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Award
at the Hong Kong Film Critics Society Awards 2003:
Film Of Merit
The promising Soi Cheang began his directing career experimenting
with the Digital Video Format in dramas like Our Last Day
and The House Of No Man. Previously he had worked
closely with another young talent, Wilson Yip, as an assistant
director on Juliet In Love and Teaching Sucks! (the
two have since logged cameos for each other in their directed
movies) He hasn't worked in as many genres as Yip but Cheang
began expanding his range by turning to horror in 2001 with
Horror Hotline...Big Head Monster. With a very straight
and serious approach, he managed to bring out much creepiness
despite the intentionally cheesy premise but it wasn't fully
successful due to it's ending. Still, to quote Bey Logan,
Soi Cheang has a very good eye and with New Blood he
continues to hone his craft in horror, this time with a less
hokey plot.
A young couple attempt suicide together but thanks to the
blood donation by Lok (Bernard Chow), Eric (Cyrus Chow) and
Joy (Niki Chow), the boy survives while the girl eventually
dies after being in a coma. Soon thereafter, the three donators
are being haunted by the spirit of the dead girl...
Leave it to horror to make not one lick of sense! Actually,
it applies to many genres, if not all, but you have a lot
more freedom when plotting out horror, in particular when
dealing with the supernatural. There's always a danger then
to go way too overboard with the unwritten movie laws but
thankfully Soi Cheang's goal with New Blood is to keep
things as accessible as possible. While not up to the standards
of the nightmarish The Eye, New Blood represents
the better part of Hong Kong's flawed horror output lately.
The screenplay by Soi Cheang and Szeto Kam Yuen is not what
carries this movie as a whole. It doesn't fill the plot with
characters but doesn't go for character depth either. The
filmmakers are not aiming at making a horror effort with originality
behind every corner. Here, Soi and his co-writer want to make
the best of the familiar and that my friends is a great big
challenge in itself today. The plot does make sense and the
main element, the love between the suicidal couple is expanded
upon enough so Soi and Szeto lay the ground nicely. If anything,
I mentioned that there's not much character depth, it is hurt
a little by the fact that you have an acting trio of not yet
established actors. That can work to your advantage and provide
huge disadvantages as well. Name actors, even the best ones,
can't sometimes avoid the star factor they project and that
way overshadowing the character. An unknown face can make
a character more believable and real if there's effort in
there. In New Blood's case, I'm sure it was a conscious
choice to cast these faces, only Niki Chow puts in a performance
of noteworthy status. Bernard Chow and Cyrus Chow are decent
but are also trying too hard in certain scenes. Now, all this
isn't an annoyance throughout because it's Soi Cheang's horror
vision that carries this movie, at times really well.
Continuing on from his style in Horror Hotline...Big Head
Monster, Soi's eye for horror takes part of a page out
of Hideo Nakata's book and injects the right touches the right
way. Soi is a stylish filmmaker, not necessarily one that
speeds up a film for style but one that has proven to be effective
when he is tossing the camera around in otherworldly angles.
One thing he does know is that the best horror comes out of
stillness and he continues to live by that motto in New
Blood. His horror imagery isn't exactly outstanding but
he's out to give his best without overdoing it. The moody
opening, featuring the couple committing their act of love
via slitting of the wrists has intercutting very familiar
to the trained movie eye and the creepiness seems to be consciously
toned down compared to Horror Hotline. It makes sense,
that film's premise needed to be more amped, straight horror
to win audiences over while New Blood has less of a
tricky road to it's horror. At the beginning, Soi logs probably
the best scare without any noise but the majority of the fairly
creepy atmosphere, unease etc. comes out of solid, again,
familiar, sound design, editing and cinematography. The quick-cuts
to reveal the spirits true form work best in that form but
disappointingly not as much when we get calmer, revealing
shots of her. The shrill sound design helps immensely and
is particular effective in a scene set at a construction site.
As the movie progresses, director Soi maintains a firm grip
on the audience without reaching greatness. It's an involving
tale or involving enough that features a few well-timed jumps
via editing and the atmosphere The cinematography leads us
into some criticisms of the film. As was the case of Horror
Hotline, the desolated environment is made up of primarily
green, blue and blacks (plus a bit of red seeing as we're
dealing with a blood theme). It does not intrude on the viewing
but doesn't feel needed either. Not that I have the solution
but there has only been few cases where strong colours actually
add. I think you can achieve great things with a minimalistic
stylized colour palette. Also, most noticeable in the beginning,
the choosen colour scheme and a few locations really seem
out of touch with reality and only fitting for a horror movie.
Especially the construction site is not something, realistically
even an established architect (Cyrus Chow's character's profession)
would voluntarily set his foot in. However, strong points
ARE the film's desolated settings. They only show the outside
world when needed and purely concentrates on the individuals
that are the focus of the film. Long, deep shots of hallways
and different locations are an effective mood setter, even
in its simplicity.
Soi Cheang has taken steps forward since Horror Hotline...Big
Head Monster and amongst all the bad entries in this genre
out of Hong Kong, he and The Pang Brothers have produced the
best work. They have the better eyes for it. Next, Soi Cheang
is directing The Twins...
The DVD:
A new film but not part of Mei Ah's anamorphically
enhanced discs. The 1.85.1 transfer looks very fine though.
Minimal wear and the colours are neatly showcased in this
presentation.
Strangely enough, none of the audio options
comes in Dolby Digital 5.1 but instead only 2.1 tracks are
on offer. Doesn't really matter because it's a very solid
sounding Cantonese track. All channels are used and surround
usage in particular sounds excellent on my 2.0 setup. A Mandarin
2.0 dub is also included.
The English subtitles feature no noticeable
errors. Traditional and simplified Chinese subtitles are also
included.
Extras are light, standard Mei Ah. The Data
Bank has a plot synopsis screen and a cast & crew listing.
Under the Best Buy option we get trailers are available for
The Mummy, Aged 19 (directed by Wilson Yip), Feel
100% and a TV-thriller with no English title, starring
Anita Yuen. The cinema trailer for New Blood is of
course available also.
reviewed by Kenneth
Brorsson
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