Could You Kill My
Husband, Please
Director: Yiu Tin-hung
Year:
2002
Rating: 4.5
It had been a while since I watched a Jade
Leung movie. So in that respect, this was a treat. She was a favorite of
mine when she exploded on the Hong Kong film scene in 1991 with Black Cat,
a Hong Kong version of La Femme Nikita. She went on to star in a handful
of other action films that were solid like Satin Steel, Fox Hunter and Enemy
Shadow. But the Girls with Guns genre had run its course as well as the Hong
Kong film industry nearly collapsing. So from about 2000 on, she appeared
in one low low budget film after another with only a few of them worth watching
(Phantom of Snake and Flying Dragon, Leaping Tiger). There were actually
two more Black Cat films made which were just sad. Unlike most of the other
Girls with Guns stars, Jade had no physical skills. She just looked great
holding a gun and a beautiful face that could express rage.
This film was not nearly as bad as I was
expecting. Shot on video and it has that cheap look that lots of HK films
did at that time. More disappointing is that she only has one fight and gets
beaten up. What the hell were the filmmakers thinking? It's Jade Leung. She
killed armies of men in her films. Here she plays a wife who is having issues
with her husband and after a few drinks too many in a bar, she yells out
"Where can I find an assassin to kill my husband". This being a HK movie,
I am surprised that every man in there did not step forward.
But one does - the wonderful Michael Wong.
No matter how much he has been mocked for his acting skills and his inability
to speak Cantonese, he became a popular actor in the 1980s and 90s. To his
credit here, he plays a fine psycho scumbag. He telephones her the next day
to tell her he will fulfill the contract. Wait, I was just kidding. Don't
kill my husband. Too late. Another fine actor got thrown into this film,
Eddie Ko as the police Inspector. Ko was in loads of classic action films
for years, almost always as a villain or in a character role, but he
was one of the best and gives this some gravitas. So a fairly mediocre film,
but three big names. And Jade looks great.
