Naked Ambition
Director: Dante Lam
Year: 2003
Rating: 7.0
I want to be the
next Porno King of Hong Kong! Take this image to bed with you tonight. Louis
Koo surrounded by a vast sea of naked female breasts. Breasts to the right
of him, breasts to the left of him, breasts looking him square in the eye
and others shyly staying behind him. Seventy naked breasts all keeping him
company as he calmly sits there chatting with an interviewer (Bey Logan)
about his life as the publisher of a weekly magazine on the sex industry
in Hong Kong. Not in the least bit fazed by this buffet of goodies, Koo tells
Bey that over the past couple of years he has seen over 10,000 naked breasts
and so this is nothing new to him. Ya, it’s good to be a Porno King – or
is it?
The sex industry has played a large role in Hong Kong films for a long time
with club hostesses and prostitutes often being central or peripheral characters
in hundreds upon hundreds of movies. Though one almost begins to take it
for granted after a while, it is really rather a strange phenomenon that
is like no other film industry in the world. In Hong Kong, the prostitute
drama is truly a genre of its own and there are very few actresses that have
not played a prostitute/bar girl at some point in their career. The last
two years has seen some interesting twists on this genre – first with the
wonderful Golden Chicken that explored the life of a prostitute from youth
to middle age and then two recent films have shown the sex industry from
the other side – from the perspective of the man - in the comedic Men Suddenly
in Black in which five friends make a night of whoring and this film, Naked
Ambition, that is about men surveying the sex industry. Though I enjoyed
Men Suddenly in Black quite a bit, I was disappointed in that I felt it pulled
its punches and didn’t have the nerve to cross the line into dubious morality
– i.e. none of the men get laid for all their trying. Naked Ambition isn’t
as good a film as Men Suddenly in Black in many ways, but I admired it for
crossing that moral line and throwing the question back at the male viewer
– how differently would we have acted?
Andy (Koo) and John (Eason Chan) both work for a magazine and are made redundant
together. Along with some of their other redundant co-workers they decide
to open a magazine of their own. But what kind of magazine they ponder –
the only ones that seem to make money are academic ones or porno ones – with
naked women dancing through their heads like sugar plum fairies they wisely
choose . . . porno. This isn’t just another typical pornographic magazine
filled with page after page of naked women though – this is a guide – sort
of a Zagats of the sex industry. In it they want to inform their readers
of the do’s and don’ts and who does what and who does it well. A consumer
report in other words. This sort of information of course entails field work
– lots and lots of field work as Andy and John visit all sorts of establishments
from massage parlors to hostess bars to small brothels to solo entrepreneurs
in apartments.
Initially they meet with resistance from the owners of these places but once
these owners learn that a good review in the magazine will lead to a rush
of new business (“a room filled with horny sperm”) and lines out the door
and exhausted lock-jawed workers, they happily co-operate. Even the triads
(Tats Lau) beat a path to their doors with hopes of getting their places
mentioned favorably in the magazine. Both men have girlfriends (Cherry Ying
and Denise Ho) and so they have a strict hands off the goods policy and simply
report what they observe – at least for a while. They meet some interesting
and colorful women in their travels. Titty Bird (Jo Koo) who cheerfully advertises
her “big bouncy tits”, Kiki (Nicky Chow) who is a drinking game expert and
tends to pass out during sex and of course Tess Tickles (get it?) played
very gamely by Josie Ho who is a master of the fire and ice technique* in
oral sex. She is also my calendar girl for the month because my doctor has
informed me that I need to eat lots of bananas for my potassium deficiency
and this is certainly a good reminder!
This all sounds like great fun of course but behind the sex, the naked breasts,
the money and the fame what does it all mean and is it really fulfilling.
Hell yes! I mean – no of course it isn’t – not when you hurt the people you
love and in the end that seems to be the message of the film. It seems that
films like this always have to contain that sort of dour message in the end
as if everyone would otherwise run out and try to be a Porno King and the
film doesn’t want to be irresponsible. There is lots to like in the film
– though its two-hour running time could easily have been cut to make it
tighter – a charismatic performance from Koo, a solid one from Eason, some
great supporting roles, an interesting story line (based I believe on a true
story) and every one of those seventy breasts!
At the same time the film never takes on the substance that one feels the
filmmakers (Dante Lam and Chan Hing-kar) may have been aiming for (ala the
Citizen Kane of Porno producers) – it is very much at its best when it is
simply being outrageous and fun – and becomes a bit tedious when it gets
serious. My very favorite Hong Kong DVD store worker Paul at Lai Ying told
me that the film has some hilarious dialogue/puns/double entendres that are
completely missed in the subtitles.
* Fire and Ice – alternating mouthfuls of ice
cubes and hot tea – please be careful!
My rating for this film: 7.0