Country: Hong Kong
Genre: Bullet Ballet/ Romance/ Drama/ Action
Director: Tsui Hark
Year: 1989

Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars


WORTH A LOOK

In spite of luscious cinematography, rich performances, and a frequently riveting plot, A Better Tomorrow III isn’t a very good movie.

The fault lies mostly with director Tsui Hark. The movie is altogether too languorous for it’s own good. There’s too much slow motion, and the editing isn’t tight enough. A Better Tomorrow III lacks the ferocious energy of the best of Hong Kong film.

Another problem is that the script by Daai Foo-Ho and Edward Leung has at least a couple too many dramatic beats. The characters take turns sacrificing for each other so many times that it becomes ludicrous.

I realize that director Tsui Hark was going for swooning romanticism, but he overdoes it so much that it blunts the emotional impact.

It’s too bad because the story has a huge amount of dramatic potential. It’s 1974 and Vietnam is about to fall. Mark (Chow Yun-Fat) flies to Vietnam from Hong Kong to get his cousin Michael (Tony Leung) out of jail and help him and his uncle (Sek Kin) to expatriate to Hong Kong. But Michael is determined to do one last deal with Bond (Nam Yin), a crooked general with the Vietnamese army. Luscious gang boss Chow Ying Kit (Anita Mui) comes to the rescue of our two heroes.

In addition, there is a romantic triangle between Chow Ying Kit, Michael, and Mark. There is chemistry between Mark and Chow Ying Kit, but Mark knows that his cousin Michael has a thing for Chow Ying Kit, so he steps aside, causing all sorts of problems.

Sound fun? Well, it is, but the impact is diluted by playing the scenes so slowly that it sometimes feels like the movie is taking place underwater.

A Better Tomorrow III works best as a nostalgia piece. You get to wallow in the star power and charisma of Chow Yun-Fat and Anita Mui for what seems like days. This will mostly appeal to huge fans of Golden Age of Hong Kong cinema.

For everyone else, you can probably afford to give A Better Tomorrow III a miss.

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Country: Denmark
Genre: Comedy/Drama
Director: Anders Thomas Jensen
Year: 2005

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars


TRASH CINEMA RECOMMENDED MOVIE

For everyone who is tired of the same recycled plots and characters, have I got a movie for you.

In Adam’s Apples, neo-Nazi Adam Pedersen (Ulrich Thomsen) is sentenced to community service at a country church presided over by Ivan (Mads Mikkelsen), a priest who views his life almost exclusively in terms of a war with Satan, who Ivan thinks is determined to undermine his faith. Ivan’s stubborn faith drives Adam bonkers.

What makes Adam’s Apples special is writer/director Anders Thomas Jensen’s dry, offbeat tone and his irreverent use of religion, in this case the story of Job. Jensen’s script for Adam’s Apples is completely devoid of sentimentality, which coupled with the ruthlessly black humor, makes for a very funny movie.

As Ivan, Mads Mikkelsen adds another maddeningly obtuse character to his gallery. Ulrich Thomsen gets a lot of laughs without seeming to do much of anything, which is part of the point. Adam only has a slightly different reaction to seeing someone shot as to the suggestion that he bake an apple pie, a sort of faint surprise, like “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

As usual, Anders Thomas Jensen’s direction is highly professional. He’s slick but always to the point.

Some might resist the extreme nature of Jensen’s characters, but I think the key to the movie is seeing it as a fable. Jensen has attempted this sort of thing before, as in the 2003 movie, The Green Butchers, but this time, he manages to create an excellent balance between drama, black humor, and whimsy. You’re never quite sure if Jensen is kidding or not, but instead of putting off the viewer, this ambiguity creates another layer of hilarity.

Recommended for adventurous viewers.

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Country: Japan
Genre: Action/ Drama/ Swordplay/ Martial Arts/ Comedy
Director: Kenji Misumi
Year: 1964

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars


TRASH CINEMA RECOMMENDED MOVIE

Someone’s always trying to kill Zatoichi (Shintarô Katsu). When he gives up his ride on a palanquin to a woman with a baby, assassins end up killing her by mistake. Zatoichi resolves to return the baby to the child’s father in a distant village. That’s just about all there is to this episode. It’s a trifle dull.

The main attraction is getting to see what kind of father Zatoichi would have been if he had been able to have a normal life.

That’s funny and touching, but probably not enough to provide enough interest for a feature length film by itself, even considering that director Kenji Misumi throws in a bunch of swordfights, including an excellent one in which Zatoichi’s would-be assassins try to confuse his sense of hearing by waving flaming torches at him.

Fight Zatoichi Fight might be thin, but it has the usual virtues of the series: universally strong acting, exciting and logical sword fights, and strong direction by Kenji Misumi.

This one will be fun for fans of the series, but it’s probably not a good entry point for newcomers.

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Country: Canada
Genre: Drama
Director: Larysa Kondracki
Year: 2010

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars


TRASH CINEMA RECOMMENDED MOVIE

Ostensibly, The Whistleblower is a true story about human trafficking that takes place in Bosnia. And it is. But it also a cautionary tale about the logical end point of a culture that celebrates the cult of the individual, in which a person assumes no responsibility beyond themselves. That is the world of the 1%, currently targeted by the Occupy movement. The unfortunate thing is that immorality, unlike wealth, does have a way of trickling down.

That’s what Kathryn Bolkovac (Rachel Weisz) finds out the hard way. She takes a job with a private security company (think Blackwater) over in Bosnia because it pays big bucks, which she needs to relocate near her daughter, whom she lost custody of in an ugly divorce.

What Kathryn gradually finds out is that the U.N. peacekeeping forces are trafficking girls from neighboring Eastern European countries. And who are the customers? The same folks, more or less. When she tries to blow the whistle, she finds out that complicity in the scheme goes to the very top of the command chain. It’s an open question whether or not Kathryn will be able to escape with her life.

Now, I’ll bet a shiny nickel that if the private security firm wasn’t in Bosnia in the first place, it’s unlikely that the human trafficking scheme would have ever materialized. What happens when you privatize government functions, which internalize profits and externalize risk, is that these private entities do the job they were paid to do as little as possible and offload the resulting suffering on the people they’re paid to help. We’ve seen it with the prison industry, we’ve seen it with Blackwater in Iraq, and now we see it here.

It’s a tawdry story without a happy ending, but it’s an important one that needs to be told.

But enough about the political implications of The Whistleblower — is it entertaining? Well, yes.

The movie is tautly written and directed by Larysa Kondracki. The dialog is intelligent, almost to a fault. There are a couple of unfortunate screenwriting cliches thrown in, maybe to appeal to the dumdums in the audience. That was pointless, as a dumdum would never knowingly seek out such harsh subject matter, but never mind.

The movie is beautifully acted, with a terrific lead performance by Rachel Weisz. But numerous character actors distinguish themselves, especially Vanessa Redgrave, William Hope, Liam Cunningham, Sergej Trifunovic, and Florin Busuioc.

Lastly, because this is a real life tale involving a likeable heroine, and taking place in the most corrupt and dangerous surroundings imaginable, a great deal of suspense is generated.

The true life nature of the tale proves to be a double-edged sword. The ending is bitter as can be and renders the victory shoehorned into the narrative unavoidably Pyrrhic.

Still, while you’re watching it, The Whistleblower is an engaging if harrowing entertainment, and it’s certainly educational. That’s enough for me.

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Country: United Kingdom
Genre: Suspense/ Comedy/ Horror
Director: Robin Hardy
Year: 1973

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars


TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE

The Wicker Man is endlessly fascinating. Screenwriter Anthony Shaffer uses a mystery structure as an excuse to imagine what a modern version of a pagan society might look like, contrasting it with the character of Sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward, in a pathetic, amusing, and ultimately moving performance), a self-righteous, Christian prig.

You see, Sergeant Howie has received an anonymous note from Summerisle, a principality located off the West Coast of Scotland. The writer of the note claims that a 12-year-old girl, Rowan Morrison (Geraldine Cowper) has been missing for several months. Sergeant Howie visits the island to investigate and becomes increasingly convinced that foul play is involved.

The locals have the appearance of normal Scots, but they break into bawdy songs at a moment’s notice, have sex in the open air, and teach their children about pagan rituals in school.

The filmmakers manage to make the island culture simultaneously seductive and alarming. The islanders have embraced sensuality and incorporated music into their daily lives. They’re having such a good time that it makes Sergeant Howie’s joy in following Jesus seem like thin gruel indeed. And yet, there may be a high cost implicit in the islander’s way of life. There are hints that human sacrifice may be required in the event of a crop failure.

The Wicker Man plays beautifully on a number of levels. The details of the pagan culture are almost ethnographic in terms of detail, the mystery proceeds logically, the music by Magnet is lovely, and the apparent efforts to mislead and stall Sergeant Howie are very funny, as is Howie’s increasingly hysterical reaction contrasted with the beatific calm of the islanders, especially their spiritual leader, Lord Summerisle (Christopher Lee, giving the performance of his career). It all climaxes in a sequence of genuine horror, all the more effective because of the relatively lighthearted nature of the rest of the movie.

If anyone tells you that they guessed where the movie was going, they’re probably lying. They heard about The Wicker Man somewhere else and are just trying to impress you with their sophistication.

Amazingly, this was director Robin Hardy’s first film.

A word of caution: The Wicker Man may be a stone masterpiece, but it won’t be for everybody. Enjoying it requires some intellectual curiosity. This is not a movie for dummies.

But for everyone else, The Wicker Man is a unique treasure of world cinema.

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As surely everyone but the dullest bulb knows by now, the 1% of the richest people in the world have bought the world’s governments and use them to further solidify their power and wealth.

Part of the strategy of the wealthy is to influence education so that it stops being training for citizenship and becomes merely glorified vocational training. Part of that training is to be subservient to authority.

That is what has happened to Isabelle Guérin (Ludivine Sagnier). Her cultural training has rendered her susceptible to the wiles of her boss, Christine (Kristin Scott Thomas), who by flattery and subtle manipulation, keeps her unbalanced and fearful, so that she can then steal credit for Isabelle’s work with impunity.

Will Isabelle continue to be a victim or will she fight back? And if so, how? That is the question at the center of Love Crime.

Writer/director Alain Corneau and screenwriter Nathalie Carter have put together a convincing portrait of corporate life. They have also provided mystery elements that only allow us to know what any observer would know. Along with the character elements, that provides enough interest to take us through the running time.

As we’ve become accustomed to, Kristin Scott Thomas gives a subtle and layered portrait, this time of a parasitic boss with major entitlement issues. Ludivine Sagnier is more opaque as her assistant, but that seems to be a choice of the actress and the director, rather than evidence of a lack of technique.

The cinematography by Yves Angelo appropriately dwells on the coldness of the corporate environment.

If there is a problem with Love Crime, it is in it’s relatively narrow ambition, rather than execution. After it’s over, you’ve been entertained, but there’s no avoiding that Love Crime is a relatively slight film.

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Country: Hong Kong
Genre: Ghost/ Action
Director: Tony Leung Siu-Hung
Year: 1993

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars


TRASH CINEMA RECOMMENDED MOVIE

The rest of Vendetta doesn’t quite live up to the blistering first 20 minutes, but it’s a lot of fun, anyway.

Hung Long (a scary Tommy Wong) is one of those total criminal badasses from the Mainland. Along with his brother Tony (Leung Sap-Yat) and sister Kitty (Linda Lau) they plan to rob a jewelry store in Hong Kong before hightailing it back to Mainland China. These three kill as casually as some people order coffee and donuts.

Anyway, after the robbery, cop David Chan (Ray Lui) and his best friend Ming (Kent Cheng) go after the criminals. Tony and Kitty wind up dead and Hung Long ends up in jail, but not before vowing to kill Chan’s entire family. What happens next I won’t reveal, but suffice it to say that for Tony and Kitty, a little detail like being dead isn’t about to get in the way of their vendetta against officer Chan.

These early scenes have the blistering energy of the best of the Golden Age of Hong Kong cinema. Director/action choreographer Tony Leung Siu-Hung imbues the first act with a remarkable amount of energy, and not just the action scenes either.

After the first act, the movie slows down for domestic scenes with officer Chan and his family, which get progressively creepier.

Then Hung Long escapes, setting us up for one final action blowout. Writers Vincent Kok Tak-Chiu and Cheung Sin-Wamake make this scene more interesting by having officer Chan booby trap his house in various ways.

I should also probably mention that the filmmakers make a couple of references to Silence Of The Lambs, which is kind of fun.

The biggest criticism I have of Vendetta is some poor story logic which takes place in the third act, culminating in a completely retarded wrap up. What mystifies me most about the ending is that Hong Kong movies, unlike Hollywood, aren’t required to have happy endings. Of all movies, Vendetta should have been bleak all the way through.

But still, Vendetta is a very enjoyable genre exercise, and you can’t have too many of those.

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Rating: 4 out of 5 stars


TRASH CINEMA HIGHLY RECOMMENDED MOVIE

When Prince Jin (Chiu Gwok) rapes the wife of the deposed Tang Dynasty emperor, who then commits suicide, bodyguard Li Lang (Lau Wing) vows revenge.

But Master Chen Bo (Lung Tien-Hsiang) sees a way to use this unfortunate turn of events to his advantage. Chen Bo wants permission to be allowed to become a “fairy,” as the subtitles would have it — that is, to go into seclusion so he can achieve martial arts mastery. He figures that Prince Jin, who is slated to inherit the throne from the dying emperor (Wong Yung), isn’t likely to grant his wish.

Chen Bo has a plan. Prince Jin was so arrogant that he had the royal painter (Wong Ching-Ho) depict the rape of the deposed emperor’s wife as it was occurring. If Chen Bo can steal the painting, he can present it to the emperor as proof that Prince Jin violated the emperor’s decree that the deposed emperor and his wife should be left alone. That way, he hopes, the succession will pass to Prince De Zhao (Max Mok), who in return for his help in gaining the throne will grant his request.

But that is only the beginning of the plots and counter plots that pepper this wildly entertaining and fast paced wuxia from director Hua Shan.

Also playing major roles in the action are Xiang Ling (Leanne Lau, cute as a squirrel), a student of Chen Bo who nurses a love jones for Li Lang, and Golden Tiger (Chun Wong), who is the patriarch of an outpost of the defeated Tang and a friend of Li Lang.

How to describe this movie?

Well, it’s got nonstop intrigue, paced so quickly the viewer can barely keep up. That also describes the wild and exciting martial arts battles choreographed by Wong Pau-Gei, Yuen Wah, and Yuen Bun. There’s lots of wirework and acrobatics, but there is a fair amount of martial arts mixed in, too. If I have a minor criticism, it’s that the editing is so quick that you have to strain to follow the logic of the fights.

I’ve also got to put in a word for the colorful sets and costumes — lots of eye candy there.

The rousing score by Stephen Shing and So Jan-Hau is old fashioned Western orchestral adventure music, and it works beautifully with the material.

The acting is broad and expert in the house Shaw style.

The plotting, which is as ruthlessly logical as it is convoluted, eventually ends up in a place that not everyone will like, but you can’t fault the screenwriters of the Shaw Creative Group for their courage. I had to laugh out loud at the stubborn integrity of the filmmakers.

Usurpers of Emperor’s Power is a grand entertainment. If you enjoy latter day Shaw Brothers flicks at all, I highly recommend it.

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Country: Hong Kong
Genre: Fantasy/ Action/ Martial Arts/ Romance
Director: Su Chao-Pin
Year: 2010
Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars


WORTH A LOOK

Reign of Assassins might be the last wuxia film Michelle Yeoh is ever in. She is a precious resource, one of the most soulful and intelligent actresses in the world. Putting her in a business as usual flick meant to make a quick buck is nothing less than a crime, and that’s exactly what Reign Of Assassins is.

Zeng Jing (Michelle Yeoh) is an assassin who has turned her back on the martial arts world, going so far as to have facial surgery to change her appearance. She has also hidden half of the mummy of a martial arts master — it is reputed that whoever possesses both halves of the body will be able to divine martial arts secrets which would make that person invincible in battle.

The Wheel King (Wang Xue-Qi), who Zeng Jing used to work for, will stop at nothing to gain possession of the mummy, and is trying to track her down to get the half she has hidden.

When Zeng Jing marries an average citizen, Jiang Ah-Sheng (Jung Woo-Sung), she must fight to protect her new life.

All of that is a standard but workable concept for a decent movie. The problem is the casting, direction, martial arts choreography and the script.

First of all, if you are going to cast Michelle Yeoh, you’d better find someone charismatic to play opposite her, or the poor guy is going to get blasted off the screen, which is exactly what happens here.

Then, in a movie like Reign of Assassins, action is all important. Here, all you get is endless wire enhanced bullshit, which doesn’t even look elegant, unlike Yuen Wo-Ping’s work in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Also unlike that superb film, there is very little in the way of convincing martial arts here. With an actress like Michelle Yeoh, that’s criminal. I’m surprised at martial arts choreographer Stephen Tung, who has done much better work elsewhere, and ought to know better.

Writer/director Su Chao-Pin doesn’t help matters by constantly showing off with stupid director tricks, which already date the film, and don’t help to tell the story. This is called showing off and it’s retarded.

Finally, the script by Su Chao-Pin has no poetry and the plotting is lame. The pacing is listless.

Gosh, I’ve really eviscerated Reign Of Assassins. What is there to like about it?

Well, getting to watch Michelle Yeoh is almost enough. And to be fair, the movie improves as it goes along. The characters motivations get a little more interesting. And the sets and scenery are often magnificent, if you can ignore all the trendy and annoying camera movements.

Sigh.

Any way you stack it up, Reign Of Assassins is a major disappointment.

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I must have Occupy Wall Street on the brain. I am once again reminded that the phenomenon of rich and powerful people protecting their own perceived interests at the expense of everyone else is as old as civilization itself.

Three Men To Destroy, based on a novel by Jean-Patrick Manchette, goes one step further.

Villain Emmerich (Pierre Dux), an military industrialist who manufactures guided missiles, is willing to kill to protect his company, on the off chance that there is a leak in his office. The amusing thing is that Emmerich’s paranoia and psychotic sense of entitlement ultimately proves his undoing, much like it will be for the financial elite in the United States.

After all, in the relentless pursuit of profit, the 1% are willing to perpetuate lies about global warming, which will ultimately be responsible for the deaths of millions of people and billions in property damage. They will not escape unscathed, even if they try to hide behind their gated communities.

Ahem, back to the movie.

Poor Michel Gerfaut (Alain Delon) is driving along a country road minding his own business when he comes upon what he thinks is a car accident. He drives the victim to the hospital and, bored with waiting for the staff to take his name and information, leaves and drives to his poker game.

The next thing he knows, a pair of assassins are after him.

I’m sure you can more or less guess the rest. Three Men To Destroy is not a complicated movie.

The action scenes are nothing special.

What makes Three Men To Destroy are the characters. Pierre Dux and Michel Auclair give us wonderful studies of the smug self-entitlement of the rich. I enjoyed the scene in which one assassin makes small talk with a woman about fine art while his partner is murdering her husband in the bathroom.

But best of all is Alain Delon, giving us yet another character who can’t be bothered with bullshit. He isn’t impressed by much of anything. When threatened with imminent death, his reaction is irritation more than anything else at the absurdity of it all. His Gallic shrugs and expressions of distaste almost make the movie worth watching all by themselves.

Unfortunately, there are a few logical inconsistencies which are so grievous that they prevent me from recommending the picture. In the first, two men attempt to drown Gerfaut in the ocean in public. Now, that just doesn’t make any sense.

But worst of all is the climax.

The villains have already killed six people for no damned good reason. Emmerich, tired of trying to have Gerfaut assassinated and failing, tries to buy him off by offering him a job. When Gerfaut tells Emmerich’s lieutenant, Leprince (Michel Auclair), to fuck himself, Leprince warns him of the consequences. Gerfaut shrugs it off and tells his girlfriend Béa (Dalila Di Lazzaro) that “it’s over.”

Now, take a minute and try to wrap your mind around how stupid that is.

Gerfaut has already proved himself over and over to be resourceful and nobody’s fool. After all that, he suddenly turns into an imbecile. When Leprince warned him, why didn’t he shrug, say “Fine, have it your way,” kill Leprince and everyone else, and then burn the house down for good measure?

That would have made more sense. And it would have been more fun, too.

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