Today's Dom has a full page article on Tony Leung Chiu Wai, Hong Kong's foremost velvet-voiced, brooding, wacky and height-challenged actor.
The article, nicked from Melbourne's The Age, tends to focus on Leung's arthouse antics with (oh noes!) Wong Kar Wai, but there are references to John Woo's Hard Boiled and, a little embarrassingly, Tokyo Raiders, to demonstrate that the article's author wasn't interested merely in Leung's Western-arthouse-friendly flicks.
Also, the author, perhaps mercifully, neglected to mention Leung's singing career.
On the HK entertainment front I haven't seen very much lately. We did recently work our way through 'Drive of Life', one of TVB's magnificent 50-part family sagas. This one, featuring aged ham Damian Lau*, is about three brothers (a common motif in Chinese culture) who suffer through the tumultuous period between Hong Kong's handover and "the present day" (ie last year). The brothers start out divided and grumpy at each other, but after several divorces, stockmarket crashes, and evil machinations by designated villains, they join forces and start building cars for the good of Greater China.
The soap commemorates the tenth anniversary of the Hong Kong handover, and is consequently stuffed with themes about harmony and cooperation between HK and the Mainland. Sadly, with all that there's not much room for keeping plot and characterisation in order, and most egregiously of all, gifted and versatile actress Suen Hoon is given a nothing role while ageing hams and horrifically overdubbed mainlanders hold sway. Boo!
On the movie front, the only thing of note looming is Stephen Chow's new flick which is coming out at this Chinese New Year. As for films I've seen lately, we did watch 2006's Seven Swords, by former wacked out genius Tsui Hark. Let me confirm what the title implies, it's basically Seven Samurai, but supposedly based on a novel by a Chinese author. My arse! The film kind of works as a dated piece of matinee nonsense, but aside from Donnie Yen doing a wooden if hyperathletic kung fu master, it's all dumb.
* Who it turns out was the Buddhist monk levitating on giant cymbals in Zu, Warriors from the Magic Mountain, so he is somewhat redeemed. Okay, totally.
Posted by stuart at January 19, 2008 5:31 PM