zombie84 said:
A Better Tomorrow I and II
After having re-watched The Killer for the first time in about 5 years I decided to give these a spin. I owned part II on VHS back in the day so I have more nostalgia for it, and it's also much more entertaining because it's the first real "John Woo Film" and has some pretty great action. The first film I have only seen once or twice and it's really something: it's not much of an action film. It's more of a crime drama, with some pretty good acting and directing, with operatic flourishes of violence that give it a slightly comic-book edge. That's on full display in the much hackier--though in some ways more entertaining, in that over-the-top 80s way--sequel, but the original film is a pretty important landmark in Hong Kong action cinema and it's easy to see why. Much like it's American counterpart, Terminator, it's an action film that doesn't quite think of itself as an action film but an honest drama with lots of shooting and chases.
Very well said and accurately sums up these two films. I can't help but love them both. And the fried rice which is like my family. ;)
Just never mention III. Bad on top of bad layered with bad peppered with bad consumed by bad in the fires of supreme mediocrity.
zombie84 said:
I should also say that I really, really miss the days when John Woo was taken seriously as a filmmaker. Even on Face/Off there was still a reverance for him.
I hated hated hated Face/Off before I knew who Woo was. I loathed MI:2 and wondered, who exactly is this guy who can make all this fantastic stylization in terrible scripts? Then came everything prior, and I realized...oh dear god can someone please get poor Mr. Woo back to Hong Kong immediately??
Bullet in the Head was damn good. Heck, even Once a Thief is extremely enjoyable. All the classic JW films had such rounded characters amidst the action and never once did anything ever leave reality. Ok, maybe a bit in ABT II but even then you still felt it assault your consciousness.
Nobody can ever touch the pinnacle he reached with The Killer and Hard Boiled. If he did Expendables III I might actually even see it. (The thought of Chow amidst the corpses of all the others is beyond appealing.)
The Big Sleep (1945/1946)
A classic Howard Hawks experience that absolutely destroys Chandler's debut novel and somehow still works. Bogie gives one his best performances chock full of nuance and likely the closest we ever get to his off-screen true persona. The Bogie-Bacall romance is central to the film and the primary reason for it being held up for re-shoots and additional sequences. The eventual '46 theatrical release adds in more of the spark between the couple while tightening up a few of the more mundane aspects of being a detective. The '45 pre-release version isn't without merit as some of its sequences are more revealing of the plot which is helpful for 99% of people who claim the movie to be beyond confusing. Then again, I adore Chandler so much that I accept the confusion. ;)
4 balls out of 4. Masterpiece.
Dead Reckoning (1947)-lower grade noir that is weakened by its innumerable plot developments. However, there is a first-rate Bogie performance in a sort of nastier turn on his Phillip Marlowe characterization in The Big Sleep and most of the film takes place in narrated flashback. I like Bogie's films for Columbia. They have a grittier honesty to them.
Bogie doing 1st person noir narration....heaven. "Maybe she was all right and maybe Christmas comes in July."
Whywhywhwhywhywhywhy couldn't there have been at least one pairing with Mitchum???
3 balls out of 4.