Wilson Yip Ip Man 3 (Wilson Yip, 2015) Ip Man 3 is the third film directed by Wilson Yip starring Donnie Yen in the title role as the master of the Wing Chun style of kung fu. Ip is best known as one of Bruce Lee’s teachers, and his notoriety and fame to this day is largely
Guan Hu Mr. Six (Guan Hu, 2015) Playing this week at the Pacific Place is Mr. Six, a gangster drama which earned star Feng Xiaogang the Best Actor award at this past Golden Horse Awards (which are held annually in Taiwan and honor Chinese-language film). Feng plays Mr. Six, an aging Beijing street tough, now in his
Wu Ershan Mojin: The Lost Legend (Wu Ershan, 2015) International treasure Shu Qi stars in this blockbuster effects-driven film out of China, opening this week at the Pacific Place. One of a trio of grave robbers, Shu Qi and her compatriots Chen Kun and Huang Bo find themselves roped into a scheme to dig up a MacGuffin from an
John Woo The Crossing (John Woo, 2015) Here are reviews of the two separately released parts of The Crossing. The Crossing — August 13, 2015 The first part of John Woo’s latest epic (the second part was recently released in China to little fanfare, but isn’t available here yet) is a romantic war movie in the
Miike Takashi Yakuza Apocalypse (Miike Takashi, 2015) Playing this Friday and Saturday at midnight only comes the latest from prolific Japanese lunatic Miike Takashi. The limited late night time slot gives a hint of what to expect, even if you’re unfamiliar with Miike’s work, much of which amounts to highly imaginative reworkings of familiar genres,
Jia Zhangke Mountains May Depart (Jia Zhangke, 2015) Jia Zhangke’s Mountains May Depart is one of the more polarizing films of the year. It marks a radical shift in Jia’s formal technique, abandoning the long-shot/long-take aesthetic that has made him one of the preeminent examples of 21st Century Asian Minimalism. Instead, working with his longtime
Hou Hsiao-hsien The Assassin (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 2015) Hou Hsiao-hsien’s latest, his first film since 2007’s Flight of the Red Balloon, is set in the late Tang Dynasty period, starring Shu Qi as a young woman who returns home after ten years as a killer-in-training to wreak vengeance on the local ruler. The film follows a
Hong Sangsoo Right Now, Wrong Then (Hong Sangsoo, 2015) While lacking the formal experimentation that distinguishes Hong Sangsoo’s best work (Oki’s Movie, The Day He Arrives) or the sheer giddy pleasure of his funniest movies (Hill of Freedom, In Another Country), Right Now, Wrong Then has a precision and focus that assures that, despite a certain conventionality,
Han Yan Go Away, Mr. Tumor (Han Yan, 2015) The goofy, cutsy, CGI-driven, Chinese fantasy cancer melodrama we didn’t know we needed. The clash of tones in Go Away, Mr. Tumor I imagine would be unbearable for most, especially audiences trained on Hollywood rules about tonal and generic consistency, but it was a smash hit in China and
John Woo Princess Chang Ping (John Woo, 1976) Before he hit it big with 1986’s A Better Tomorrow, John Woo was a journeyman director for hire on the margins of the Hong Kong film industry. He worked mostly in slapstick comedies such as the Chaplin homage Laughing Times with Dean Shek, or the hit Ricky Hui film
Jackie Chan Project A 2 (Jackie Chan, 1987) The sequel is even more Chan-focused than the first Project A was, as the other Little Fortunes are absent (they were off in the jungle making Eastern Condors) and Jackie is joined by a trio of women played by Maggie Cheung, Carina Lau, and Rosamund Kwan, in an apparent nod
Jackie Chan Project A (Jackie Chan, 1983) Comparing Project A to Sammo Hung’s Wheels on Meals, released the next year in 1984, shows some stark differences between Sammo and Jackie Chan as directors. Both films are swashbuckling adventures with ridiculously athletic fights and stunts, slapstick comedy, and a real obsession with beating the hell out of
Johnnie To The Heroic Trio (Johnnie To, 1993) Before becoming a renowned auteur, a favorite of critics and film festivals the world over, Johnnie To was known primarily in the West for the two films he made in 1993 in collaboration with director and action choreographer Ching Siu-tung. The Heroic Trio and Executioners star Michelle Yeoh, Maggie Cheung,
Ringo Lam Wild City (Ringo Lam, 2015) After more than a decade of semi-retirement, legendary director Ringo Lam returns to the big screen with a thriller that hearkens back to the golden age of the Hong Kong crime film. Lam made his mark in the late 80s and early 90s with a series of action films–gritty,
Corey Yuen Yes, Madam! (Corey Yuen, 1985) Of the members of the Seven Little Fortunes Peking Opera troupe to become major figures in the Hong Kong film industry in the last 20 years before the colony’s handover to China, Corey Yuen is the least well known. Unlike Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, and Yuen Biao, he stayed
John Woo A Better Tomorrow (John Woo, 1986) After an up and down decade as a director for hire, working alternately in the wuxia and wacky comedy genres, John Woo finally hit it big in 1986 when he teamed up with Tsui Hark and the Cinema City studio to remake Patrick Lung Kong’s 1967 drama The Story
Jiang Wen Gone with the Bullets (Jiang Wen, 2014) So Jiang Wen made a Wong Jing movie. . . I watched the Thai DVD, which is the first version I’ve seen that has English subtitles. The running time is 119 minutes. Wikipedia and the IMDb give it a running time of 140 minutes, with a 120 minute international cut, while
Cheuk Wan-chi Temporary Family (Cheuk Wan-chi, 2014) Reading the description for this comedy about people in the Hong Kong forced to share a luxury flat while they try to flip it in an over-competitive bubble market, I was hoping for a Hong Kong version of The More the Merrier, the 1943 George Stevens movie in which Jean
Teddy Chan Kung Fu Jungle (Teddy Chan, 2014) The latest acclaimed Hong Kong film to sneak onto Seattle Screens at the AMC Pacific Place (following Johnnie To’s Don’t Go Breaking My Heart 2 and Tsui Hark’s The Taking of Tiger Mountain, among other recent hits) is a new collaboration between director Teddy Chan and star/
Chang Cheh Masked Avengers (Chang Cheh, 1981) Masked Avengers was released in 1981, one of the latest in a series of films directed by Chang Cheh and starring a group of actors and stunt performers generally known as the Venom Mob, after the 1978 film in which they were first gathered, The Five Deadly Venoms. The plot
Hou Hsiao-hsien Café Lumière (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 2003) Café Lumière was supposed to be one part of an anthology made to honor the 100th anniversary of Yasujiro Ozu’s birth, but the other directors involved dropped out and so Hou Hsiao-hsien expanded his section into a feature. It’s set in Tokyo and tells the story of a
Hou Hsiao-hsien Millennium Mambo (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 2001) Millennium Mambo, released in 2001 and Hou Hsiao-hsien’s first to be theatrically distributed in the US, is his first one set entirely (well, almost) in the contemporary world since Daughter of the Nile, and like that film it tends to be passed over in favor of more ostensibly serious
Hou Hsiao-hsien Flowers of Shanghai (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 1998) Flowers of Shanghai is based on an 1892 novel by Han Bangqing, considered a masterpiece but composed largely in the Wu dialect of Chinese, which is unintelligible to Mandarin speakers. The script (by Chu T’ien-wen, of course) is based on a translation by novelist Eileen Chang who wrote the
Hou Hsiao-hsien Dust in the Wind (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 1986) The fourth in the series of coming-of-age films that marked Hou Hsiao-hsien’s transition from competent movie-maker to celebrated auteur, Dust in the Wind is based on the experiences of New Cinema multi-hyphenate Wu Nien-jen, most famous in the US for his starring role in Edward Yang’s Yi yi.
Hou Hsiao-hsien The Time to Live, The Time to Die (Hou Hsiao-hsien, 1985) After his turn toward more personal filmmaking with 1983’s The Boys from Fengkuei, which was based on incidents from his own life transplanted onto a story of contemporary youth, and the following year’s A Summer at Grandpa’s, based on the recollections of Chu T’ien-wen, an author
