Chapter Two: A Better Tomorrow 2
By Brett Beach
August 27, 2009
BoxOfficeProphets.com
However, when I return to a song, or a book, or a film after a prolonged absence, it hasn't changed, but I have. I possibly might find the same things delightful that I originally did "back then" and encounter new riches. Or I may find the love affair has passed and I have moved on. In a way, it is certainly easier to hang on to my initial reaction, confident in how I felt about the film once upon a time. But it's not real. The downside then is accepting that things have changed. That I am different. And that feeling is just like waking up to the person next to you in bed or sitting across from you at the table and finding a stranger. What happened? Where did all the time go? For some reason, I always think of the recurring image in Anand Tucker's wonderful 1998 biopic Hilary and Jackie with Emily Watson and Rachel Griffiths as musicians/sisters (both actresses were Oscar-nominated). Watson's character is standing on a beach watching herself and her sister play as adolescents. At one point, the girls come over and Watson whispers in the ear of her younger self. We never hear what is said, which is the point, I think. What advice could we possibly give our younger selves? All that might be uttered is that time speeds up so insanely fast as you age. That and most certainly, things change.
My first cinematic encounter with the art of firing a gun in each hand at the same time was not in a John Woo film. Nor was it in a Hong Kong action film of any stripe. It was an Entertainment Tonight profile on Harvey Keitel from the summer of 1992 (in my mind, his heyday as an indie icon in the making and the apex of his on-screen bad-assedness). They were showing a clip from Reservoir Dogs and I remember it so clearly because my brain said quite loudly, "He's firing two guns at the same time. How is that possible?!" At the risk of sounding hopelessly naïve, I have no doubt that I had seen this done before in my prior decade of movie watching. I certainly had not seen any HK (Hong Kong) flicks though and wherever I might have first encountered double the bullets/double the fun, it had certainly made no impression on me. The sight of HK (Harvey Keitel) in dark shades, dark suit and white shirt posed just left of center in the frame, determined look planted upon his mug did impress upon me most deeply. Let's face it. I was smitten.
My initiation into the world of Woo came just over a year later - in the fall of 1993 - during the 72-hour film fest that my undergraduate school held during finals week each semester. The Killer and (oddly enough) Reservoir Dogs were scheduled back-to-back beginning at 5:45 a.m. on the first full day. I would have just enough time after The Killer to grab breakfast and head off to my Introductory Calculus I final (which by the way, I bombed, for reasons having nothing whatsoever to do with John Woo, thankfully.) One of my friends joined me for the film and our verbatim real-time reaction to the bullets, the doves, the operatic insanity that is The Killer consisted of variations on "Holy shit!" We were quite impressed and delirious and happy with the world, as only teenage boys who have witnessed mind-blowing amounts of choreographed mayhem, perhaps, can be. This high was almost undone 24 hours later with an ill-advised midnight screening of the director's cut of Caligula, a film I wish upon not even exes or enemies, a film that is not redeemed by starring a 30-something Helen Mirren, though perhaps only she alone could have emerged with her reputation and career intact and on track.
During the summer of 1994, one of the bastions of independent cinema in Portland, a theater named Cinema 21, was having a Woo double feature for three days: A Better Tomorrow II and Hard Boiled. Never mind that I had never seen A Better Tomorrow and so feared that I might be lost in plot nuances and obscure references (yes, I know, I needed to calm down). Being as that I was home from school for the summer and not permanently encamped in Portland, this entailed Mom and me making a three hour drive back to the big city. All I knew of the films going in was what I had seen of ABTII in True Romance (it's one of the two films that Alabama is watching on TV while Clarence is messing it up with Drexel) and that Hard Boiled's finale featured a hospital on fire and Chow Yun Fat saving babies while blowing away bad guys. Mom actually sat through both films and enjoyed herself. I was still in awe that Woo could top himself with action sequences of such audacity and ridiculousness (at least from my chronological viewing experience). I eventually caught up with A Better Tomorrow and Woo's 1990 war opus Bullet in the Head on bootlegged videotapes before my college years were over.
Watching both ABT and ABTII back to back recently proved two things to me: First, that there is a lot to be gained, from an emotional standpoint, from seeing both in close proximity. Two of the main characters recur and their relationship does alter considerably from one end to the other. Second, it is absolutely not necessary to see the first film because ABTII gives you all the flashbacks you need to fill in the blanks in the opening three minutes and because it contains five scenes worth the price of admission including a gonzo finale that 15 years on has lost none of its ability to plaster a big old ridiculous grin on my face. I'll break those scenes out in a little while.
A Better Tomorrow was Woo's international breakthrough and it still works as a calling card for the charms of Chow Yun Fat. The man does stoicism and determination as well as any action star and certainly looks convincing with a loaded pistol in each hand, but he is also willing to be as utterly goofy as the plot requires and has no qualms about sacrificing small matters such as "pride" for the sake of the production. I haven't seen many of his roles that showcase the more comic side, however. A question that has occurred to me: Has anyone ever attempted to lasso Yun Fat and Bruce Campbell together for a buddy film? We've had Chow and Stifler (Bulletproof Monk) and Chow and Marky Mark (The Corruptor), but no Chow and Ash.
ABT is enjoyable but average and simply suffers in comparison to its brethren - which is an apt choice of words since both films concern the importance of brotherhood. ABT is a standard tale of good brother Kit (police inspector) and bad brother Ho (counterfeiter) and bad brother's right hand man (Mark, played by Chow). There are betrayals and subterfuges but at the end, the brothers are united - though Ho is letting himself be taken back to prison - and Mark has gone down in a plethora of bullets after coming back to save both of them. The film was a huge commercial success in 1986 and the following year ABTII came out.
It wouldn't do, of course, to have your breakout star not return for the second installment just because his character died. What to do? You could make a prequel (which is what A Better Tomorrow III turned out to be) or .... you could write a scene that goes something like:
"Who's that in the photo with Mark? They look a lot alike."
"That's Ken, Mark's twin brother. He lives in Brooklyn and runs a noodle shop." (Great Scene #1)
All kidding aside, I find it impossible to be cynical about such a ridiculous plot turn when it is done with such a straight face.
Thankfully, Ken is also an ex-gangster so he knows how to be intimidating around shakedown artists. When a couple of goons come around his shop, scare customers away and knock a bowl of Ken's rice to the floor (!) all in the name of getting him to pay protection money, we get to witness Chow run the gamut of emotions and chew the scenery like it was made of salt water taffy. Ken is by turns genial, wounded, bitter and vengeful and the scene ends with him scooping the rice off the floor, and forcing Goon #1 to eat it at gunpoint. We never see the goons again but the point has been made: Ken is a mofo badass, who has a very personal sense of wronged honor (Great Scene #2).
Woo's screenplay (based on a story by Tsui Hark) amps up not only the comic interplay but also the action sequences as well. When cars are shot at and crash, it always ends with a fiery explosion as if the anonymous gangsters had stopped off at the local filling station en route to their ill-advised attempt to off Ken and his ward (Lung, a retired Hong Kong kingpin who has been targeted for a rubout). At one point, the hood actually shoots up off a car in a majestic trajectory towards the heavens and Woo captures it in slow motion. Small but noticeable touches like this are particularly endearing.
Great scene #3 involves Ken and Lung holed up in a tenement building and Ken blasting his way out through scores of hit men, culminating in a face up backwards slide down a flight of stairs, which parallels nicely with Chow's slide down a banister at the start of Hard-Boiled. All the while, Ken is attempting to rouse Lung out of the near catatonia he has sunk into upon learning of the death of his daughter and the film's consensus seems to be that nothing pulls a grieving man out of a mental stupor than being shot at and forced to fire off a few return rounds in self-defense.
If Ken's first scene is the over-the-top-comic highlight, then Kit's last scene is the over-the-top tragic counterpart. Filled with bullet holes for the umpteenth time over the course of the two films, Kit is fading fast and knows he won't make it to the hospital in time to see his newborn daughter. He does have time to pull over from the road and call up his wife and talk to her and help her choose a name before succumbing to the grim reaper right there in the phone booth. Mightn't he have made it the hospital with all the time it took? Perhaps, but then we wouldn't have been allowed Great Scene #4.
ABTII ends with a ten minute hailstorm of shootouts, gun play, samurai sword/battle axe clashes and Mexican standoffs that result in a body count somewhere in the high three digits. It's all edited and played for maximum humor as the blood is excessive but not gruesome and explosions send bad guys flying recklessly every which way like always happened on The A-Team. The sequence begins with a slow-motion shot of three men climbing over a wall that I am fairly certain Spike Jonze structured his concept for the Sabotage video around, and only pauses for air once or twice so Ken can take a few bites off an apple. Perhaps Woo was venting steam here for the troubled production ABTII endured, but even its excesses feel light and giddy (in a manner of speaking).
Fui-On Shing deserves singling out for his menacing (and entirely wordless role) as the nameless chief enforcer for the bad guys. With a thinning hairline and cheap prescription sunglasses, he doesn't look intimidating but he is a fierce opponent and his tete a tete with Ken is the climax's highlight. Keep in mind that the dubbing (whether you watch in Mandarin or Cantonese) is preposterous, the English subtitles are often nonsensical - although at times so inappropriate they achieve a tone of Zen serenity - and the music score alternates between soulful Morricone-esque harmonica licks and knockoff Moroder-ish synth blasts. No matter. A Better Tomorrow II isn't any kind of masterpiece, but it is, for now, a former lover worth reaching out to once again.
In coming weeks: Two sequels from the early ‘90s and a pair from the early ‘60s. Three of the four are part of franchises that are still ongoing.