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Fri/Sat/Sun October 13~15, 2017

(October 13)

TheatersTheatersChina Film CinemaTel: 8661-7199Add: Block A, Building 2, Qushui Bay, OCT Bay, Baishi Road 8, Nanshan District (南山区白石路东8号欢乐海岸园区内的曲水湾2栋A区)

UA KK MallTel: 2290-6660Add: 4/F, KK Mall, 5016 Shennan Road East, Luohu District (罗湖区深南东路5016号京基百纳空间购物中心四楼)

Golden Harvest ShenzhenTel: 8266-8182, ext: 0Add: 3/F, The MixC, 1881 Bao’an Road South (罗湖区宝安南路1881号万象城三楼)

South Movie CityTel: 8261-1138Add: 3/F, Kingglory Plaza, Renmin Road South, Luohu District (罗湖区人民南路金光华广场三楼)

New South Movie CityTel: 2594-4588Add: 3/F, City Plaza, 1095 Shennan Road Central (深南中路1095号新城市广场三楼)

Shenzhen Jinyi Intl. CinemaTel: 8280-1168Add: G/F, Central Walk, Fuhua Road, Futian District (福田区福华路怡景中心城内G楼)

Broadway CircuitTel: 8881-1222Add: 2/F, Coco Park, Fuhua Road 3, Futian District (福田区福华三路Coco Park二楼)

China Film Antaeus Intl. CineplexTel: 8253-1188Add: 3/F, Jiaxinmao, intersection of Nonglin Road and Qiaoxiang Road, Futian District (福田区农林路和侨香路交汇处嘉信茂三楼)

MCL Cinema CityTel: 2685-8870Add: 5/F, Garden City Center, Nanhai Boulevard, Nan-shan District (南山区南海大道花园城中心五楼)

Holiday CinemaTel: 8269-8989Add: L3, Yitian Holiday Plaza, opposite Window of the World, Nanshan District (南山区世界之窗对面益田假日广场L3层)

Coastal City CinemaTel: 8612-9988Add: 3/F, Coastal City, 33 Wenxin Road 5, Nanshan District (南山区文心五路33号海岸城三楼)

ScheduleScheduleCurrently playing

Chasing the Dragon (Cantonese)——————————————

The Foreigner (English)——————————————

Contra! empo (The Invisible Guest)(Spanish)

——————————————Sky Hunter(Mandarin)

——————————————War for the Planet of the Apes

(English)——————————————

Never Say Die(Mandarin)

《追龙》

Starring: Donnie Yen, Andy Lau, Kent Cheng, Philip Keung, Kent Cheng, Wifred Lau, Ken Ton Directors: Wong Jing, Jason Kwan

Chasing the Dragon

Andy Lau (L) as Rock and Donnie Yen as Crippled Ho. File photo

AS Hong Kong’s premier schlock-meister, Wong Jing has never been shy about mining his own legacy to depletion. This is the man, after all, who managed to drain whatever fun there was left in his own trademark gambling comedies with his recent From Vegas to Macao franchise. With “Chasing the Dragon,” Wong and co-director Jason Kwan offer a pale reboot of the mobster-biopic genre Wong helped make a corner-stone of Hong Kong cinema in the 1990s. Revisiting the characters and stories from two classics of that era — Lawrence Ah Mon’s “Lee Rock,” which Wong himself produced, and Poon Man-kit’s “To Be Number One” — the new fl ick is thick in visual bom-bast but thin on story, characteriza-tion and period details.

This strange narrative arc speaks volumes about the kind of hero-ism “Chasing the Dragon” seeks to place center stage. Its protagonists’ real-life counterparts were colorful personalities but hardly do-gooders, as seen in those nuanced 1990s biop-ics: Lui Lok, on which the character Lee Rock is based, amassed US$64 million in kickbacks in the ’60s, while Ng Sik-ho, a.k.a. Crippled Ho, controlled Hong Kong’s heroin trade in the same period. Literally rubbing the template clean, Wong has refash-ioned these criminal linchpins in the image of his two famously morally upstanding stars who, perhaps unsurprisingly, happen to be the fi lm’s executive producers.

Andy Lau returns to the role of Rock, which he played with aplomb in Ah Mon’s fi lm 26 years ago, here transforming the gangster from a

raw, rough and ready chap into a well-dressed sophisticate who speaks perfect English. Meanwhile, Donnie Yen channels his generous, family-loving offscreen persona into his turn as narco-kingpin Crippled Ho, transforming a much-feared crimi-nal overlord into a highly sympathetic fi ghter hell-bent on protecting his kin and clan.

The pair’s Chinese fanbase will defi nitely embrace “Chasing the Dragon,” as will those who prefer more action than characterization in their gangster fl icks. New converts to Rock and Ho’s universe, meanwhile, might marvel at the lavish production design and strong camerawork. The slickness of it all, however, takes away the grime and grit that propped up the genre in the fi rst place. If the 1990s originals are Hong Kong’s answer to Lucky Luciano, “Chasing the Dragon” will be the equivalent of “Mobsters.”

The fi lm’s title is Cantonese slang for the pursuit of heroin-driven highs. It’s just one of many vices shown in a collage of images unspooling beneath the opening credits, where re-enacted snapshots of mainlining, prostitution and gang violence appear alongside newsreel footage of the city’s 1960s streetscapes. All these things provide the backdrop before which “Chasing the Dragon” unfolds, as it recounts the wily Rock’s irresistible rise in the police hierarchy and the impov-erished Crippled Ho’s fi ght up the underworld ranks.

Given the close relationship between the cops and the mob in that era, the pair soon become part-ners and eventually blood brothers, with Ho serving as the brainy Rock’s

very loyal brawn. The turning point comes when Ho saves Rock in a deadly (and impressively choreo-graphed) ambush in a downtown ghetto; while Rock survives more or less intact, Ho has his leg shattered by the rival gangster masterminding the attack. The injury, which explains Ho’s limping nickname, soon drives a wedge between the pair. Ho more aggressively expands his drug-traf-fi cking realm and becomes embit-tered toward Rock, especially when Rock asks him to make up with the very thug who broke his leg, in order to stop gang wars from getting out of hand.

With bad blood fl owing in all directions, the scenario seems ripe for betrayal to set in and all hell to break loose. Cue the action scenes, in which Crippled Ho defi es his nickname by battling his foes to dis-traction and death in Hong Kong and Thailand. But “Chasing the Dragon” doesn’t switch beyond middle gear as a melodramatic celebration of fl awed heroes. Rock and Ho never waver as righteous avengers, teaming up to settle the score against rival gangsters, bad Chinese cops and brutal British superintendents.

“Chasing the Dragon” concludes with the end of an era, as the pair go their separate ways in the face of a government clampdown against cor-ruption and crime. With its limp treat-ment of dark and explosive material, the fi lm also reduces larger-than-life characters and epic narratives into stuttering, second-rate melodrama.

The movie is now being screened in Shenzhen.

(SD-Agencies)