance, making things incredibly awkward for her. He was her high school crush, while he carried a torch for her more popular sister. She even offered to deliver his love notes, but that did not go according to plan. However, Zhihua cannot resist sending him hard copy letters, sans return address, to prevent her tech savvy husband from discovering her correspondence.

You can think of Last Letters as a cross between Beaches and Cyrano de Bergerac, produced in Mandarin. Fortunately, it is a remarkably effective tear-jerker, since Iwai is apparently already at work on a Japanese language version. He and the first-class cast are not shy when it comes to manipulating our emotions and yanking on our heart strings. However, this film works so surprisingly well, because the characters are always quicker to figure out each deception than the would-be deceivers realize. Granted, these people are damaged, but they are not stupid.

It is a little odd to see the radiant Zhou Xun playing Zhihua, the ugly duckling sister, but she is terrific and deeply moving in the part. Qin Hao also brings a rumpled, sad sack dignity to the film as the older, disillusioned Yin. However, Zhang Zifeng is absolutely devastating two-times over as young Zhihua and her daughter Saran. She also develops a wonderful rapport with Enxi Deng, primarily in her scenes as Mumu, but also in flashbacks as young Zhinan—rather significantly, the adult Zhinan is never seen on-screen, as if she only exists for Zhihua and Yin as her high school ideal.

Arguably, Chinese cinema has a comparative advantage when it comes to tearjerkers and Iwai is no stranger to the genre himself, making this a shrewd choice for his first Mainland project. Last Letter will totally choke you up, but in a way that is ultimately rejuvenating. It is the kind of film that makes you feel good about people. Of course, the ridiculously attractive cast does not hurt in any way. Highly recommended for fans of sentimental romance and family dramas, Last Letter opens tomorrow (11/9) in New York, at the AMC Empire.

Ann Hui’s Our Time Will Come

Fong Lan is a schoolteacher and Blackie Lau is an outlaw, but they work well together on missions for the Dongjiang resistance to Imperial Japanese occupation. However, those are only short-term assignments. Over the long-term, Fong will endure the occupation and the stress of her clandestine work thanks to the support of her caustic mother. Ann Hui takes viewers behind enemy lines, but she is even more interested in life on the home front. She is admittedly not one to wave the bloody shirt, which is why some speculate her film was precipitously replaced as the opening night film of this Shanghai International Film Festival. Regardless, Ann’s Our Time Will Come released in Chinese-language markets just in time for the official Handover anniversary celebrations and opens this Friday in New York, soon after our own Independence Day (trailer here).

Poet and future PRC Minister of Culture is renting a room from Fong’s mother (she will be called Mrs. Fong, period), but they can sense he is primed to bolt. Fong herself will help facilitate his flight as part of an underground Varian Fry-like operation to smuggle intellectuals out of occupied Hong Kong. Her grace under pressure is definitely noticed by Lau. He is still relatively new to the resistance, but not to living a shadowy underground existence. Soon, Lau returns to recruit her to lead their urban division. There will definitely be sparks passing between them, but they will not have time for that until after victory.

Both Fong and Lau will become very, very good at what they do. Mrs. Fong is troubled by the risks her daughter takes, but she starts to worm her way into low level resistance activities, to maintain a connection with her. Meanwhile, Fong’s ex, Gam-wing accepts a white-collar office position with the Imperial government. However, he is not a collaborator. Instead, he is an independent mole, looking for an opportunity to do some serious damage on his own initiative.

Frankly, the time has come for an Ann Hui career retrospective, considering how consistent and prolific her work has been, especially as she approaches 70. Arguably, the long, almost self-contained Mao Dun sub-plot gives the film a somewhat episodic feel, but it is still a rich cinematic feast. Zhou Xun and Eddie Peng have terrific chemistry together as colleagues-not-lovers, Fong and Lau. Zhou is still one of the most expressive actresses on the planet, while Peng has developed some tremendous action chops that Hui periodically allows him to show-off. Honestly, Peng has become the movie-star Tom Cruise mistakenly thinks he still is.

Wallace Huo (who has back-to-back New York releases, following Reset) is also terrifically suave and intriguing as Gam-wing—a heroically roguish performance in the tradition of George Sanders in B-movies like Appointment in Berlin. However, Deannie Ip truly takes command of the film in the third act as the unlikely and tragically valiant Mrs. Fong.

As cool as it is to see “Big” Tony Leung Kar-fai playing an elderly Dongjiang veteran chronicling the exploits of Fong and Lau to an interviewer (played by Hui), those modern-day segments mostly take us out of the film rather than pulling us in. This film brings out the armchair editor in us, making us want to tighten it up and tweak the structure precisely because the superstar cast is so fantastic in it. The period production details are also spot-on and the action sequences are brief, but muscular and adrenaline-charged. Ultimately, it is a touching film about family and sacrifice. In other words, it is an Ann Hui film. Quite highly recommended overall, Our Time Will Come opens this Friday (7/7) in New York, at the AMC Empire.

Women Who Flirt: Just Friends with Zhou Xun?

Considering she looks like Zhou Xun, Angie really shouldn’t have to resort to a lot of game-playing. Unfortunately, she has carried a torch for Marco, her colleague and former classmate so long, he now takes her for granted. When a flirty game-player stakes a claim to the oblivious platonic friend, Angie will have to learn how to fight fire with fire. The battle will be joined in Pang Ho-cheung’s Women Who Flirt (trailer here), which opens this Wednesday in New York.

Shocked to learn her longtime best friend is suddenly serious about a woman who is not herself, Angie calls on her eye-lash batting chum May to form a kitchen cabinet of proud Shanghai flirters to advise her. However, she finds their recommended baby talk and helpless damsel-in-distress routines absolutely vapid. She is just not equipped for this fight and her rival Hailey knows it. Still, if she can get dumb old Marco alone for a romantic getaway in Taiwan, she just might have a puncher’s chance.

Yes, there are similarities between Flirt and My Best Friend’s Wedding and its tragically romantic Chinese-Korean reconfiguration, A Wedding Invitation, but Zhou’s Angie is a protagonist we can really get behind. Her withering stares and palpable disgust at the Sex in the City antics going on around her are often quite funny and highly sympathetic. Frankly, she is just too cool for everyone else in the film.

Of course, Flirt will eventually settle into a sentimental rom-com, but at least it takes a rainy day trip to the Ju Ming Museum, which looks incredible (so good tourist tip there). In fact, Zhou and Ju are just about enough to carry the film across the finish line. Sonia Sui certainly looks like a deceptively cute femme fatale and shows some convincing claws when the time comes. Still, it is hard to see why they would fight over a blockhead like Marco, played rather woodenly by Huang Xiaoming. In contrast, Xie Yilin constantly kicks up the energy while inhaling scenery as May, the Obiwan of flirters.

 

Pang’s films certainly come in a variety of flavors. Instead of a naughty screwball comedy like Vulgaria, a gory satire like Dream Home, or a sensitive family drama like Aberdeen, Flirt is most closely akin to his reasonably mature rom-coms, such as Love in the Buff. It is too bad this one does not depart further from genre conventions, because Zhou and her character deserve something more outside-the-box. Regardless, she still commands the screen. Recommended for fans of Zhou and romantic comedy in general, Women Who Flirt opens this Wednesday (11/26) in New York at the AMC Empire, from China Lion Entertainment.

The Great Magician: Nothing Up Tony Leung’s Sleeve

Any good illusion depends on a distraction.  There were plenty of those in Republican era China, including rampant warlordism, the threat of foreign intervention, and a conspiracy to restore the Qing dynasty. Yet, master illusionist Chang Hsien is far more concerned with rescuing his former fiancée in Derek Yee’s The Great Magician (trailer here), which releases today on DVD and BluRay from Well Go USA.

When Chang left to study magic abroad it left his intended without his ostensive protection.  Belatedly learning she has been kidnapped and forced to live as warlord Bully Lei’s wife #7, Chang falls in with a group of revolutionaries plotting to abduct the abductor.  However, he finds Liu Yin is just as hacked off at him as she is with Lei, whose clumsy advances she easily foils with some vintage Jackie Chan style acrobatics.

Nonetheless, Chang is determined to save her and his imprisoned mentor (her father, of course), but as he befriends Lei under false pretenses, he learns the circumstances are more complicated than he suspected and the warlord might not be as bad as he assumed.  Then the real bad guys get down to business.

There are some stylishly choreographed scenes of Chang in performance that look great and advance the story quite cleverly.  However, the film’s real ace in the hole is Zhou Xun’s Liu Yin.  Subverting the damsel-in-distress convention, she is a genuine force to be reckoned with.  Zhou frequently flashes her “we are not amused” look and it kills every time.

The suave illusionist might sound like a perfect role for Tony Leung (Little Tony Chiu-wai of Red Cliff and 2046, not Big Tony Ka-fa The Lover and Election) and he indeed fits comfortably into the tuxedo.  Although he makes a smooth transition from martial arts to stage illusions, Leung frankly gets a bit hammy when the film periodically veers into slapstick.  Yet, he is the picture of dignity compared to Lau Ching-wan, who mugs shamelessly as Bully Lei.  Still, the way their friendship develops on screen is somewhat endearing.

There is a lot of handsome spectacle in Great Magician, nicely rendered by Siu Fu Ma’s VFX team.  Zhou’s fans will also be delighted with a lovely performance dripping with attitude, which considerably elevates the proceedings.  There is a fair amount of shtick to wade through, though.  Recommended for primarily fans of Leung, Zhou, and magic in general, The Great Magician is now available for home viewing from Well Go USA.

Flying Swords of Dragon Gate: Tsui Hark Does the 3D Thing

It was a time when eunuchs terrorized the land.  However, a handful of wandering knights are willing to challenge them, even at the cost of their lives.  Good multi-taskers, they will still find time for a bit of treasure-hunting in Flying Swords of Dragon Gate (trailer here),Tsui Hark’s monster 3D return to the legendary Dragon Gate Inn world, which opens a special two-week IMAX-coming-straight-at-your-head limited engagement this Friday in New York.

Sort of but not really a sequel to Raymond Lee’s 1992 Dragon Gate Inn (produced and co-written by Tsui), Flying 3D picks up three years later in movie time.  Dragon Inn burned to the ground and the femme fatale proprietress disappeared under murky circumstances, but since there was a demand for a sketchy flophouse right smack in the middle of sandstorm alley, the inn has been rebuilt by a gang of outlaws.  While they might roll the occasional guest, they are really more interested in the legend of the fabulous gold buried beneath the sands.

Two mysterious swordsmen calling themselves Zhou Huai’an will find themselves at the remote outpost after tangling with the corrupt eunuch bureaucracy.  One Zhou has just rescued Su Huirong, a potentially embarrassing pregnant concubine from the forces of the East Bureau.  This Zhou also happens to be a she and she has some heavy history with the man she is impersonating.  For his part, the real Zhou Huai’an has just barely survived a nasty encounter with the East’s top agent, Yu Huatian. 

The doubling continues when fortune hunter Gu Shaotang shows up at the inn with her partner Wind Blade, a dead-ringer for the evil Yu.  Add to the mix a group of rowdy, hard-drinking Tartar warriors, led by their princess Buludu and you have a rather unstable situation.  Before long, sides have been chosen and a massive gravity-defying battle is underway, as the mother of all sandstorms bears down on Dragon Gate Inn.

Frankly, the 3D in Flying is so good, the initial scenes are a bit disorienting.  Tsui probably has a better handle on how to use this technology than just about any other big picture filmmaker, dizzyingly rendering the massive scale of the Ming-era wuxia world.  Flying is also quite progressive by genre standards, featuring not one but three first-class women action figures.  When the headlining Jet Li disappears from time to time, he really is not missed.  Of course, when it is time to go Mano-a-mano in the middle of a raging twister, he is the first to step up to the plate.

All kinds of fierce yet genuinely vulnerable, Zhou Xun is fantastic as Ling Yanquiu, the Twelfth Night-ish Zhou Huai’an.  Likewise, Li Yuchun is a totally convincing action co-star as the roguish Gu, nicely following-up on the promise she showed in Bodyguards and Assassins.  Yet, Gwei Lun Mei upstages everyone as the exotically tattooed, alluringly lethal barbarian princess.  Her Buludu is both more woman and more man than Xena will ever be.  In contrast, Chen Kun is a bit of a cold fish in his dual role, which suits the serpentine Yu just fine, but does not work so well for Wind Blade.

Throughout Flying, Tsui throws realism into the whirlwind and never looks back.  If you are distracted by scenes that look “fake,” many of the CGI fight scenes will have you beside yourself.  On the other hand, if you enjoy spectacle, you really have to see it.  Surpassing its predecessor in nearly every way, Flying Swords of Dragon Gate is a whole lot of illogical fun.  Highly recommended for everyone still reading this review, it opens for two weeks only this Friday (8/31) at the AMC Empire.

Painted Skin: The Resurrection—Prepare to Lose Your Heart

Can you have sympathy for a demon like Xiao Wei?  You might if she looked like Zhou Xun.  Her story is indeed a tragic one, rooted in heartaches past.  Nonetheless, as a fox demon, she must constantly consume human hearts.  Still, she yearns to become human herself in Wuershan’s wuxia paranormal romance Painted Skin: The Resurrection (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Those who have not seen the previous Painted Skin (or King Hu’s prior adaptation of the Pu Songling story) should not be concerned.  The sequel is practically a complete reboot.  Xiao Wei is doing her thing once again, tearing men’s hearts out (literally), with only the bird demon Quer for companionship.  As she preys on powerful men, she hopes in vain someone will willingly and knowingly offer theirs up to her, so that she may become human again.  The clock is ticking though.  A looming solar eclipse may spell the end of her.

Suddenly deliverance might have arrived in an unlikely form, when a warrior with a smoldering heart “rescues” Xiao Wei from marauders.  However, this is no hero—this is the Princess Jing, masking herself to hide the scars she received in a rather nasty teenaged encounter with a bear.  General Hou Xin blames himself for that incident.  He also still harbors a forbidden love for the Princess he failed, which she reciprocates.  Yet, even the true blue palace guard is no match for a fox demon’s bewitchments, setting the stage for a supernatural love triangle.  Meanwhile, the rival Tian Liang clan is making threatening noise.  Unfortunately, the Princess and her General are distracted by the agitation caused by Xiao Wei’s presence.  That’s what happens when you have a demon in your midst.

Then again, Xiao Wei is not really the villain in this story.  Her yearning to live is somewhat akin to Larry Talbot’s search for the secret of death in the classic Universal Wolfman films, except Zhou Xun is obviously no Lon Chaney, Jr. to look at, not by a long shot.  As Quer the bird demon Mi (Mini) Yang is also cute as a button.  In fact, she develops some surprisingly sweet romantic chemistry with Pang, an unprepossessing demon hunter, by virtue of his bloodline.  It is a surprisingly appealing turn by Feng Shaofeng, evolving from somewhat cringy comic relief into a legit secondary hero.

For a special effects-laden tale of demons and swordplay, Resurrection has unexpected depth of feeling and a third act reversal that works quite well, at least before Wuershan resorts to the Harry Potter-esque thunder-and-wrath climax.  The real fireworks involve the two alluring co-leads.  Blessed with an extraordinary expressiveness (check her out in Equation of Love and Death, if you can), Zhou renders the fox demon as a fully dimensional, deeply tragic figure.  Though Zhao Wei occasional flirts with melodramatic excess, as Princess Jing, she effectively expresses romantic longing while totally rocking the Phantom of the Opera-style mask.  Chen Kun’s Hou broods and pines well enough, while Yang and Feng consistently inject energy and verve into the proceedings.  Unfortunately, the evil Tians are not well defined, though Chen Tincha and Fei “Kris Phillips” Xiang certainly look menacing as the dastardly clan princess and sorcerer, respectively.

Featuring several dangerous women, a few men who are a bit slow on the uptake, and a whole lot of frustrated ardor, Resurrection is a far better date movie than most wuxia epics.  It is also a great showcase for Zhou.  Recommended for her fans and those who appreciate big, dark uncanny spectacles with a strong human element, Painted Skin: The Resurrection opens this Friday (8/17) in New York at the AMC Empire and in San Francisco at the AMC Metreon and Cupertino.

True Legend: The Drunken Fist Creation Story

It is an ancient form of Wushu equally derived from divine inspiration and inebriation. Incorporating the swaying looseness and erratic unpredictability of a good bender, the “Drunken Fist” discipline is probably most closely associated with Jackie Chan’s Drunken Master films. Yet according to lore, it was Beggar So who first developed the deceptive Wushu practice. Some of the greatest figures of martial arts cinema tell his creation story in Yuen Woo-ping’s True Legend (trailer here), which opens today in New York.

Su Can is one of the Imperial army’s greatest warriors. After rescuing his patron prince in a daring raid, Su declines an appointment as regional governor, requesting his resentful half-brother Yuan Lie serve in his place. In retrospect, this turns out to be a mistake. While Su quietly retires to study Wushu in its purest form, Yuan masters the dark mystical technique of the Five Deadly Venoms.

There’s a little bit of West Virginia or Woody Allen in this family, considering Su married his step-brother’s sister Xiao Ying. Still seeking to avenge his birth father against the family he was forcibly adopted into, Yuan very nearly kills Su. However, Xiao whisks her battered husband away to the mountain retreat of the beautiful and mysterious Dr. Yu, leaving behind their son Feng as a hostage. Regrettably, Su appears defeated, both in body and in spirit. After a prolonged bout of drunken self-pity, a series of otherworldly encounters with the God of Wushu spurs Su to begin training again. Yet, to Xiao’s eyes, a delusional Su is simply beating himself seven shades of black and blue.

It is a joy to see Michelle Yeoh back in a grand genre epic, even if she does not have any fight scenes to perform as Dr. Yu. With the gorgeous Zhou Xun more than holding down the dramatic end of the film as Xiao, you pretty much ought to have the price of admission right there. Adding in colorful appearance by genre superstars like Jay Chou, Cung Le, Gordon Liu, and David Carradine (in one of his final screen roles) makes Legend sound like an all-time monster.

Unfortunately, Su has to be one of the most self-indulgent, angst-ridden heroes you will find in martial arts cinema. His boozy decline into Beggar So is all too slow and depressing. Also mildly distracting, much like Ip Man 2, Legend concludes with a showdown between Beggar So and the hulking white devil wrestlers hired by Carradine’s blood-sport impresario in scenes that also appear tailor-made to stoke Chinese xenophobia.

Legend marks Yuen Woo-ping’s directorial return after rocking the fanboy universe as the fight choreographer for the Matrix films, Kill Bill, and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Since he helmed Jackie Chan’s original 1978 Drunken Master, Yuen clearly has an affinity for the style. Indeed, there are some spectacular fight sequences (though ironically, the pre-drunken opening rescue mission might be the best). Unfortunately, the connective scenes are often rather draggy (when not enlivened by the radiant Zhou).

Easily divisible into Su and So halves, Legend is definitely a film of its parts rather than a sweeping whole. Some of those parts are indeed quite satisfying (Yeoh, Zhou, a spectacular fight scene in a well), but ultimately the film is just pretty good instead of great. For those of us with an enduring affection for those kinds of component-pieces, Legend opens today (5/13) in New York at the Regal E-Walk.

NYAFF ’09: Equation of Love and Death

Driving a cab might not be prestigious work, but it ought to serve LiMi’s needs perfectly. She is doggedly searching the city of Kunming for her boyfriend who mysteriously vanished several years ago. Unfortunately, the missing Fang Wen does not seem to want to be found in Cao Baoping’s Equation of Love and Death (trailer here), which screens today during the New York Asian Film Festival.

Li-Mi is cute and tough, but she has serious neurotic tendencies as Equation opens. She compulsively rereads Fang’s letters, obsessing over their dates, hoping to glean a numerological clue to his fate. Yet all she has to show for her efforts are some alarmed customers. One day, two lost souls from the countryside hail her cab, setting in motion a tragic chain of circumstances.

For reasons initially kept obscure, the provincial fares have a rendezvous with a hipster poet on a highway overpass. However, when their contact takes a surprising nosedive into traffic, it causes a nasty accident, ensnaring another man who happens to be a dead-ringer for Fang. Back in Li-Mi’s cab, the desperate yokels become increasingly belligerent, as Equation suddenly takes a detour into thriller territory.

Equation is the sort of film where everything and everyone are ultimately related somehow. However, rather than feeling forced, it all seems like the inevitable result of the film’s internal logic. Cao deftly stage-manages his intricately constructed tale of fickle fate, holding back a few genuinely surprising revelations for the third act.

In a deliberate departure from her glamorous image, Chinese actress Zhou Xun gives a tour-de-force performance as the hardboiled but vulnerable Li-Mi. Her uncannily expressive eyes are truly haunting, belying her gruff, street-smart exterior. Zhou owns the film, but she has some able support, notably from Zhang Hanyu, as an ostensibly sympathetic investigating officer, Ye Qingcheng.

Thanks to Zhou’s remarkable lead performance and Cao’s sensitive direction, Equation is a smartly constructed, richly rewarding film. Highly recommended, it screens today and July 1st at the IFC Film Center as part of the New York Asian Film Festival.