• Her Fatal Ways
• Hero

Her Fatal Ways

Here's a premise that might seem slightly familiar to anyone who's seen Supercop (or a number of other films). A fugitive from mainland China has crossed over into Hong Kong, and a female Chinese officer has been paired with a male officer from the Hong Kong force to track him down and bring him in. Of course, plenty of whacky "fish out of water" hijinks ensue. Those whacky hijinks, however, tend towards scenes such as the one in which the straight-laced, non-drinking mainland officer goes to a club with her Hong Kong counterpart, gets smashed, and gets up on stage to sing karaoke so badly that she shatters the glasses of most of the patrons. Not exactly side-splitting stuff. Stars Carol Cheng and Tony Leung Ka-Fai, fine as they've both been in other films, don't really seem to quite have their hearts in it here, and as a result gags that MIGHT have been funny keep not quite coming off. And it does get a little disconcerting to see the woman officer (who after all has gone through extensive training and faced many dangerous cases in her own land) constantly becoming helpless and frightened in the face of harmless things like a power outage in an elevator (yes, yes, it probably IS a comment of sorts on the relationship of China and Hong Kong and their respective strengths... even so, that doesn't make it any less sexist). And that's not even mentioning the fact that Cheng's "ways" don't exactly prove very "fatal" in this film (but then, a list of Hong Kong action comedies with appropriately accurate titles would probably be a rather short list). Her Fatal Ways is a competently-made film, made by and featuring people who know what they're doing... they just don't seem to be as enthusiastic about doing it here as they've been on other occasions.

Also starring Alfred Cheung, Lam Kau and Michael Chow. Directed by Alfred Cheung. (Review written: 7/15/02)

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Hero

King Qin Shihuang has been targeted by a series of assassins trying to stop his goal of becoming China's first emperor. But master assassin "Nameless" has finally eliminated them all and saved his life. Or has he, really? Not everything here is as it seems...

Zhang Yimou is certainly a world-class master film-maker with a track record of amazing films such as Raise The Red Lantern, Ju Dou and The Road Home. But none of those have really prepared you for what you find in Hero, and in spite of what you might imagine, Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon hasn't really prepared you for it, either. This historical period epic contains all the swordplay, action, stunts and literally flying heroes and villains that you've seen in the Ang Lee film (and many others), but it also is filled with some of the most astonishing, breathtakingly beautiful images you've ever seen in film. The notion of literally thousands of an army's arrows descending upon the castle of their enemy being a lovely thing to behold has probably never occurred to you before, but the way Zhang films them that's exactly what they are, and when Nameless and his opponent Flying Snow burst OUT of that castle to continue their duel right in the midst of the arrow fall, you truly won't believe your eyes. And while other directors might go on and on with dialogue to drive home the point of how small a single human is in the path of all these sweeping historic events, Zhang puts it far more eloquently with a single long shot of nameless, so small you can barely identify him, climbing alone up the colossal steps of the emperor's palace. And if that's not enough, there are lots of philosophical musings about friendship, war & peace, patriotism and sacrifice. It's not until you actually sit back and give it some careful thought afterward that you actually realize how richly textured and many-layered Hero really is (not to mention how brilliantly performed by a cast featuring the best actors in Hong Kong films). Those merely looking for an exciting action movie will certainly be more than satisfied with Hero, but if you approach it ready to appreciate in on all of its many levels, you'll have a movie watching experience like few you've ever known.

Starring Jet Li, Tony Leung Chiu Wai, Maggie Cheung and Donnie Y en. (Review written: 4/28/03)

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