Ip Man: The Final Fight by Herman Yau

Ip Man: The Final Fight by Herman Yau

Ip Man: The Final Fight chronicles the later life of Wing Chun Grandmaster Ip Man.

The most interesting aspect between Herman Yau-Anthony Wong collaborations is that their partnership had its roots in Hong Kong Category III horror. Ebola Syndrome is still one of the most disgusting movies I have ever seen and been guiltily entertained by. Forget Outbreak or Contagion, Ebola Syndrome was a far more disturbing movie about a viral outbreak. Forget Hannibal Lecter, Anthony Wong truly played a disturbing sociopath in that movie. The point is: they’re not afraid to delve into the gritty, the ugly and the disgusting.

Set against the big commercial movie cog machine and the Ip Man franchise, the majority of Yau-Wong penchant for grittiness is diluted and only some of it remains in Ip Man: The Final Fight. It is that essence of the grittier and the uglier sides of Ip Man that makes out for the more interesting parts in Ip Man: The Final Fight, but it’s also the film’s major weakness because it never treads far enough from familiar territory.

What the film ends up being more like tonally is a combination of the Wilson Yip-Donnie Yen Ip Man films and Bruce Lee My Brother, where it is loosely glossing over the details of the grandmaster’s life and dramatically punching up the action so it can allow for fight scenes, but also providing a retro-gaze of Hong Kong accompanied with a celebrity guest-list cameos.

For example, it’s been said that Ip Man sported an opium habit. The concept is telegraphed but never truly explored. Another example is Hong Kong actor Liu Kai Chi gives a cameo as Ip Man’s friend who is suffering from poverty. They start what might be a potentially interesting storyline but it never finishes itself. Much of the film is like that.

There are about several subplots running through the story and they all end up as separate vignettes that do not rise above the sum of it’s parts. For a biopic drama, that’s a problem because it does not provide an unified narrative goal. This is not an editing issue. The story was based on Ip Chun’s stories of his father and it is as if seemed like the screenwriter noted them down as told and the director literally shot them that way. So I attribute this issue to lazy writing. The retroactive voice-over device ends up killing a lot of the drama. The scene will be happening and the voice-over will cut in summing up the rest of the scene in past tense. It keeps glossing over by stating what happened instead of letting the audience experience what’s happening in the now.

Anthony Wong is very natural as Ip Man. He looks most like the real-life version of Ip Man and actually adopts a Foshan accent. He breathes many colors into the role and the scenes with Ip Man and his students is the heart of the film. Anthony Wong is pretty much the best thing about this movie and his performance alone is the price of admission.

Eric Tsang has a great supporting role as a Crane style master who befriends Ip Man. There is a self-referential joke where Tsang says being a ‘clan master’ (獎門人) is difficult, a reference to his famous television gameshow, that was self-serving and unnecessary. Tsang and Wong share an awesome fight together. Not a lot of people remember that Eric Tsang started out as a stuntman; the fight looks very authentic. They were really smashing their forearms together. Eric Tsang is a badass.

Something I noticed about the cinematography was there were way too many crane shots in this film. There’s a scene that ends on a connective moment between two characters and then it cuts to a crane shot backing away presenting a view of the entire rooftop set. I have a theory about this. In Hong Kong, booking a crane from a production house is a planned expense and usually you would require more crew members or more time to set up a crane shot. Production houses in the Mainland will give crews an entire film equipment package in their deals, which includes cranes and jibs. With the cheap labor and higher amount of crew members, a crane shot can be set up much faster in the Mainland. As a recent occurrence, a lot of Chinese productions lead by Hong Kong directors have recently been very crane shot-heavy. Hong Kong directors, this needs to stop. You have to remember to pull back every once and a while.

Just as a small footnote, I really hated the Bruce Lee cameo. Playing Bruce Lee in a film is by no means an easy feat but the actor they chose was abysmally awful. He made Bruce Lee look like a rich asshole sellout. It was not fun, nor did it work as a pop culture reference.

Overall, I enjoyed this film, but I do not think it works completely as a standalone piece. It seems to fit as the final piece to this whole line of Ip Man films. In a way, I can’t help it because they’ve made so many movies about Ip Man in such a short time.

With every film, I see a little more of who this man was, what his legacy was and it had me thinking about even what being a good teacher means. I still think The Grandmaster (my review here) is the best Ip Man film. They really don’t need to make any more Ip Man movies. And if they do (and I think they are because I saw a poster for an Ip Man 3 with Donnie Yen), please do the story with Bruce Lee and get him right.

Next Round of Reviews! Upcoming thoughts about Stephen Chow’s Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons

My next round of reviews:

• The Dark Knight Rises by Christopher Nolan
• Rust and Bone by Jacques Audiard

Who takes 7 months to review a Batman movie? I do! It’s been a long struggle reviewing The Dark Knight Rises and Rust and Bone, realizing that the more you like something, the harder it is to articulate why it was personal to you. It was a repetitive cycle of opening up the post and geting lost in my own scrambled feelings that needed to be unknotted and structured for a reader. I encountered a similar problem with The Grandmaster review but thank goodness that only took me a week. My goal is to finish these two reviews by Chinese New Year.

• The Dark Knight Returns Part 1 + 2 by Jay Oliva
• Moonrise Kingdom by Wes Anderson
• Silver Linings Playbook by David O’Russell

Three titles that will likely be reviewed faster than the above two films.

• Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons by Stephen Chow

Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons by Stephen Chow

As of right now, I haven’t seen the new Stephen Chow film yet. Even though my interest in the film is halved by the fact that Stephen Chow is not acting in it. It’s been pretty funny seeing the trailers playing in Hong Kong theaters, as it shows a lot of behind-the-scenes footage of Stephen Chow directing his actors. Which begs me to question, if they are flat out marketing the movie with footage of Stephen Chow acting out the scenes for his actors, what’s the point in seeing a Stephen Chow movie without Stephen Chow in it? I intend on finding the answer.

I have never been someone that feels my childhood is at stake when something I like is being rewritten upon, but it feels like that this time. Stephen Chow has given me some all-time highs throughout my childhood. It feels brutal. On one hand, its always fascinating to see how an artist evolves, for better or for worse. Maybe I have to accept its the end of an era. That there won’t be a Stephen Chow film with him acting in it ever again and I’m going to have to come to terms with that. Heck, I took it hard when I realized he probably wasn’t going to work with Ng Man Tat anymore.

So I’m both looking forward and dreading it at the same time.

Womb by Benedek Fliegauf

Womb (film)

A woman’s consuming love forces her to bear the clone of her dead beloved. From his infancy to manhood, she faces the unavoidable complexities of her controversial decision.

There is a dark intensity to Eva Green’s face. I always thought this since Casino Royale, and it’s well utilized in the film. Rebecca is a character who simply cannot let go of her grief and move forward with her life. In some other film, there would be a new man who’s romantically available for her (she’s Eva Green after all) but the film does not even go there. She embodies a unrelenting stagnant pain under a quiet demeanor, and trying to move forward by progressing backwards. The love story takes a while to set up but is truly touching, and feel Rebecca’s loss when Tommy is taken away from her. Oddly that’s two science-fiction films she’s done this year that were pretty good.

Set in a unspecified barren location and minimally populated setting, Womb strongly operates in a fairy tale-like setting. Nature acts as a character in the film. There are numerous wide shots of the ocean with the actors as little specks off looking off into the ocean. The scenery evoked a looming feeling of nature, possibly to imply that nature is bigger than all of us.  Eventually it made me think about how man prehistorically came from the sea.

It’s impressive how Womb immerses the audience into its world. The outside world beyond the town is never shown. It’s a world where cloning exists but we never cut away to some cloning protest in a religious country elsewhere or spend too much time watching a news anchor give Basil Exposition on TV. The workings of the world are shown through scenes within the town where parents discuss whether they should allow their kids to play with clone kids (“copies”, a sort of slur for clone). That’s something really artful about Womb. It slowly gets creepier and creepier as the story progresses, especially when Matt Smith shows up again as the new adult Tommy. There is a scene where the new young Tommy (played by Tristan Christopher) and Rebecca playfully wrestle, Tommy pins down Rebecca and Rebecca just eyes him lovingly in a romantic way. You dread the idea of incest. I found myself really afraid for the new Tommy as the slow-burn tension arises to him finding out the truth. After all, what is the meaning of his existence? He’s her son but treated like her love underneath.

Womb proposes some challenging questions about cloning, but it does not run too far with it. It stays with its story and characters and moves towards its inevitable conclusion. It doesn’t tap out and give up on its own convictions. It does not end up being a piece of anti-cloning “issue-tainment”  and it remains a tale about someone not being able to let go of a loved one.

Tyrannosaur by Paddy Considine

Tyrannosaur by Paddy Considine

Before I write out my thoughts, I must admit that I am only familiar with the general popular mainstream British cinema. I know the stars, uprising actors and some independent directors of who I have only seen bits of their filmography (i.e. Thus far I have only seen one Ken Loach film). I am not yet immersed enough yet to know about the British character actors. The two major players from Tyrannosaur, director/actor Paddy Considine and actress Olivia Colman, both of whom I only recognize from Hot Fuzz.

Tyrannosaur begins with Joseph (played by Peter Mullan), an unemployed widower who’s on the verge of self-destruction, decides to change his life after accidentally killing his own dog in a fit of rage (one of the most engaging inciting incidents I have experienced in a long time). Joseph befriends the local charity shop worker Hannah (played by Olivia Colman), a respectable wholesome and kindly Christian woman who takes pity on him. They slowly become friends. However, Hannah has a dark secret of her own at home – James, her physically abusive husband . This threatens to plunge Joseph back into his former life.

One of the joys of watching a movie is seeing the story unfold. Each scene engages you with a bit more information and you search and piece things together in the next scene, so on and so forth. Tyrannosaur sucks you right in from the beginning in its opening sequence (my reaction: “He kicked a dog dead! Who is this guy?”) and keeps you asking questions about its characters. It doesn’t even end with Joseph as the Hannah’s character is introduced. We begin to explore her story and ask questions about her. I found myself thrilled to know the answers.

Director Paddy Considine understands that the lurking threat of violence is much scarier than merely presenting violence occurring and manages to create some tense dialogue set pieces, particularly the scenes between Eddie Marsan and Olivia Colman. He knows the exact amount to show and when to get out of the scene and it incorporates it with film language. i.e. A character is about to be punched and we cut to another character hitting a brickwall with a sledgehammer in another scene. We are left to ponder about the fate of the first character as the brickwall is being pounded away.

Having seen Olivia Colman only in Hot Fuzz as a goofy policewoman, she really blew me away as Hannah. It’s one of the most engaging performances I’ve seen this year. One noteworthy scene where James, Hannah’s abusive husband, pleads for forgiveness, breaks down and cries at her leg for physically abusing her. Hannah gently pats his back in a loving gesture but her face reads entirely different. She acknowledges that this is only the beginning of a never-ending abusive cycle. Olivia Colman’s face plays 6-7 emotions; from love, worry, fear, pity and dread all at once. It is a very layered performance that hits a lot of different emotions and you won’t understand the subtlety of her performance until the end of the movie.

That’s the thing, Tyrannosaur struck me hard emotionally. So much that it mentally delayed me from acknowledging what was really going on. The film ended and I was left thinking about the characters: connecting their backstories, the events of the film and what would probably happen to them after the story. It was raw and it was real. The two central characters are very engaging and the three leads turn in a very good performances in a well-crafted story. I like to see more films from Paddy Considine in the future.

Woody Allen: A Documentary by Robert B. Weide

Woody Allen: A Documentary by Robert B. Weide

If you ever owned a DVD of a Woody Allen movie, you will know that there are never any special features. There is probably no budget for a behind-the-scenes documentary crew following him around on his film shoots, heck, Woody Allen has said he does not even like the concept of special features. He even burns the deleted scenes after the film is completed.

Up till now, the only way to truly learn about Woody Allen’s process was through books. I own Conversations with Woody Allen by Eric Lax (who’s in the film as his biographer) and Woody Allen on Woody Allen: In Conversation with Stig Bjorkman, which both are all fine reads and great insights into Allen’s creative process. I knew most of his stories: his workman-like approach, his approach to casting, , .

The structure of the documentary is tailor-made to its subject and it really fits. It chronicles Allen’s life from his career transitions beginning from a young joke writer to stand-up comedian to a filmmaker. Much of Allen’s frequent collaborators and family are interviewed, including his sister, actors, co-writers, casting director and producers. Each film that he’s made is covered more or less but much more emphasis is placed on his creative phases: his early funny films, the transition with Annie Hall and the Diane Keaton era, the Mia Farrow era, Match Point and now the current European city phase. The behind-the-scenes section on the set of You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger where you see Allen rehearsing a scene with Naomi Watts and Josh Brolin in an argument scene was a real treat. Also, my top five favorite Woody films are all covered (Crimes and Misdemeanors, Stardust Memories, Everybody Says I Love You, Deconstructing Harry and Midnight in Paris), so I am a happy camper.

I had a dumb dream once where I met Wong Kar Wai and he took off his infamous sunglasses, looked me straight into the eye and spoke to me. I woke up realizing I saw Wong Kar Wai’s eyes in person and felt like I knew something deeper about him because I was in his presence.

That’s how this documentary made me feel. Despite that my previous knowledge, I didn’t know anything about Woody Allen in terms of a human being. The documentary offers that close proximity as we basically hang out with Woody Allen for 3 hours. We take a trip with Allen around New York visiting various locations like his cutting room, his old elementary school (which he hates), the jazz club (where he plays the clarinet every Monday) and the local cinema he used to frequent (inspired the idea for Purple Rose of Cairo) and we see the space of his own world and can visualize where the genesis of his ideas come from. One major highlight is when we’re in Allen’s actual home where he shows you his typewriter and takes out his notes for story ideas and reads out a few of them.

It’s an absorbing experience as we gain great insight into Allen as a human being and an artist. It totally makes up for the lack of special features for every Woody Allen DVD. A highly recommended experience for fellow Woody Allen fans.

Martha Marcy May Marlene by Sean Durkin

Martha Marcy May Marlene by Sean Durkin

Before I review this movie, I have to talk about exposition in screenwriting. If you already know what exposition is, please skip ahead.

Exposition is the facts that you need to know to follow and understand a story. As film is a visual medium, the general rule in giving exposition is that you should always “show, don’t tell”.  i.e. You should never have a character say he is deadly killing machine, instead you show him taking out 10 people at the same time in a scene.  The best exposition is done as invisible as possible. The viewer should not be aware of it. At the worst of times, it disconnects the viewer because all of sudden they are shown the nuts and bolts of the story. It is simply not engaging or entertaining.

As a screenwriter, I wrestle with the idea of exposition. First of all, you have to get certain information across for the story to work. So you have to do it. Second of all, you have to make exposition interesting. What constitutes as interesting? Where is that line? My personal favorite example is in Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery where they have a character named Basil Exposition whose sole purpose is to give exposition. So he’s giving you the exposition but because of the “wink wink” postmodern factor it is interesting again. So where is that line between interesting and uninteresting exposition? In Christopher Nolan’s Inception, often characters are explaining what’s going onto each other. Can we justify that it was interesting because Leonardo DiCaprio’s character was teaching Ellen Page’s (whose character is representing the audience) how the dream world works? Was there another way to show the audience what’s going on without the dialogue?

Martha Marcy May Marlene is a drama pasted on top of a horror movie skeleton. It is about a young woman named Martha (played by Elizabeth Olsen), who has just escaped an abusive cult in the Catskill mountains to stay with her older sister  Lucy (played by Sarah Paulson) and her husband Ted (played by Hugh Dancy). As she recovers, Martha deals with delusions and paranoia from her dark past.

Elizabeth Olson is an engaging actress and carries the film competently, she plays a naive innocence against massive trauma and we experience the inner turmoil she is hiding from everybody. What can I say? I like underplaying performances. John Hawkes is great as the leader of the cult. It’s a very subtle performance that is quite creepy. I have noticed him in several movies (Michael Mann’s Miami Vice where he played an informant) and even a Canadian short film where in the opening sequence he sets his arm on fire (I cannot remember the name of it). He’s a fine screen presence. I hate that there is not enough of just normal dudes on film. Hawkes will probably have to work his way up through playing disheveled creeps or crazy people to get a starring role like Michael Shannon in Take Shelter. I wish him all the best.

So how is it horrific? It is how Martha acts and what she says that suggests remnants of an odd warped view of the world (from the influence of being in the cult) that contrasts with societal norms represented by Lucy and Ted. Martha is taciturn about her past, she never directly tells Lucy what has happened (No exposition! Hurrah!). However the audience knows as we switch between the past and the present, the story shows pieces of what happened and leaves plenty of space for us to imagine the in-between. The horror forms out of everything between the cracks.

Non-linear storytelling is the trend this year with the likes of The Iron Lady, J. Edgar, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and We Need to Talk About Kevin. Martha Marcy May Marlene contains the best justification of the non-linear storytelling device this year so far.

It’s well-written, disciplined piece of drama that knows the subtlety of it’s own punches. And you know what? Basil Exposition is nowhere to be seen and I was rather marveled by that accomplishment.