CrazyFrog
05-06-2008, 06:23 PM
The Iceman Cometh (1989)
Yuen Biao, Yuen Wah, Maggie Cheung
Directed by Clarence Fok Yiu-Leung
Wanting to check out more of Yuen Biao's catalog, I heard about this movie and how it was underrated. After seeing it, I am a little confused about it being underrated but different strokes for different folks!
Plotwise, this movie is solid if not exactly original. A Ming Royal Guard hunts down one of his comrades (Yuen Wah) who has gone crazy raping and killing women. Yuen attempts to harness the power of the Black Jade Buddha to avoid capture but winds up being chased to a snowy location where they battle and fall off a cliff and freeze (although they hit the cliff a few times on the way down for good measure). 300 years later, a scientific team, doing God knows what, accidentally finds them and carves them out of the ice with lasers (+1 bonus points!) but they are accidentally thawed by some bumbling crooks and they escape into modern Hong Kong (circa 1989). Biao runs into Maggie Cheung, a hooker who uses his naivete and super-human skills to her advantage, including cleaning her house, cooking her food, and generally berating him at any given moment; it's really touching!
Needless to say, Yuen Wah also has found his way around HK as a mercenary thug with a look that can have only existed in the 80's. His outfit was one of the highlights of the movie for me- he looks FOB with a Micheal Jackson Thriller video setup complete with denim vest, skinny tie, those round, black shades and high top sneakers! And a mullet!! This has the unfortunate effect of making Wah not so badass but that's not the movie's main problem.
Wah continues killing women and eventually ***SPOILER*** finds Maggie Cheung and uses her as a pawn in his fight with Biao****SPOILER END***. To go on from here would reveal the ending, plus it's pretty hard not to guess what happens from this point. Will Biao capture or kill Wah? Will he ever get back to his own time? Does Maggie Cheung ever stop abusing him? Seriously, women in New York pay top dollar for that kind of man-slave!
The action is good- in fact, it's quite good in places. Biao doesn't show any slippage in his acrobatic skills and throws some mean kicks here. His style is quite clean, fluid, and fast, and I now have confirmed (for me) that he is probably the most physically gifted out of the Seven Fortunes. Wah, also one of the Fortunes, is toe to toe with Biao in their fights, matching his agility with amazing responsiveness. The fights flow well and also have some pretty visceral hits in them. Throw in some good swordwork by both and actionwise, this movie is pretty good. Not fabulous, but pretty damn good.
However, it is doled out sparingly to make room for the interaction between Maggie and Biao. While their pairing had some chemistry, it wears thin after a bit, especially as all it seems Maggie does is heap verbal abuse on Biao and take advantage of him. In fact, she never shows the slightest interest in doing anything but, so when the final pieces of the story unwind, it is a little hard to swallow. I also find it hard to believe that she is a prostitute with as much as she connives her way out of it, especially when Biao shows up. I began to think that her real job was playing mah jong with her hooker friends! Maggie is cute but she just falls short of carrying this part of the film, which felt one-dimensional to me anyways. Some things worked- the scene where she brings Biao home is funny and you feel for Biao, who realizes just how far away he is from his place. Biao seems to have some acting chops and holds his own in this movie.
Other parts of the story felt uneven, especially as it seems some effort was made to use locations (mountains, city) and setpieces (large giant Freedom Wheel, special effects). They could have bolstered the backstory between Biao and Wah some more, especially as they are the main antagonists. Maybe some flashbacks to their arduous training? Or some more footage of them in the Ming period? Either way, even some judicious editing could have improved this film more. You get the basics of the story well enough but then it just falls apart, especially when it doesn't focus on Biao or Wah.
So, to sum it up: Good action, and serviceable plot with a good performance by Biao, but the movie overall was just too long. They tried to combine a romantic-comedy and action-thriller with some success but it still feels half-baked. I think watching Biao and Wah fight is a good reason to get this movie but it makes you feel like they could have had a real solid movie with all those elements they tried to incorporate. And so it goes into the mediocrity bin, where it will be frozen with all the other 80's action thrillers until some future time when people when unthaw it and go "Hey! Yuen Biao! Wasn't he great in Prodigal Son?"
2 and a half out of 5 skinny ties
Yuen Biao, Yuen Wah, Maggie Cheung
Directed by Clarence Fok Yiu-Leung
Wanting to check out more of Yuen Biao's catalog, I heard about this movie and how it was underrated. After seeing it, I am a little confused about it being underrated but different strokes for different folks!
Plotwise, this movie is solid if not exactly original. A Ming Royal Guard hunts down one of his comrades (Yuen Wah) who has gone crazy raping and killing women. Yuen attempts to harness the power of the Black Jade Buddha to avoid capture but winds up being chased to a snowy location where they battle and fall off a cliff and freeze (although they hit the cliff a few times on the way down for good measure). 300 years later, a scientific team, doing God knows what, accidentally finds them and carves them out of the ice with lasers (+1 bonus points!) but they are accidentally thawed by some bumbling crooks and they escape into modern Hong Kong (circa 1989). Biao runs into Maggie Cheung, a hooker who uses his naivete and super-human skills to her advantage, including cleaning her house, cooking her food, and generally berating him at any given moment; it's really touching!
Needless to say, Yuen Wah also has found his way around HK as a mercenary thug with a look that can have only existed in the 80's. His outfit was one of the highlights of the movie for me- he looks FOB with a Micheal Jackson Thriller video setup complete with denim vest, skinny tie, those round, black shades and high top sneakers! And a mullet!! This has the unfortunate effect of making Wah not so badass but that's not the movie's main problem.
Wah continues killing women and eventually ***SPOILER*** finds Maggie Cheung and uses her as a pawn in his fight with Biao****SPOILER END***. To go on from here would reveal the ending, plus it's pretty hard not to guess what happens from this point. Will Biao capture or kill Wah? Will he ever get back to his own time? Does Maggie Cheung ever stop abusing him? Seriously, women in New York pay top dollar for that kind of man-slave!
The action is good- in fact, it's quite good in places. Biao doesn't show any slippage in his acrobatic skills and throws some mean kicks here. His style is quite clean, fluid, and fast, and I now have confirmed (for me) that he is probably the most physically gifted out of the Seven Fortunes. Wah, also one of the Fortunes, is toe to toe with Biao in their fights, matching his agility with amazing responsiveness. The fights flow well and also have some pretty visceral hits in them. Throw in some good swordwork by both and actionwise, this movie is pretty good. Not fabulous, but pretty damn good.
However, it is doled out sparingly to make room for the interaction between Maggie and Biao. While their pairing had some chemistry, it wears thin after a bit, especially as all it seems Maggie does is heap verbal abuse on Biao and take advantage of him. In fact, she never shows the slightest interest in doing anything but, so when the final pieces of the story unwind, it is a little hard to swallow. I also find it hard to believe that she is a prostitute with as much as she connives her way out of it, especially when Biao shows up. I began to think that her real job was playing mah jong with her hooker friends! Maggie is cute but she just falls short of carrying this part of the film, which felt one-dimensional to me anyways. Some things worked- the scene where she brings Biao home is funny and you feel for Biao, who realizes just how far away he is from his place. Biao seems to have some acting chops and holds his own in this movie.
Other parts of the story felt uneven, especially as it seems some effort was made to use locations (mountains, city) and setpieces (large giant Freedom Wheel, special effects). They could have bolstered the backstory between Biao and Wah some more, especially as they are the main antagonists. Maybe some flashbacks to their arduous training? Or some more footage of them in the Ming period? Either way, even some judicious editing could have improved this film more. You get the basics of the story well enough but then it just falls apart, especially when it doesn't focus on Biao or Wah.
So, to sum it up: Good action, and serviceable plot with a good performance by Biao, but the movie overall was just too long. They tried to combine a romantic-comedy and action-thriller with some success but it still feels half-baked. I think watching Biao and Wah fight is a good reason to get this movie but it makes you feel like they could have had a real solid movie with all those elements they tried to incorporate. And so it goes into the mediocrity bin, where it will be frozen with all the other 80's action thrillers until some future time when people when unthaw it and go "Hey! Yuen Biao! Wasn't he great in Prodigal Son?"
2 and a half out of 5 skinny ties