Sheep without a Shepherd

误杀

China, 2019, colour, 2.35:1, 111 mins.

Director: Ke Wenli 柯汶利 [Sam Quah].

Rating: 8/10.

A Chinese remake of a much-remade Indian hit, this strongly packaged cat-and-mouse crime procedural is involving at every level.

STORY

Chanban village, Thailand, the present day, March. Li Weijie (Xiao Yang), a Chinese Thai, owns an internet equipment shop and has an honest reputation, regularly visiting a corner cafe owned by Song En (Qin Pei), a fellow Chinese Thai. An uneducated man, his one big interest is watching crime movies. One day he helps out a local whose son has been beaten up by spolied teenager Suchat (Bian Tianyang), the son of mayoral candidate Dutporn (Jiang Haowen) and his wife Laoorn (Chen Chong), chief of police in neighbouring town Lua Pathom. He earns the enmity of corrupt policeman Sangkun (Shi Mingshuai) who was trying to arrange a pay-off to the boy’s father and take a hefty cut. (The ruthless Laoorn is not above falsifying evidence to catch criminals she suspects, having recently tricked a murderer [Chen Zhipeng] into a confession.) At a school summer-camp outing, Li Weijie’s teenage daughter Li Ping (Xu Wenshan) has a drink spiked by Suchat, who then molests her and records it on his mobile phone. Later, Suchat blackmails Li Ping into meeting him one evening for sex. To his surprise, the distraught Li Ping brings her mother Yu (Tan Zhuo) along and, when Suchat tries to have sex with Yu, Li Ping accidentally kills him. When Li Weijie returns the same evening from a business trip to repair the wifi at a hotel in Lua Pathom, he hears what has happened and decides to cover up the crime by burying the body in a family grave; next day he ditches Suchat’s mobile phone and dumps the boy’s car in a lake. Unknown to him, however, he’s been spotted breaking into the car by Sangkun. Using an idea from the South Korean crime film Montage, Li Weijie establishes a false alibi for his whole family – including his younger daughter Li An (Zhang Xiran) – by taking them all on a day’s outing to Lua Pathom, returning home in the evening after a visit to a Muay Thai match. Laoorn and the whole police force search for Suchat, whose car is discovered in the lake. Meanwhile, Li Weijie meticulously coaches his family in what to say when the police, inevitably, come to question them. Despite the lack of any concrete evidence, and the absence of Suchat’s body, Laoorn is convinced Li Weijie is guilty, and she and Sangkun are determined to prove it at any cost, despite the doubts of her deputy (Huang Jianwei) and the support of Li Weijie’s many friends.

REVIEW

When the spoiled son of a powerful local family accidentally ends up dead, a father tries to protect his wife and elder daughter from a murder charge in Sheep without a Shepherd 误杀, a crime procedural which depends on its Swiss Clock-like script and colourful array of characters rather than action setpieces or gunplay. Strongly cast down the line, with a quietly impressive lead by Mainland comedian Xiao Yang 肖央 (Old Boys: The Way of the Dragon 老男孩 猛龙过江, 2014) and a scenery-chewing performance by veteran actress Chen Chong 陈冲 [Joan Chen] as a monstrous police chief, it’s an impressive feature debut by young Malaysian Chinese director Ke Wenli 柯汶利 [Quah Boon Lip/Sam Quah], here working under experienced Mainland director Chen Sicheng 陈思诚 (Beijing Love Story 北京爱情故事, 2014; the Detective Chinatown 唐人街探案 series, 2015-  ) as creative producer 监制.

Born in Penang but based in Taibei, Ke, 34, previously directed the half-hour crime short The Free Man 自由人 (2014) and edited the 2018 short A Taxi Driver 暴好人, directed by Taiwan’s Chen Yanhong 陈彦宏. In scenes like the actual crime and its aftermath, there are traces of Free Man‘s moody style, but in every other way Sheep is a big step-up for Ke, blending a variety of emotions across a long span and maintaining an atmosphere of simmering tension as the battle of wits is played out between the father and the police. It became a surprise word-of-mouth hit in the Mainland, eventually taking a rosy RMB1.2 billion [later growing to RMB1.33 billion].

Despite its curious English title which is never really explained – the Chinese one simply means “Manslaughter” – Sheep is actually based on a Malayalam Indian film, Drishyam: Visuals Can Be Deceiving (2013), written and directed by Jeethu Joseph (see poster, left), which has already been remade into four regional-language versions – of which the Hindi one, Drishyam: Visuals Can Be Deceptive (2015), directed by Nishikant Kamat, is the best known (below left) – as well as a 2017 Sri Lankan version. Instead of being relocated to China, the story is moved to Thailand (presumably to get around Mainland strictures on showing corrupt police) but otherwise the six scriptwriters – including Yang Weiwei 杨薇薇, a regular collaborator with director Gu Changwei 顾长卫, and Lei Sheng 雷声 (Double Deaths 消失的妻子, 2017) – closely follow the original’s plotline.

Taking its darker dramatic tone more from the Bollywood version than the leisurely Malayalam one, it’s basically an amped-up, better structured re-telling, preserving the focus of the father protecting his family but making the police chief a much more dominant character. It’s also almost an hour shorter and is let down only by a coda that still plays along to Mainland censorship rules – despite including as much equivocation as possible – as well as omitting the original’s delicious final twist.

The opening half-hour most clearly shows the writers’ embellishments, adding an opening which introduces the ruthless police chief who’s not above fabricating evidence to get her man, as well as scenes depicting her home life with an ambitious husband (Hong Kong’s Jiang Haowen 姜皓文 [Philip Keung], all fierce looks) who’s standing in a mayoral election and their spoilt, arrogant son whom she protects with maternal fervour despite his faults. All of this strengthens her later behaviour as a Female Fury, which Chen, kitted out with a severe hairstyle and junta-like sunglasses, attacks with relish. Despite being way o.t.t., it’s all highly entertaining, with Chen, 58, in her juciest big-screen role for a decade.

Initially known as one half of the comic duo Chopsticks Brothers 筷子兄弟, Xiao, 39, is equally impressive in a quieter way, scruffed up as a smalltown internet techie who’s well-liked by the locals and, when driven to it, is as equally protective of his family as the police chief. Though the idea of being inspired in his plan by a crime movie (in this case South Korea’s Montage 몽타주, 2013) is a tad film-buffy, it’s not made into a big thing and in fact stems from an idea in the Indian original. Xiao’s sly performance, with flecks of light comedy, is surrounded by a fine line-up of supports, all playing in the same key: the always interesting Tan Zhuo 谭卓, 36, as his nervously supportive wife; US-born Xu Wenshan 许文姗 [Audrey Hui], 17 – in real life Chen’s younger daughter – and especially six-year-old Mainlander Zhang Xiran 张熙然 as his children; Hong Kong veteran Qin Pei 秦沛 [Paul Chun] as a fellow Chinese Thai restaurateur; and Taiwan’s Huang Jianwei 黄健玮 (The Rice Bomber 白米炸弹客, 2014) as a Thai police officer who believes the father is innocent of murder.

Technical credits are top drawer, from the widescreen images of d.p. Zhang Ying 张颖 (Dealer/Healer 毒。诫, 2017; Our Shining Days 闪光少女, 2017) to the design by Zhao Xuehao 赵学昊, Li Bing 李冰 and Li Miao 李淼, all oozing local atmosphere. Interestingly, Montage has already been re-made, not only in Hindi (Te3n, 2016) but also in Chinese – as The Guilty Ones 你是凶手, shot in early 2016 but only released in late 2019, a few weeks before Sheep.

CREDITS

Presented by Fujian Hengye Pictures (CN), Wanda Media (CN), China Film (CN), Perfect Sky Pictures (CN), Jiangsu Omnijoi Media (CN), Beijing Enlight Pictures (CN), Shanghai Taopiaopiao Movie & TV Culture (CN), Shanghai As One Production (CN). Produced by Hengye Herdsman Pictures (CN).

Script: Yang Weiwei, Zhai Pei, Li Peng, Fan Kaihua, Qin Yuqian, Lei Sheng. Script advice: Gu Zheng. Original script: Jeethu Joseph. Photography: Zhang Ying. Editing: Tang Hongjia, Zu Xinyu. Music direction: Zhao Huiyuan. Production design: Zhao Xuehao. Art direction: Li Bing. Styling: Li Miao. Sound: Li Tao, Wu Wei. Visual effects: Wang Mingpeng (VHQ Beijing). Executive direction: Zhang Yu.

Cast: Xiao Yang (Li Weijie), Tan Zhuo (Yu, Li Weijie’s wife), Chen Chong [Joan Chen] (Layun/Laoorn), Jiang Haowen [Philip Keung] (Dupeng/Dutporn), Xu Wenshan [Audrey Hui] (Li Ping), Bian Tianyang (Sucha/Suchat), Zhang Xiran (Li An), Qin Pei [Paul Chun] (Song En), Huang Jianwei (Chabing, deputy police chief), Shi Mingshuai (Sangkun), Chen Zhipeng (criminal suspect), Gu Yang (Plang, building contractor), Zhang Lin (Li Weijie’s assistant), Zhang Yu (Shen Wenguan), Chen Guan (TV reporter), Sun Kaifeng (Kai Wen), Ye Liu (Bing), Zeng Ziru (Pony, Suchat’s schoolfriend).

Release: China, 13 Dec 2019.