Enter the Dragon
Crouching Tiger
Hidden Dragon
Chinese New Year,
Box Hill, Feb 2000
Young & Dangerous 3
Made in Hong Kong
Running Out of Time
Dreamtrips
Nang Nak
Needing You
Faye Wong
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Exit the Dragon... Enter the Snake!
The Dragon was a big year for me, with a trip to Hong Kong at
last, and all manner of movies streaming before my happy eyeballs.
My eyes were finally opened to the Pan Asian Vector - my initial
disappointment at the lack of HK flix at Melbourne Film Festival was
blown away by awesome fare from Japan, Korea and Thailand. Another
highlight was meeting many fine 'virtual' people this year (aka
Internet buddies) - a big shout out to Alison, Bey, Brent, Chris,
CY, David, Juanita, Jude, Kari, Lucille, Miles, Nicole, Paul, Ryan,
Stefan, Stephen, Tim and plenty of others who made my year rock. I
loves youse all. Now that the year is closing, it brings with it the
happy tang of the runaway success of Crouching Tiger Hidden
Dragon - looks like the mainstream is finally waking up to what
we've known for years. What took 'em so long?
I'm a Snake myself (that means by dint of zodiacal mathematics
that your Heroic editor is turning one of the following ages this
year: 12, 24, 36, 48, 60 or 72. Answers on a postcard). If you want
to know what your Chinese symbol is, check
here. Once you've got that, you can check
here for your astrological predictions for 2001.
(Disclaimer: Heroic Cinema website and its associates are not
responsible for any bad decisions concerning business, travel or
romance in the year 2001 made as a result of reading bogus Internet
horoscopes.)
So, what else rocked in the Year of the Dragon? Here's a stream
of consciousness rundown, forgive any errors:
SBS had a bumper year, with
premieres of Stephen Chow's Forbidden City Cop and From
Beijing With Love, Tsui Hark's The Blade, Fruit
Chan's Made in Hong Kong, Stanley Kwan's Hold
You Tight, the first three of Andrew Lau's Young &
Dangerous movies, and more. World
Movies was quiet by comparison, with a few Michael Hui
comedies (Front Page and Magic Touch), some art films
(Kitchen and He and She), and not much more new. The JEDI
satellite brought an unprecedented 8 channels of Chinese
Entertainment to Australia.
Madman Entertainment
kicked goals all year, starting out strong with the world's first
video release of Andrew Lau's A Man Called Hero, and
kicking on through Teddy Chan's Downtown Torpedoes, Benny
Chan's Big Bullet, Clarence Ford's Cheap
Killers, Jingle Ma's Hot War, Andrew Lau's The
Duel, Wong Jing's The Conman and Johnnie To's
mighty Running Out of Time. Chinatown
Video finished up the Chow Yun Fat collection with Prison
on Fire 2, Tiger on Beat and All About Ah Long, as
well as chestnuts such as Chinese Ghost Story 3 and new
offerings like Gordon Chan's Armageddon and Beast
Cops.
There were good films to be seen at the Melbourne, Sydney and
Brisbane Film Festivals - not much HK, but plenty of good Asian
fare, such as Nowhere to Hide (Korea), Nang Nak (Thailand)
and Audition (Japan). The best selection was to be found at
the inaugural Sydney Asia Pacific Film Festival, which promises to
be bigger and better in August 2001 (and hopefully might tour!). The
Hong Kong Film Festival did not happen, alas, but the Eastern
Connection II festival covered a few cities and offered interesting
indie Asian cinema, including special guest Kal Ng screening
his Dreamtrips. The Sydney Japanese Animation festival had a
great program, including the long awaited Australian premiere of the
sublime Princess Mononoke. Chris Doyle appeared at a
few film festivals, and at the Mercury in Adelaide.
Perhaps the most significant development was the Silk Screen
series of films, which took arthouse back from the French, with
regular mainstream screenings of new Chinese and Japanese films -
when you consider that the only two Asian films got a wide release
in 1999, things are definitely improving, with five films shown
across Australia this year. Not so good perhaps for the actual
Chinese Cinemas in 2000 - the Australia Cinema in Sydney closed in
July and does not look set to reopen (although films have been shown
at Reading Market City, it ain't a double bill, and it ain't the
same). The Harbour Cinema around the corner has not bought a new
film since 1998 it seems. Only Melbourne's Chinatown Cinema seems to
be still firing, boosted by screenings of Indian films. New HK films
were shown regularly in mainstream cinemas in all capitals bar
Brisbane, Darwin and Hobart. If you missed them, you didn't try hard
enough.
So what was were my Top Ten 2000 films? Dammit, there are still a
bunch I need to watch, but so far Johnnie To's Needing You is
my favourite for the year - such floss! such fun! - and the other
nine are Derek Chiu's Comeuppance (neat and unexpected
poisoner plot), Jingle Ma's Tokyo Raiders (zingy
action), Gordon Chan's Okinawa Rendezvous (a bunch of
friends on summer holiday make a film about a bunch of friends on
summer holiday), Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (not
strictly a HK film, but bite me, it rules), Andrew Lau's The
Duel (less angst and more fun in the CGI swordsman style), Johnnie
To & Wai Fa Fai's Help! (what were those boys
on?), Wong Kar Wai's In the Mood For Love (a poem in
light, with cello), To Where He Belongs (a fine triad piece)
and Those Were the Days (Jordan Chan is still young
and dangerous). But I reserve final call until I've worked my way
through the rest of the recommends, such as Juliet in Love, A
War Named Desire, Double Tap and many many more...
Outside of Hong Kong, I adored The Road Home (China), Nang
Nak (Thailand), Ring and Ring 2 (Japan), Princess
Mononoke (Japan), Nowhere to Hide (Korea) and Shiri (Korea).
Cinema highlight for the year was finally catching a Hong Kong film
in Hong Kong - the 1:40am screening of Those Were the Days in
Kowloon, with a packed house of Triad wannabe kidz.
Overall Hong Kong entertainment highlight though without doubt
was the Faye Wong concert. Such sonic rapture, such glowstick
magic. My expectations were high, but I couldn't conceive how divine
her voice is live, nor how exciting the songs, nor the depth to
which her fans love her. It was a wonderful night.
The site kicked on, with many more visitors: thanks. I couldn't
have done it without the help of Andrea, Andrew, CY, David, Ian,
Jamie, Jonathon, Paul, Penny, Pol, Trish, and many others: double
thanks.
So that was the Dragon. Let's see what the Snake has for us!
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