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Milkyway
Productions is a place where Derek Chiu absolutely fits in.
The producer of Comeuppance Johnnie To is the man responsible
for some of their memorable work, in particular The Mission
and Running Out Of Time. Those were two movies
with genuine effort and cleverness behind them and in 2000
Derek Chiu showed what he could do for Milkyway.
Cop Michael (Sunny Chan from The Enemy) and his team
is dispatched to a bar where a triad boss King have been murdered,
through poisoning. We then get to follow quiet and mild mannered
Sung (Patrick Tam) executing the murder by putting cyanide
in King's beer. Sung doesn't stop here and continues to take
out criminal after criminal, in his own creative way. At the
same time journalist Hak (Jordan Chan from Big Bullet)
starts to write fictionalized stories based on these murders,
stories that then become the inspiration for further acts
by Sung...
It's hard to start deconstructing Derek Chiu's highly enjoyable
story of comeuppance. I'm only two movies into his filmography
and both those have been hard to pinpoint exactly where they
belong in the myriad of genres. Comeuppance is for
all intents and purposes a lighthearted crime thriller but
director Chiu is not one wanting to follow the layed down
structures within a specific genre. Together with Zevita Tong
and Billy Li he's crafted a tale that demands your attention
but is remarkably easy to follow. In it's opening minutes
I was really searching for the one thing that would kickstart
this movie and as soon as we understand what Patrick Tam's
Sung is up to, Derek's film starts to reveal itself (and why
it's called Comeuppance).
During the proceedings, Derek builds a pretty unpredictable
story structure that is only basically recognizable at it's
very deepest core. It revolves around the hunt for a murderer
and in between we get memorable scenes after another. It's
all presented as a quirky narrative where we get to see odd
angles and places (one being a sewer) though the important
storypoints are still clearly conveyed. Unlike Love Au
Zen, that relied so much on the dialogue, Comeuppance
comes off more understandable right away. It's just more odd
than regular viewers may be used to, however Milkyway veterans
are probably comfortable with the format. When Derek breaks
the light mood with a bit of tension (mostly revolving around
Sung's plans being jeopardized) he manages to get the audience
gasping a bit and second being on the edge of their seat slightly.
That he also flip flops between the past and present without
warning and makes the audience still get what's going on is
a testament to Derek's skill.
Also as part of and outside of the narrative he tries to
technically achieve this level of quirkiness, not necessarily
for comedy purposes though. Examples of this include scenes
where Sung is imagining a jug of beer turning red because
of the cyanide. This is a tricky device because we're not
entirely sure whether it positively shows his remorse or his
pleasure in what he's done. That's less of a throwaway moment
but there are others that easily could have taken you out
of the movie but it somehow becomes acceptable for the director
to selfindulge a little. It is ok because Derek never loses
sight of the story that is calmly paced and feature a good
deal of clever written words & situations. In Derek's
Love Au Zen I spotted a repeating stylistic trait of
having events play out in the background and foreground. He
repeats himself in Comeuppance as well, this time
in the form of several panning shots of walls separating rooms.
May not mean anything but it's there to observe anyway.
The trio of actors you can say one thing about. They all
fit their roles. To match the movie, some of their acting
is rather low-key. Sunny Chan's cop role is on paper clichélike
but certainly doesn't feel like it in the writing and performance.
Jordan Chan, looking very different after a few simple costume
choices, is more the comedy element of the film. It's the
distinct look that makes this performance cool to watch, never
seen Jordan being so dorky. Patrick Tam (Hong Kong Film Award
winner for his role in Beast Cops) gets to challenge
himself in his role as our good/bad guy (depending on how
you see it). It's his character that will create the potential
debate about the movie but regardless of that, he does the
writing very much justice. Out of the four movies I've seen
with Patrick in them, I had the hardest recognizing him in
this one. He looks pretty different than in Beast Cops.
Derek Chiu's Comeuppance is the work of a smart director
flanked by smart writers. It's a different but very accessible
and lighthearted crime story.
The DVD:
Strong 1.85:1 transfer by Mei Ah. It's a little
soft but print damage is kept to a bare minimum.
The Cantonese Dolby Digital 5.1 track is mostly
active in the front speakers, mainly through music since it
otherwise has dialogue basically. That is competently mixed
with the music to create a good audio experience. A 2.0 Cantonese
option as well as the same choices for the Mandarin dub.
Excellent English subtitles! Not one spelling
error and it's a pleasure getting, for once, accurate subtitles
on a Hong Kong dvd. Traditional and simplified Chinese subtitles
are also included.
The Data Bank has the usual cast & crew
listing and a plot synopsis. No trailers of any movie is on
the disc. Mei Ah has been disturbingly bad at providing a
trailer for the main feature in the past also.
reviewed by Kenneth
Brorsson
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