A Killer's Blues
Director: Raymond Lee
Year: 1989
Rating: 6.0
A mix of hard-hitting triad rivalry and maudlin
melodrama that goes back and forth between the two like a drunken butterfly.
The triad section is pretty standard stuff of machetes, betrayals and brotherhood
but it at times gets buried beneath the family drama. Not that there is anything
wrong with trying to give a triad film some emotional resonance, but there
was way too much of it here. The action scenes from choreographer Tony Leung
Siu-Hung are well done - chaotic, confusing, bloody - with masses of bodies
just trying to get a slice of someone else. And the drama from Fenny Yuen,
Olivia Cheng and Ti Lung is well acted but it gets so saccharine that you
can probably guess where it is going.
The film begins with a wonderful frantic
foot chase down alleys, over roofs and into broken down buildings - Ti Lung
is running after Alan Chui and finally catches up with him. Chui begs for
his life because he has a young daughter but Ti Lung tells him, I can't let
a man live who betrayed the Big Boss (Bau Hon-lam) and in the ensuing shoot
out kills him. And he sees the daughter with a water pistol off to the side
watching. Ti Lung has a girlfriend - Olivia - and tells her I am going away
for a while - can you adopt the daughter. Can I just say that normally adopting
a child of a man you killed is asking for trouble. A while turns out to be
fourteen years in prison and with a lot less hair. The little girl has grown
up to be Fennie and she gets a crush on her Uncle. A crush that is a little
creepy. And he has to tell her the truth.
Meanwhile, Ti Lung has gone back to see
the Big Boss along with his good friend played by Lo Lieh with only one-arm.
I was hoping for some One-Armed action but not to be. There is trouble within
the gang - the Second Boss (Wang Hsieh) is itching to become the Big Boss.
Don't they always. You would think being Second Boss would be the best position.
No one is trying to kill you and you still get lots of benefits. Both bosses
have sons who are the cause of the trouble that takes place. Both rotten,
spoiled and sociopaths. Mark Cheng is the Big Boss's son and Roy Cheung is
the other's son. Good to see Roy Cheung again - did he ever get to play a
normal guy in any film? Always a punk, psycho or gangster.
Two Alpha Males with something to prove.
Tensions build up and it is rumble time as the sons take turns trying to
kill the other one. Ti Lung really wants none of it - he looks forward
to a home life - but he owes the boss and has no choice. The shootout in
the funeral home is a highlight but the montage of killings crisscrossed
with a happy Ti Lung and family camping is pretty awful and obvious. But
nice having three of the Shaw Brother's veterans in the same film with a
few of the new tough breed to fill it in. This is directed by Raymond Lee
who would go on to do some wonderful work with Tsui Hark, directing Swordsman,
Dragon Inn and the East is Red.
