Hot Picks
|
|
|
Mad Detective
Hong Kong 2007
produced by Johnnie To, Wai Ka Fai, Charles Heung (executive) for Milkyway Image, One Hundred Years of Film, China Star
directed by Johnnie To, Wai Ka Fai
starring Lau Ching Wan, Andy On, Lam Ka Tung, Kelly Lin, Lee Kwok Lun, Karen Lee (= Lee Choi-ning, Flora Chan, Cheung Siu Vai, Lam Suet, Jay Lau (= Lau Kam Ling), Eddy Ko, Jo Kuk, Yuen Ling To, Jonathan Lee, Ronald Yan, Wong Wah Wo, Apple Chau, Jackson Ha, Hung Wai Leung, Jeff Cheung (= Cheung Ka-kit, Shing Chiu Chi, Jack Lai, Law Ching Ting, Singh Hartihan Bitto, Dhillon Jeevan Singh
written by Wai Ka Fai, Au Kin Yee, music by Xavier Jamaux, special makeup effects by Mark Garbarino, visual effects by Raymond Man
review by Sam Jones from DVD is Go
|
|
|
|
Available on DVD! To buy, click on link(s) below and help keep this site afloat (commissions earned) |
Always make sure of DVD-compatibility!!!
|
|
|
|
|
Shortly to arrive on UK cinema screens
and later DVD, Eureka Video present the jaw dropping
Hong Kong cop thriller Mad Detective, a film that, if
justice is served, will cross over into mainstream
success alongside classics like Battle Royale and
Old Boy.
Mad Detective, from Election and
Exiled director Johhny
To, follows the trials of a cop plagued by either
psychic powers or mental illness, depending on which way
you approach the movie. Lau Ching Wan is Inspector Bun,
a homicide detective who has a unique way of solving
his cases; by recreating the circumstances of a crime,
he can visualize the perpetrators.
During the opening scenes this is portrayed brilliantly,
in two incredible sequences where first we are
introduced to the highly strung flatfoot as he stabs at
a pig carcass in his office in order to feel the events
that led to a murder. Next he ropes in a rookie cop, who
is instructed to zip him up in a suitcase a throw him
down a flight of stairs
...then another...
...then another.
When the bruised and battered lawman emerges from his
temporary prison, the name of a cold killer is on his
lips.
All this before the title card!
Bun may be a psychic genius when it comes to getting his
man, as the headlines of numerous newspapers attest, but
his interpersonal skills leave a lot to be desired and
he is struck from the force because of his erratic
behaviour and violent outbursts.
A broken man, he retreats into himself with only his
wife for comfort. The trouble is, his wife left him a
while back and he's making do with a mental construct as
he descends further into murky insanity.
Bun claims to be able to see peoples inner
personalities, a phenomena made possible on film by a
constantly changing viewpoint that flits back and forth
between the real world and Bun's cracked perspective. Is
he telling the truth? Can he see visions and gauge
peoples true motives through psychic force alone? The
movie is always careful to leave a shred of doubt,
despite the appearance of Bun's wife in the latter half
of the movie and references to psychiatric treatment and
medication.
With Bun teetering on the edge of a depressive abyss,
the rookie who was co-opted to fling him down the stairs
re-enters his life. It seems the young cop (who Bun sees
as a scared child) has risen in the ranks and now heads
up an investigation into a cop killing. Was it
perpetrated by a criminal or the dead man's corrupt
partner? Maybe the unstable Bun can tap into the secrets
of this harsh and violent case...
Mad Detective is a near perfect film, marrying the
violence of Hong Kong action films and the balletic gun
play of pre-Hollywood John Woo with intense drama and a
sensitive but gripping study of a deranged man spiraling
into mental turmoil. There are amazing scenes in which
the film shows the suspect's seven differing
personalities as they crowd around the character. His
cold, hard intelligence is represented by a callous
vixen, his psychotic violence a mean faced street punk
and his true persona as a fat, glutinous, badly attired
middle aged man. Is this really a true representation of
the man's inner life or just another manifestation of
Bun's inherent mental confusion? That the film offers no
concrete evidence only piles on the intrigue.
Mad Detective is one of the best movies I've seen in a
long time. Violent, brooding and downbeat, it offers the
viewer a well constructed insight into the realms of
madness.
|
review © by Sam Jones from DVD is Go
|
Feeling lucky? Want to search any of my partnershops yourself for more, better results? (commissions earned) |
The links below will take you just there!!!
|
|
|
Thanks for watching !!!
|
|
|
Robots and rats,
demons and potholes, cuddly toys and shopping mall Santas,
love and death and everything in between,
Tales to Chill Your Bones to is all of that.
Tales to Chill Your Bones to -
a collection of short stories and mini-plays ranging from the horrific to the darkly humourous,
from the post-apocalyptic to the weirdly romantic,
tales that will give you a chill and maybe a chuckle,
all thought up by the twisted mind of screenwriter and film reviewer Michael Haberfelner.
Tales to Chill Your Bones to
the new anthology by Michael Haberfelner
Out now from Amazon!!! |
|