MOVIE REVIEW: "DON'T GO BREAKING MY HEART 2". 单身男女 2

“DON’T GO BREAKING MY HEART 2″ (2014)

Movie Review. 单身男女 2

Hong Kong is well-known for movie quickies.Whenever and wherever there’s a successful formula, just get ready to shoot a sequel, and then some.

There’s a perpetual drought of bright ideas everywhere, so it is safer to stick to one concoction that’s proven right and expound on it, rather than to shoot bullets in the dark.

“DON’T GO BREAKING MY HEART 2″ is one fine example.

This 2011 romantic comedy returns with a resounding gong, adding MIRIAM YEUNG and VIC CHOU onto the stable of leads. Naturally, it is equipped with a brand new sub-plot. What else?

“DON’T GO BREAKING MY HEART 2″ is Hong Kong director Johnnie To’s vivid continuation of his 2011 money-churning rom-com.

He adds MIRIAM YEUNG and VIC CHOU to the goodlooking threesome of LOUIS KOO, DANIEL WU and GAO YUAN YUAN. You just have to take your pick.

A QUICK SYNOPSIS

As soon as  playboy investment banker Shen Ran (LOUIS KOO) loses Zixin (GAO YUAN YUAN) to a brawny hunk of an architect, he conveniently swings back  to his notorious life as a incorrigible womanizer.

He starts bedding every girl that crosses his path until he finally settles for stock market specialist Yang Yang (MIRIAM YEUNG), a lusty sophisticate.

Unbeknownst to Shen Ran, his old flame Zixin suddenly appears.

Coincidentally, Zixin’s slightly older brother Paul has developed a hippo crush for power woman Yang Yang.

Now confusion and chaos set in.

At first Yang Yang mistakes Paul to be Zixin’s fiance and rejects his advances.

But she finally discovers the truth on Zixin’s wedding day and has to make a tough decision about her own pairing.

What would you do with fickle-minded women?

Shen Ran, in the meantime, arises from his stupor to realize that his love for Zixin has never died and determines to woo her back at all costs.

This is as stupid as you can get, because you don’t simply go and break up a devoted couple.

In summary, this movie is an entertaining farce not to be taken seriously.

However much two lovebirds might share, it’s what they don’t know about each other that rejuvenates their relationship. 

That’s the best part.

Right.

RATING: 3.5 out of 5

LOCAL DISTRIBUTOR:  GSC MOVIES

“LIFE WITHOUT PRINCIPLE” 奪命金 MOVIE REVIEW. Film Director JOHNNIE TO returns in Top Form.

“LIFE WITHOUT PRINCIPLE ”  奪命金 PRESS PREVIEW

“LIFE WITHOUT PRINCIPLE” is one taut financial thriller.

It hits home a gritty truth that the Hong Kong populace is driven by competitive greed and obsessive wealth.

This one throws you into the murky depths of reality where you get to swim with the money sharks.

It’s a matter of life and death and expounds man’s ever going pursuit of a quick fix to get rich, and what’d have happened when the best of plans go awry.

Just be warned, do not touch what’s been predestined not to be yours.

Because theft is a seedy word and comes with a hefty price tag.

Money is everything.

And people are willing to do anything, everything,

and even die for it.

Money has, and always will be, the root of all evils.

“LIFE WITHOUT PRINCIPLE” is not crafted as a shoot-them-up action film.

It preys, rather, on the human psychology on greed. Nobody can be satisfied with just having enough. 

DENISE HO is Teresa who’s listless and unhappy in her demanding job as a financial analyst. She is forced to sell high risk securities to her customers in order to achieve her sales target. Far from doing well, her latent insecurities are eating her and driving her up against the wall.

LAU CHING WAN plays a blinking and bumbling small time gangster called PANTHER. He’s a loyalist to his sworn brothers and will stick by them through thick and thin.  He learns his way into the futures index to reap easy money in order to post bail for his irresponsible, lawless buddy. Some buddy, right.

RICHIE REN is Cheung Ching Fong – a straight, upright and honest police inspector who smells trouble big time when his materialistic wife fights with him on a down payment to purchase a luxury sea-facing condo that they both cannot afford.

The path of these three unlikely characters careens and intertwines when a boastful middle-aged loan shark is murdered for his bag of 5 million dollars, putting everybody in a tight spot.

This is where the protagonists are forced to examine the inner self, about the dangers that come with ill-gotten wealth.

Master of the craft JOHNNIE TO offers a nicely caliberated mix of intellectual dread and visceral shock in this suspenseful thriller that will keep you enthralled till the last frames where the credits roll.

Let’s hear from the man himself when he says “This is a turbulent world and in order to survive, people have no choice but to play the game.”

 A splendid script and brilliant performances by LAU CHING WAN and DENISE HO.

It’s a tour de force that’s truly worth a visit.

Go catch it.