The Great Wall.

Sometimes its best to ignore the critics and go with your gut feelings and The Great Wall (2017) is a fine example of this. After seeing the trailer for the film at our local cinema I thought it may be well worthwhile shelling out for two tickets to see the movie on the big screen, which in all honesty is the only place to see it to get the best out of the special effects, and I was not disappointed. This is an exceptionally enjoyable movie with action that never stops from start to finish. And believe me its great to have such worthy escapism at this time of political upheaval. 

 

William Garin.

This Chinese/USA co-production is a fantasy monster movie set in the Song Dynasty (AD 1010-63). The story involves a band of mixed race mercenaries who are hunting for the ‘black powder’ but are attacked by bandits who reduce their numbers down from twenty to five. Continuing on their journey they are attacked by an unknown creature who kills a further three men before it is killed by the head of the mercenaries William Garin (Matt Damon) who cuts off its arm, keeping as a trophy.  Along with his side kick Pero Tovar (Pedro Pascal) they continue their search. That is until they accidently stubble on the iconic Great Wall of China that is manned by The Nameless Order who are a special part of the Chinese Military and are all specialist in their own field of battle. Led by General Shao (Zhang Hanyu), Strategist Wang (Andy Lau) and Commander Lin Mae (the very attractive Jing Tian) of the Crane Troop who have the task of holding the wall against invaders. It’s not long before our two soldiers of fortune discover that the arm belongs to the invaders - the TaoTie are a massive horde of alien monsters who are now due to attack after a break of sixty years. 

 

Commander Lin Mae.

Strategist Wang

General Shao.

Directed by Zhang Yimou, best known for The Road Home (1999) and the action fantasies Hero (2002), House of the Flying Daggers (2004) and Curse of the Golden Flower (2006) with an imaginative screenplay co-written by director/producer/writer Tony Gilroy. The movie has a large Chinese cast and shooting took place in Qingdao in the Peoples Republic of China and incidentally this movie is the most expensive film ever shot in that country. 

A Simple Life.

A Hong Kong drama that felt more Japanese than a Chinese was this weeks Robert Burns Centre Film Theatre Film Club offering. A Simple Life (2012) showing for one night only, turned out to be a real treat. Based on the true-life experiences of Roger Lee, the producer of the film, it’s about a retainer who had served the same upper middle class family as housekeeper and nanny for 60 years. Ah Tao now has only one member of the family to look after as most of the others have emigrated to America. Roger Leung, a busy producer working in the Chinese film industry, still relies on the services of Ah Tao for all his house hold tasks until one day he returns home to find that the old servant has suffered a stroke and has been rushed to hospital where she announces that she wants to retire and spend the remainder of her life in a nursing home. Its now that Roger realises how much he relied on Ah Tao and more importantly how fond of her he was. A beautiful loving ‘mother and son’ relationship develops between the two, and it’s this relationship that forms the backbone of our film.

Our host for the evening was Julie McMoran who introduced the film telling us a little about the Hong Kong/Chinese film industry and how movie making in Hong Kong had changed considerable since the 1997 hand over of the island to China. The fear is that China will excerpt more and more control over Hong Kong’s film output and eventually take over its complete film industry. Also the takeover has presented problems with censorship with the mainland imposing more political control.

She also informed us that Ann Hui directed the film who has worked in the industry for 30 years making 26 films but is little known in this country through lack of exposure. 65 year-old Hui originally studied at the London Film School for two years before she returned to Hong Kong to take up a post as assistant to the Chinese film director King Hu before becoming a vanguard of Hong Kong’s New Wave in the 1970’s a movement that draw attention to realist contempory social matters.

A beautiful loving relationship gradually develops.

In this relationship drama you are allowed the time to really get to know the characters and one can’t help observing the empathy the director has for the elderly inmates of the nursing home all of which are treated with gentle concern. Beautifully observed and extremely moving without being overtly sentimental Ann Hui can also be very proud of the performances she elicited from all concerned. But special mention must go to the two main leads Deannie Ip, someone else not particularly well known in the UK, deservedly won a Best Actress Award at this years Venice Film Festival for her very believable and poignant portrayal of Ah Tao putting many better known actresses in the shade. The part of Roger Leung was played by the Hong Kong born actor Andy Lau who most of us will know from films like Wong Kar-wa’s As Tears Go By (1988) Johnnie To’s Fulltime Killer (2001) Infernal Affairs (2002) and of course the award winning House of the Flying Daggers (2004). One of the points noted in the discussion that followed the film was the role food played and may put you off ox tongue for life but don’t be put off this wonderful film. This is the third week of the Film Club and we have been very lucky with the choice of films thus far. 

The film swept the Hong Kong Film Awards.

As Tears Go By.

Ah Wah and Ngor.

Considered as a energetic reworking of Martin Scorsese’s 1975 classic Mean Streets Wong Kar-wai's directorial feature debut As Tears Go By (1988) revolves around a small time gangster, Ah Wah, who spends most of his time trying to keep his ‘brother’ Fly (Jacky Cheung) out of trouble to the detriment of his on/off love affair with his cousin Ngor who has recently arrived to stay in his flat to be close to the hospital where she is receiving treatment for an illness. For Wong it’s a relatively conventional Asian gangster film made before he linked up with cinematographer Christopher Doyle and before he developed many of his trademarks that were to become pronounced in his breakthrough film Chungking Express (1994).

Rival gangster meet to sort out there differences.

The film stars Andy Lau, best known for his roles in films like Fulltime Killer (2001), the Infernal Affair’s trilogy (2002-2003) House of the Flying Daggers (2004) and the recently released A Simple Life (2011), as Ah Wah with Ngor played by Maggie Cheung who was born in Hong Kong but raised in England and has appeared in four other Wong Kar-wai movies Ashes of Time Redux (2008), 2046 (2004, In the Mood for Love (2000) and Days of Being Wild (1990). She has also appeared in two of her ex-husband’s Olivier Assayas films Irma Vep (1996) and Clean (2004).

Maggie Cheung.

Focusing on vengeance and violence this tough gritty movie has a different feel to his later films but is none the worse for it, in fact it’s a great deal better that a lot of other Asian gangster movies and certainly would appeal to lovers of that genre along with Wong’s many fans.

Andy Lau.