Accident (Cantonese) New Action Movie
Cast And Crew
Genre: Action
General Release Date: 24 Sep 2009
Running Time:
Distributor: Golden Screen Cinemas
Cast: Louis Koo, Michelle Ye, Richie Ren
Director: Soi Cheang
Producer : Johnnie To Kei Fung
Action Director : Jack Wong Wai Leung
Reviews
A self-styled "accident choreographer," the Brain is a professional hitman who kills his victims by trapping them in well crafted "accidents" that look like unfortunate mishaps but are in fact perfectly staged acts of crime. After one mission accidentally goes wrong, causing the life of one of his men, the Brain is convinced that this accident has been choreographed: someone is out there plotting to terminate him and his team. He becomes increasingly paranoid, walking on the thin line between reality and delusion. When he is accosted by a mysterious insurance agent Fong who happened to be on the scene of the "accident" as well, the Brain becomes obsessed that this man must be the mastermind behind a conspiracy to take him out. To regain his sanity and to safe his life, he must strive to kill Fong before he makes his next move.
This comment may contain spoilers ***
The world premiere of Written By was the opening night film of the New York Asian Film Festival. I really wanted to go see it but I just couldn't swing it on either of the first two play dates with the director present. I was kind of happy when I read a less then positive review for the film but changed my mind and decided to go to the third screening when I read some positive comments and saw the trailer. I should have listened to the first review.
The plot of the film has a family trying to get over the death of the father and husband after a terrible car accident that left the daughter blind. Ten years on and the past is still not put to rest when the daughter, Melody, decides to write a novel where the father survived the accident but was blinded, and where his family all died. This begins to bring the family around and soon the father of the story is writing a novel of his own where he died and the family lived. The story spins out from there as we follow the story in various levels. There is a great deal of whimsy at times since in the story world there are ghosts and an after life.
I'm hard pressed to say something about the film, but I think the easiest thing to say is that the film is a mess. Director Wai Ka-fai has made a multi tiered film that becomes needlessly complicated.For much of the film its not really clear as to which incarnation of the story we are watching. It becomes clear at the end, but until then things jump from story to story to story for a reason that really eluded me. The problem with the film is not really the jumping from thing to thing thats the problem its just that things get so knotted that by the end its not really clear as to what the point of it all really is. The point of it ultimately seems to be that we all need something, in this case writing,or a belief in an after life, as a bridge to acceptance and getting by in life. I don't know if all of what proceeded the ending is what the ending seems to mean, which kind of comes across as a WTF moment where you're left going "thats it?".(I know that makes little sense but you'd understand if you saw the film- then again maybe not since I'm not sure what I saw)
I know I wasn't the only one who was bewildered by the film since I noticed what appeared to be several walk outs and a general feeling of what did we just see in the audience once the credits began to roll. (One guy was snoring in his seat across the aisle from me.). A discussion of the film by three or four of us in the lobby after the film concluded it was probably the directors weakest film, which I think was a polite way of saying we didn't have a clue about the film we had just seen. We all said that the most interesting thing was the Queen of the Underworld character who brings people into their next lives via a trolley car. I, like everyone else I talked to wants to see if there is really such a figure.
The film itself is for the most part very well made. Except for some of the worst, and I do mean worst, people acting blind in a film the performances are all excellent(but the blind behavior is embarrassing and laughably bad- I can't stress this enough.)
What really disappoints me about the film is that there are more than a handful of times when the film hits its stride, most of them having to do with the whimsical or fantastical elements of the story. There is also a moment later in the film when two of the characters break down emotionally that sends the film to the level where the film should have been operating all along. Regrettably the moments are only that, several minute stretches where the film seems to pull it all together.
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