Amnesty Decree
Director: Clifford Choi Kai-kwong
Year: 1987
Rating: 5.0
Pre the
1997 Handover, there were many Hong Kong films that dealt with illegal migration
from China. Most of them were either vicious gangs coming over the border
on foot or by boat to rob and pillage Hong Kong - or there were comedies
in which the Mainlander was portrayed as rude, crass, ignorant and a bit
of an idiot. You don't see many films these days coming out of Hong Kong
that are like that. This film from 1987 is neither though. It is a soapy
melodramatic look at one of the social issues of the day. Many adults migrated
illegally into Hong Kong but had to leave their children behind for logistics
reasons but with the intentions of bringing them over later. This follows
the story of three of them as they try to do so. It is pretty dull going
though back at the time the film was made it might have seemed more relevant.
Three good actors help you get through the film. One of the mother's with
two children is played by Nina Li, another is Cecilia Yip and the third is
a father played by Ku Feng. The video I saw was a copy of an old video tape
in which the white subs were invisible against the white background about
50% of the time. There were parts I didn't really understand.
It begins with a speedboat crammed with
tiny tots making for Hong Kong. Smugglers aka snakeheads. The Hong Kong police
catch up with them, so the two men dive overboard and most of the children
fall off the boat and are picked up by the coastal police. The children are
taken back and kept in a compound back over the border and the parents are
notified and allowed to see them. Or something like that. It's confusing
and the subs were of no use. But we get to meet our three protagonists -
Kim (Nina Li) has a boy and a girl, Alice (Cecilia) has a little girl and
Ku Feng has a son. Kim and Alice work in a nightclub getting men to buy them
expensive drinks. Ku Feng runs an outdoor food cart. Tsai (Kenneth Tsang)
is the villain in the film - along with the bureaucracy that keeps children
and parents apart. Tsai is a nasty snakehead who promises to bring Alice's
little girl over if she pays him a lot of money and sleeps with him.
Kim finds a different way. Marry rich. She
gets a customer (Melvin Wong) who she plays like a trombone. She tells Alice
that she loves him but loves his money more. He tells her he doesn't want
children. She tells him nothing about her two. It all gets dramatic in the
final 20-minutes - Hong Kong announces that they are putting on a one-day
special. Bring in your child the next day before 5pm and your child will
become a citizen of Hong Kong. Amnesty. At the same time the two children
of Kim's and the child of Alice's - these are like from 4 to 7 years old
- decide to escape their confinement and make their way to Hong Kong past
the guards and the barb wire. And Kim is getting married that day and
Alice goes after the snakeheads with a machete. Some happy endings. Some
not so happy endings.
