End Game

人潮汹涌

China/Hong Kong, 2021, colour, 2.35:1, 119 mins.

Director: Rao Xiaozhi 饶晓志.

Rating: 6/10.

A remake of the Japanese Key of Life, this swapped-identities crime comedy makes good use of the separate skills of Hong Kong’s Liu Dehua [Andy Lau] and Mainland comic Xiao Yang.

STORY

Shanghai, Nov 2019. In a multi-storey car park, a desperate-looking man, Wu Yanzhen (Wang Xuebing), is stabbed to death by a man in a mask and cloak, who then reveals himself to be Zhou Quan (Liu Dehua), an immaculate, highly organised professional assassin. The whole incident is secretly recorded by an onlooker. The same evening, in a dingy flat in Hongkou district, penniless film extra Chen Xiaomeng (Xiao Yang) tries to hang himself in despair but fails when the rope breaks. Finding a complimentary ticket to the upscale Roman Fairy spa among his things, he goes there and, when the receptionist (Wang Ge) tries to block him, is helped by Zhou Quan, who happens to be a member. In the changing rooms, Zhou Quan accidentally slips on Chen Xiaomeng’s bar of soap and knocks himself out. Sensing an opportunity, Chen Xiaomeng swaps Zhou Quan’s locker key for his own and makes off with Zhou Quan’s clothes, watch and car. Inside the car he finds a wallet stuffed with RMB100 notes. Next day he pays off all his debts and even gives some cash to his former girlfriend (Wei Lai), who’s about to get married. Feeling guilty, he decides to return Zhou Quan’s clothes and car; but at the hospital he finds Zhou Quan is being treated for temporary amnesia. Because of the things he found in his (switched) locker at the spa, Zhou Quan thinks he is actually Chen Xiaomeng. Chen Xiaomeng therefore decides to adopt Zhou Quan’s identity fulltime, though he does pay the man’s hospital bill before leaving. Zhou Quan is discharged and, while walking along the street, he is accidentally splashed by the car of media company CEO Li Xiang (Wan Qian), a single mother who was just at the same hospital visiting her 12-year-old son, Li You (Wei Zhihao). Feeling sorry for the bedraggled, unemployed Zhou Quan, she offers him a lift home; shocked at the condition of his flat, and seeing the suicide noose, she pays off the aggressive landlord (Guo Jingfei) when he comes demanding back rent. With his usual precision, Zhou Quan sets about reconstructing his (new) identity from things he finds in Chen Xiaomeng’s flat. Meanwhile, Chen Xiaomeng, wallowing in Zhou Quan’s luxury apartment, discovers a huge collection of different clothes and IDs for various characters, as well as dozens of mobile phones, plans and … a gun. One of the mobiles rings and a voice says everything is ready. In the meantime, Zhou Quan starts turning up for work as an extra on various films, starting with a swordplay movie. Feeling guilty again, Chen Xiaomeng drives to his old flat and bumps into Zhou Quan, who recognises him from the hospital and invites him in to thank him for paying the medical bill. Li Xiang is also there visiting, and is amazed to see how clean and tidy the flat now is. Li Xiang takes Zhou Quan out to dinner, while Chen Xiaomeng has dinner at the hotpot restaurant of Zhou Quan’s Chongqing-born boss, Wang Yanhui (Huang Xiaolei), who knows him as just “Mr. Z”. Following her contract for the murder of her onetime boyfriend, Wu Yanzhen, she now offers him RMB100,000 to kill her onetime BFF Zeng Jiurong (Cheng Yi), who stole Wu Yanzhen from her. Having never seen Zhou Quan face to face before, Wang Yanhui doesn’t realise Chen Xiaomeng is not Mr. Z. Continuing to act the role, he has no option than to accept the new contract but, as he gets to know Zeng Jiurong, feels unable to go through with it. Meanwhile, Li Xiang and Zhou Quan get to know each other better, though he doesn’t realise she’s using him as research for a script she’s developing. Then one night Zhou Quan starts to regain his memory and Wang Yanhui discovers Chen Xiaomeng is not Mr. Z.

REVIEW

Shot in Shanghai during late 2019, and released in the Mainland in Feb 2021, End Game 人潮汹涌 teams Hong Kong veteran Liu Dehua 刘德华 [Andy Lau] and Mainland comedian Xiao Yang 肖央 in a swapped-identities crime comedy that makes good use of their separate skills. As precise as a pin, Lau (who’s also the film’s creative producer 监制) plays an obsessively organised professional assassin who develops amnesia and thinks he’s a penniless film extra, while Xiao, whose gift for black comedy was also showcased in recent police drama Walk the Line 扫黑    决不放弃 (2024), plays the slobby film extra who takes advantage of the situation. A remake of the 2012 Japanese comedy Key of Life 键泥棒のメソッド, written and directed by Uchida Kenji 内田贤治 (A Stranger of Mine 运命じゃない人, 2005, see poster, left), it’s a pleasant enough time-passer that’s weakened by a soggy, more romantic mid-section and some structural problems in the second half.

It was only the third feature by Guizhou-born writer-director Rao Xiaozhi 饶晓志, 39 at the time of shooting. With roots that were strongly in theatre, he had made his first movie only a couple of years earlier, the absurdist comedy The Insanity 你好，疯子！ (2016), followed by another, more precision-tooled black comedy, A Cool Fish 无名之辈 (2018), a surprise hit that took a meaty RMB795 million. End Game performed similarly, with RMB762 million, though being a CNY release it was thrown into deep shade that year by blockbuster hits Hi, Mom 你好，李焕英 (RMB5.41 billion) and Detective Chinatown 3 唐人街探案3 (RMB4.5 billion). It finally placed fourth place among the CNY live-action movies, behind action drama A Writer’s Odyssey 刺杀小说家 (RMB1.03 billion), on which Rao was ironically one of the financiers. Since End Game, he’s directed the patriotic heartwarmer Home Coming 万里归途 (2022) – atypical for him but a well-acted, very solid production that was a big hit – and is currently shooting Made in Yiwu 无名之辈2, a comedy in the same vein as A Cool Fish that includes Liu among the cast.

End Game is actually the second adaptation of Key of Life, following the South Korean version, Luck-Key 럭키 (2016), directed by Yi Gye-byeok 이계벽 | 李桂碧 (see poster, left). Rao’s version, co-written with Fan Xiang 范翔 (a supporting actor in A Cool Fish) and Li Xiang 李想, is closer to the Japanese original than the Korean one, especially in the first hour or so; and just like the original, it sags in the middle as each man finds romance, recovers its opening comedic spirit around the 70-minute point, and could still profitably lose about 15 minutes. The second half is simply overladen with plot, including the kidnapping of a young boy (an invented character who’s not in the original) and his whole backstory of a father who was supposedly an astronaut. On top of everything, Xiao’s o.t.t. stint in the finale, pretending to be a psycho-killer, is too much, too late when the film should be wrapping up.

In Rao’s version, the most significant change, in fact, is having the professional assassin played not by a plug-ugly actor, as in the original (Kagawa Teruyuki 香川照之) and Korean (Yu Hae-jin 유해진 | 柳海真) versions, but by the handsome Liu; and the hard-up actor played not by a good-looking juvenile lead but by the somewhat shabby-looking Xiao, a well-known comedian. This significantly changes the character dynamics, though it does make the romance between the assassin and the single mother more believable and Liu expertly manages the transitions between cold, clockwork killer and charming amnesiac. Also, Liu’s screen image of playing generally good guys makes the plot twist more believable.

The constant cutting back and forth between the two story strands that mirror each other is a built-in problem with any swapped-identities movie, and End Game doesn’t attempt to get round it, leading to a feeling of repetitiveness after a while. Also the soggy 20-minute section in the middle, showing both characters’ romances, is light on comedy, and only rescued by the cast itself, especially under-rated actress Wan Qian 万茜, then 37, as the initially self-serving media exec-cum-single mother who makes use of Liu’s amnesiac assassin. Hunan-born Wan always has a strong screen presence far beyond her role itself (the wife in God of War 荡寇风云, 2017; pathologist in Guilty of Mind 心理罪, 2017; tough birth-mother in The Oldtown Girls 兔子暴力, 2020; shouty wife in Papa 学爸, 2023). Liu, then in his late 50s, and Xiao, in his late 30s, team easily throughout, while actress Cheng Yi 程怡 (the property developer’s lover in A Cool Fish) is notable as the actor’s love interest and Huang Xiaolei 黄小蕾 especially memorable as the assassin’s boss-lady, a loud-mouthed owner of a hotpot restaurant with a heavy Chongqing accent. The fact that Xiao’s character is a film extra provides excuses for quite a few movie in-jokes, with pals like director Guo Fan 郭帆 (The Wandering Earth 流浪地球, 2019) popping up and even Rao himself in an end-title scene.

The whole film is consistently good-looking thanks to the richly-textured widescreen photography of Liao Ni 廖拟 (who was to shoot Rao’s Home Coming). Though it references Samuel Beckett’s absurdist 1957 play Endgame at one point, the film bears no similarities in either plot or tone.

For the record, the film’s title is clearly spelt as two words in the opening credits though as one in the closing credits. Presumably as an in-joke, several of the characters have been named after ones in A Cool Fish or members of End Game’s crew. The Chinese title is as obscure as the English one, a four-character phrase that literally means “a surging tide of people”.

CREDITS

Presented by Shanghai Artown Entertainment (CN), Beijing Enlight Pictures (CN), Emperor Film Production (HK), Shenzhen Yiyi Yiyi Culture Media (CN).

Script: Rao Xiaozhi, Fan Xiang, Li Xiang. Story planning: Zhou Quan, Zhou Ziya, Chen Jiurong. Original script: Uchida Kenji. Photography: Liao Ni. Editing: Zhi Liyun. Artistic director (editing): Zhang Jiahui [Cheung Ka-fai]. Music: Deng Ouge. Art direction: Shu Xingjia. Costume design: Fu Yue, Zeng Ming, Gao Wei. Styling: Liang Tingting. Sound: Xiong Yi, Wang Gang, Liu Xiaosha. Action: Cao Hua. Visual effects: Ding Yanlei (Orange VFX). Executive direction: Dong Changming.

Cast: Liu Dehua [Andy Lau] (Zhou Quan/Mr. Z), Xiao Yang (Chen Xiaomeng), Wan Qian (Li Xiang), Cheng Yi (Zeng Jiurong), Huang Xiaolei (Wang Yanhui), Di Zhijie (Yin Sheng), Guo Yiqian (Yang Wei), Wang Xuebing (Wu Yanzhen), Guo Jingfei (Chen Xiaomeng’s landlord), Liu Tianzuo (Ma Ming, head extra), Lu Yang (director of swordplay film), Guo Fan (himself, director of sci-fi film), Shi Hang (clown), Lei Jiayin (film producer), Liu Haoliang (film director), Wang Ge (Roman Fairy spa receptionist), Zhang Ning (film producer), Rao Xiaozhi (himself, film director at wedding reception), Gu Xiaodong (Liu, CEO), Wang Zichuan (Li You’s PE teacher), Lin Hai (hospital doctor), Wei Zhihao (Li You), Wei Lai (Chen Xiaomeng’s former girlfriend).

Release: China, 12 Feb 2021; Hong Kong, 18 Mar 2021.