city on fire
review
Toronto Globe and Mail
Jackie Chan, do your thing! Two college professors offer a Marxist
analysis of Hong Kong cinema.
PATRICIA SEAMAN
Saturday, September 4, 1999
CITY ON FIRE: Hong Kong Cinema
By Lisa Odham Stokes
and Michael Hoover
Verso, 372 pages
Kill or be killed. That's what North American audiences think of Hong
Kong cinema thanks to a guns-to-the-head scene in Quentin Tarantino's
Reservoir Dogs, a scene well known for being a direct theft from John
Woo's Hard Boiled. If you are watching City Hunter, starring Chinese
Opera Academy-trained, martial-arts wizard and comedic hunk Jackie Chan,
you are, however, more likely to laugh yourself to death. Hollywood may
have finally looked up from its navel and welcomed megastars John Woo,
Chow Yun-fat, Jackie Chan, Michelle Yeoh and Jet Li into the fold, but
Hong Kong cinema is, and will remain, a whole other world.
City on Fire is named after Ringo Lam's explosive crime film, which
spills its guts on the teeming, neon streets of HK. "Exciting and
riveting . . . the best book on Hong Kong cinema," John Woo says on
the jacket. Although nothing as brilliant as watching the film, the book
is a really great HK cinema primer. However, like the hitman in Woo's
The Killer, its strengths are also its weaknesses.
The scholarship is right on, with its thorough commentary on the
historical rise of HK cinema in the context of the social-political
development of the colony. The survey of films, filmmakers, cast and
crew is as detailed as the many story descriptions provided by U.S.
college professors Lisa Odham Stokes (humanities) and Michael Hoover
(political science). It is an excellent "everything you ever wanted
to know about . . ." The problem is the Marxist framework that the
authors have used to structure the book. The magical, maniacal,
murderous mayhem of HK cinema gets crammed into a morality tale about
the evils of capitalism. Maybe capitalism is the dragon lurking behind
the destroyed lives of the gangsters, cops, victims and heroes, but holy
entrails, Kato, it takes all the fun out of the flying people.
If they had to go that route, I would have preferred the authors to be
more democratic in their use of theory. The work would have benefited
from a little feminist analysis, never mind some socio-cultural
analysis. HK cinema is riveting because of its energy, excess,
weirdness, kooky love, bizarre stories and tragic lost causes. John Woo
has nothing on Stokes and Hoover when it comes to draining all the blood
out of a thing.
If you can get past the lecturing, City on Fire gives a fantastic survey
of Hong Kong cinema genres, including, of course, Woo's reinvented
gangster movies, a combination of Hollywood western and Chinese
swordplay in a world of film noir. But then, Woo is just one bullet in
10,000. Wuxia pian, martial chivalry films, are costume dramas that use
wire-work to create those fantastic flying people. There are also the
ever-popular ghost stories; and the newly popular erotic ghost stories,
which are an improbable mix of soft porn, horror, comedy and spirits in
unlikely morality tales. Tsui Hark's We're Going to Eat You is described
as "a kung fu horror-comedy about cannibalism."
Stokes and Hoover have taken on the gargantuan task of making sense out
of the disparate stuff of HK cinema and have discharged their duty well.
"Aspects of sci-fi, horror, action, suspense, melodrama and special
effects combine to create this cinematic chow mein," they write. It
can't be easy to categorize an action/musical/martial arts/crime spoof
that takes place on a ship, a la City Hunter. Or villains who shout,
"You can masturbate in hell!" and, "I need a canned
woman!"
Now, flying over to the '60s Mistress of Martial Arts (Emma Peel)
memorial page, City on Fire does mention women's contribution to HK
cinema, but strangely neglects to note that The Reincarnation of the
Golden Lotus, by Clara Law, is one of the best movies of all time. Law
also gave us the best ever filmed hetero-sex scene, with two bald-headed
monks; and Farewell China, the most powerful movie I've ever seen about
immigration. Speaking of chicks, Michelle Yeoh is certainly the greatest
female action star. The thrill of watching her ride a motorcycle onto
the top of a moving train in Supercop screams "replay,
replay." Not to mention her astonishing ability to kick the gongs
out of gangs of men.
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