Films of Fury: The Kung Fu Movie Book (31 page)

Woo amped up everything: the emotional angst, the bloody slaughter, the sheer physical and mental bedlam … but the power of the film cannot be denied. By trying to overdose his audience, Woo had not only effectively satirized himself, but painted himself into a blood-red corner. Now he would have to top himself with each subsequent production. But Woo was up to the challenge. It would take him two years, but he was up to it.

The Killer
appeared in 1989, and Woo cemented his reputation with it. Chow Yun-fat
stars as an expert assassin, whose conscience is resurrected by his accidentally blinding a beautiful bystander (Sally Yeh
). To finance an operation to restore her sight, he takes the infamous “one last job” from exactly the wrong client … the kind who likes to leave no witnesses to his misdeeds.

Around this somewhat stereotypical story, Woo lavishes wit, invention, and style in addition to his customary flair for gunfire. An honest cop (Danny Lee
) is hot on the title character’s trail, but the film really takes off when he corners the killer in the blind girl’s apartment. Unaware that the men have their guns in each other’s faces, she makes tea and the two pretend to be friends for her benefit. This was a stunning, refreshing dance of death deftly designed by Woo, and it immediately separated the film and filmmaker from the pack.

Ultimately, the two antagonists team up against the greater evil, and Woo stages a final blowout in and around a church … before capping the invigorating film with the bleakest of black comedy jokes that, again, delighted his attentive audience. Here Woo firmly establishes his cinematic trademarks: the “Cantonese Stand-off” of multiple antagonists pointing guns in each other’s faces in various combinations, flocks of doves flying hither/yon, and an artful use of slow-mo. Movie lovers could see echoes of this in previous works by director Sam Peckinpah
, but Woo brought it to new, nearly ludicrous levels. Woo created fever-dreams of violence on the nature of brotherhood, betrayal, moral villains, and immoral heroes, all delivered with a filmmaking prowess that echoed the best of Francis Ford Coppola
, Martin Scorcese
, Jean-Pierre Melville
, and Sergio Leone
.

Once up to such rarefied heights, Woo seemed unsure where to go in the down-and-dirty world of Hong Kong Cinema, which explains his name on the credits of
Just Heroes
(1989) — a fun, frenetic, but overly familiar film that could be considered
A Better Tomorrow
-lite. According to modern sources, Woo collaborated on the direction of this derivative film as a favor to his ex-mentor Chang Cheh
, who was struggling to survive. So Woo teamed with another ex-Cheh-assistant director, Wu Ma
, as well as actors Danny Lee
, David Chiang
, and even Stephen Chow
, to finish this film.

It was just as well that Woo had this distraction because, elsewhere, the infamous “Tsui Hark
Syndrome” was kicking in. Woo wanted to go his own way. Tsui Hark wanted Woo to go his way. There’s some question as to what happened next, but what is unarguable is that Woo directed
Bullet in the Head
(1990) while Tsui Hark directed
A Better Tomorrow
III
(1989), which had some “interesting” similarities to Woo’s work. There’s no question, however, that Hark worked round the clock to beat
Bullet in the Head
into Hong Kong theaters. There’s also little question that
Bullet in the Head
is the better film, despite contractual alliances that locked Chow Yun-fat
into Hark’s prequel/sequel.

A Better Tomorrow
III
pictures Chow’s character from the first film in Saigon of 1974 — showing viewers how he became the man he was.
Bullet in the Head
is a completely different animal — an epic saga of three Hong Kong friends who seek their fortune in Vietnam at the worst possible time. Tony Leung
Chiu-wai took over for Chow in Woo’s work (which would not be the last time he does that). Although smaller in stature, Leung’s acting talent is large, and he suffers better than anyone in cinema. And that skill comes in handy in this bruising classic, as friendships dissolve into betrayal and brutality.

The title refers to the film’s central betrayal, as a greedy friend (“All I want is this box of gold … is that so much to ask?” is the actual line in the film) shoots a wounded friend to keep him quiet as they hide during an attack. But instead of killing him, the lead lodged in his skull makes him a pain-wracked killing machine. Jacky Cheung
(aka Jackie Cheung), once known as “little Jacky” because of Jackie Chan
’s support in his early career, had developed into an extraordinary composer, singer, and actor, and his performance here, as the one with the title affliction, is beautifully realized. And, of course, Tony suffers brilliantly as he’s compelled to put his friend out of his misery — building to a final confrontation with the betrayer (Waise Lee
, who played much the same role in the original
A Better Tomorrow
).

In the original release, the film ends with the screen going dark and a shot being heard. But in subsequent home entertainment releases, a different, longer finale was seen: the confrontation extends to the docks where the two ex-friends have an extended, exhausting, ferocious joust with smashing cars and blazing guns. Once again, the connections to Chang Cheh
or Lu Chin-ku
’s bloody, battering wuxia
films can be clearly seen. This is truly gun fu, with automatic weapons replacing swords.

Now a fan can hunt down the many versions of the film available in various incarnations all over the world. Woo’s original cut was around three hours long. The studio’s cut was about two hours. Film Festivals show, and certain DVDs contain, a two hour and fifteen minute version that Woo generally approves.

Following that exhausting effort, however, Woo needed to regroup and rethink. The grouping is obvious in his next film,
Once a Thief
(1991), but not necessarily the thinking. Although it marks a reunion with Chow Yun-fat
and Leslie Cheung
, the film seems forced and unnatural. Although it starts well, as a Hitchcockian romp about three art thieves, it eventually seques into an odd payback tale, with a wheelchair-bound Chow supposedly seeking revenge, before degenerating into an unwelcome slapstick slaughter that has more in common with
To Hell with the Devil
than
A Better Tomorrow
.

The writing was on the wall. With rumors spreading that Woo was tough to work with, and the 1997 changeover looming, the director started searching for safer shores. But, before he left, he wanted to leave his homeland with one last blast of concentrated Woo-ness. And, after glorifying criminals in most of his work, he wanted to do the same for cops.
Hard Boiled
(1992) was a cunning combination of Woo’s best work, from the elegant to the overblown. Chow Yun-fat
was back in the lead as this film’s version of “Dirty Harry
Bullitt,” with Tony Leung
alongside as a cop deeply undercover in the gun-running trade.

Woo fills the film with bravura sequences, from the opening gun battle in a tea house, through a blow-out in a garage, to the final, elongated, elaborate war in a hospital (which includes an extended sequence through halls, into elevators, and down stairs without a single cut). For pure, high-powered fun,
Hard Boiled
more than lives up to its name, and works well as Woo’s suitable so-long to Hong Kong … for now.

But just because Woo was packing his bags didn’t mean that Hong Kong was through with guns. Remember, this is an industry that created the Bruce Lee
clones — and weapons were far easier to replicate than the king of kung fu. Even noted schlockmeister Wong Jing
was able to till this fertile ground with what many consider his best film,
God of Gamblers
(1989). Chow Yun-fat
starred as the title character, who, when egregiously betrayed by his brother, becomes a child-like amnesiac, who is convinced to impersonate the God of Gamblers by a con man (Andy Lau
). Obviously inspired by
Rain Man
(1988) as well as
A Better Tomorrow
, the film’s ramifications will be explored in a later chapter.

Meanwhile, predominantly filling the Woo void were Ringo Lam
Ling-tung, Andrew Lau
Wai-keung, and, perhaps most importantly, Johnnie To
Kei-fung. Beatles-loving Lam was born in 1955 and studied cinema in Toronto before returning to Hong Kong. There he tried a few romances before teaming with Chow Yun-fat
on the influential cop thriller
City on Fire
(1987) which deeply and sincerely influenced Quentin Tarantino
. The director and star followed up that hit with
Prison on Fire
(1987),
School on Fire
(1988), and
Prison on Fire II
(1991) before creating
Full Contact
(1993), which was the closest thing to a Woo film without Woo.

Lau, meanwhile, had started as an award-winning cinematographer, filming
Legendary Weapons of China
,
Millionaire’s Express
, and
City on Fire
, among others, before he made a jump into the director’s chair in 1990. There he would again flounder in a variety of genres until he hit pay dirt with the
Young and Dangerous
series (1996-1998), which was basically
A Better Tomorrow
: The Teen Years
.

He peppered his resume with some great wuxia
fantasies like
The Storm Riders
(1998) before teaming with Alan Mak
Siu-fai on the influential
Infernal Affairs
trilogy (2002-2003). This saga of a cop infiltrating the mob while a mobster infiltrates the cops was turned into
The Departed
, Martin Scorcese
’s Oscar-winning 2006 film. Many feel the Hong Kong version was superior — especially since the American adaptation goes head-shot-crazy as soon as it deviates from the original’s plot.

But it was Johnnie To
who took John Woo
’s inspiration and made gun fu something uniquely his own. Starting, like so many other Hong Kong directors, by trying a mix of genres, he found that he loved them all, and was able to excel in each. He was great at comedies (1990s
The Fun the Luck and the Tycoon
), dramas (1989’s
All About Ah-long
), satires (1992’s
Justice My Foot
), superheroes (
The Heroic Trio
), and even kung fu (1993’s
The Bare-Footed Kid
). But even though it would be more than ten years between his first (1988’s
The Big Heat
) and second gun fu film (1999’s
The Mission
), it was in this genre that he would elicit international acclaim.

He followed those memorable thrillers with such blockbusters as
Running Out of Time
(1999),
Fulltime Killer
(2001), and
PTU
: Police Tactical Unit
(2003) — all while also creating a wealth of such other comedy and martial art classics as
Love on a Diet
(2001),
Running on Karma
(2003), and
Throw Down
(2004) — often with his collaborator Wai Ka-fai. With
Election
(2005),
Election 2
: Harmony is a Virtue
(2006), and
Exiled
(2006), he shows his Woo influence as well as his mastery.

With these three films essentially being his versions of
A Better Tomorrow
and
Bullet in the Head
, Johnnie To
cultivates Woo soil with his own crops. Each of his successive films (2007’s masterful
Mad Detective
, and 2009’s thought-provoking
Vengeance
being just two) have become a cause for celebration for film fans throughout the world.