Wang Jing only used one scene to bring all the main characters of the film to the stage.
One of the most surprising movies in this year's National Day archives, because I have heard some good reviews, I deliberately raised my expectations before watching the movie. Even so, after watching the whole film, I can't help but applaud Wang Jing, it doesn't even look like a film directed by him.
The story takes place in Hong Kong in the 1960s and 1970s, still in the British colonial period, where gangs run rampant and corruption thrives. Two gangsters (played by Donnie Yen) and ordinary police officers (played by Andy Lau), who also worked hard from the bottom, finally climbed to the peak of their lives with their skills and courage, and became the big brothers (Lai Hao and Lai Luo) who are both black and white in Hong Kong.
Movies with gangster characters as the protagonists are generally beautified appropriately to highlight the characters' love and righteousness.
In "The Godfather", Marlon Brando is not like a gangster, more like a gentleman in suit By. In the world of "The Godfather", justice always comes in time and quickly, and all betrayals will be severely punished, just like an isolated utopia.
In "Chasing the Dragon", the lame man under Wang Jing's lens is an inspirational image of a gang leader who grows step by step from a stowaway who can't eat enough with his own efforts.
Although he is a gangster, he and his subordinates have never violated the interests of the common people. No one has gone bankrupt because of drug addiction, no one has been ruined because of gambling, and no woman has been forced to become a prostitute. On the contrary, he pulled his horse back from the gaming table time and time again, and was heartbroken because of Serena's drug use.
This seems to create an illusion that changes the impression of the gangster in the audience's mind, so much so that immersed in the world given by the film, there is admiration and sympathy for what happened to Lame Hao and Lai Luo.
The hero does not ask about black and white, but about love and faith, which is the core point of this film.
The character descriptions are also very skillful.
At the beginning of the fight scene in the restaurant, the gangs downstairs were fighting, and the bosses upstairs were watching the battle. In the scene switching, the characters' personalities came into view. And when this scene ends, the life trajectories of Lai Hao and Lai Luo have already intersected, and the key characters of the film have also appeared. Wang Jing only used this scene to bring all the main characters of the film to the stage, which can be described as a master's handwriting.
As for Lai Luo's promotion, it is very clear in just a few strokes. In fact, Wang Jing chose a good reference object-Yan Ye, who was black and white in Hong Kong back then.
The first scene is when Lai Luo was slapped in public on the day of Ye Yan's birthday. At that time Lai Luo was just a detective in the community, swallowing his voice in front of Ye Yan; the second scene was at the dance held by Sir Zhou. The lord assigned Ma Zai to take care of the Jazz's daughter, but Lai Luo was the first to win the heart and win back a city. With only these three strokes, Laidlaw's narrative line to the pinnacle of power is complete.
At the end of the film, the misfortunes of the two brothers and their families are used to reflect the punishment for being late, and the characters' explanations are a little hasty. In addition, every brother of Lai Hao and Lai Luo died, they had to be deliberately sensational, which lowered the overall taste of the film, and some evenings were not guaranteed.
The flaws do not hide the truth, this film is Wang Jing's best work in the past ten years, and it is also an amazing one of the recent Chinese movies, which is worth savoring.
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