Let the Bullets Fly (2010)

I don't know what to make of this movie. The trailer promised lots of action and remembering some of Chow Yun Fats best movies, I had high hopes. But instead of tons of action, we get a movie about two men trying to outwit each other in a macabre duel of treachery:A robber becomes an impostor, assuming the role of a towns new governor. He soon begins to oppose the towns true ruler, a crime lord in a game of deadly schemes. This could be very entertaining, if most of the humor wasn't lost in translation. The non verbal humor is basically slapstick and seems kind of outdated. The acting was okay, the characters had some depth to them, especially the "robber". There were some CGI effects in the movie and they were terribly bad.It's an uneven mixture that'll probably prove to be boring or confusing to most watchers.

If William Shakespeare had written a western that takes place in China at the beginning of the 20th century, it would be thus. This intricate plot contains many of the hallmarks of Shakespearean storytelling, conveyed with clever and engaging dialogue and satisfying action: murder, revenge, hidden identities, nobility of purpose, greed, political machinations, romance, violence, greathearted heroes, petty tyrants, henchmen, and impostors. My only real complaint with this film is that the denouement is a little weak. But, overall, I loved it.If you buy/rent it on DVD, I would recommend viewing it in Mandarin with English subtitles —I found that the English overdub was enjoyable, but a little too "American"; the subtitles had more punch, and kept the flavour of the original Mandarin (fyi, watching it with English overdub *and* English subtitles is trippy).

There are so many funny metaphors but you do need to be somewhat acquainted with Chinese to understand them. I think this will be a difficult film for non-Chinese to grasp, especially with a lot of deadpan satire and dark humor. It is extremely funny in a way, especially the scene between Jiang Wen and Carina Lau where she displayed a series of objects to him in bed. You won't "get it" if you don't understand Chinese proverbs and surreptitious meaning. So I'm not surprised if this movie will be rated exceptionally intelligent to its Chinese audience but will appear to many as silly, improbable and illogical.

The opening of the movie proffers LI Shu-tong's sadly languid "Song of farewell", the best known musical piece of the period in the warlord-troubled period of China of the early 20th Century. The transition to the farce that follows is a stroke of brilliance.The main drawing card of the movie is of course three superstars in the Chinese language cinema today, JIANG Wen, CHOW Yun-fat and GE You – in the order of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. This is actually the second time Jiang has fashioned a movie in this way, the first one being "Tian di ying xiong" (2003) in which he also took the role of The Good, while roles of The Bad and The Ugly were taken up, respectively, by Kiichi Nakai and WANG Xueqi (who back then had not yet attained today's lofty status in the movie world). The beauty in that one was ZHAO Wei.As mentioned in my summary line, to the main structure of "The Good, the Bad and The Ugly" is added certain elements of the Kurosawa's classic Yojinbo (1961). But while therein, the hero (played by Toshiro Mifune) is the guy between two opposite camps, here in "Bullet" it's the clown, i.e. The Ugly.I am not going to go into the plot which can be summarized as a convoluted game of power struggles between two rivalling gangs for control a small town. Exciting action and outlandish black humour make the movie thoroughly enjoyable. The highlight is of course the acting of the three superstars. One scene, in particular, must not be missed – the first meeting between The Good and The Bad, with the Ugly as the balancing factor in the subtle confrontation. Just to witness how in this scene the three pull all plugs in their acting reservoir to outdo one another is worth the admission price.