Doomsday•Party
末日派对
Hong Kong, 2013, colour, 1.85:1, 96 mins.
Director: He Kang 何康.
Rating: 5/10.
Ambitious, multi-character thriller has good local atmosphere but a shallow script.
STORY
Hong Kong, Oct 2013. Following a long period of social unrest over bank failures, property speculation and government mismanagement, crowds gather to demonstrate in front of the Legislative Council building. Panic ensues as a bomb is reported inside the LegCo building, planted by someone calling himself “Skywalker”. Meanwhile, a branch of Hong Kong & China Banking Corporation is held up by two young people in masks – chemistry student Lang (Guan Chuyao) and social drop-out Fish (Liao Ziyu). Among the people in the bank are disillusioned former teacher Yu Zhongde (Guan Weipeng), councilman He Songli (Zhang Guoqiang), his mistress Rebecca (Chen Meiqi), the bank’s investment saleswoman Lu Yunyi (Xie Anqi), her philandering boyfriend Victor Luo (Liu Haolong), and Lu Yunyi’s onetime boyfriend, police detective Jianhao (Huang Guanzhong). All have their own reasons for being in the bank that day.
REVIEW
A first-time feature whose script doesn’t fully service its ambitions, Doomsday•Party 末日派对 is still an interesting calling-card for a director who clearly has his sights set high. Hong Kong-born He Kang 何康, who studied film at California’s Art Center College of Design, and has made shorts, commercials and music videos since returning, wraps a critique of rampant property development, corrupt financial practices and government complicity inside a thriller format in which various individuals, all with stories of their own, find themselves thrown together during a bank hold-up. The criss-crossing screenplay’s main fault is its tendency to move characters and relationships around at its own convenience rather than create protagonists who themselves drive the drama, and though some are better drawn than others there’s not much space between all the plot-juggling for the viewer to become engaged in their fates.
A case in point is the character of a disillusioned former teacher who, on the day in question, is planning a personal protest against the bank that ruined him. Played by veteran actor-singer-director Guan Weipeng 关维鹏 [Teddy Robin] – who also (under his Chinese name) takes producer and writing credits on the film – he ends up as a shadowy, under-written figure with little dialogue until the end. Others, such as a politician’s middle-aged mistress and the philandering boyfriend of a bank clerk, are even less developed, while the main character of the young urban terrorist and his female accomplice are given little background to justify their actions or engage the audience’s feelings. He, and the other five credited writers, over-egg the screenplay with too much incident and not enough psychological depth or meaningful dialogue, making the movie more a clever construction than a satisfying thriller-cum-emotional drama.
However, for a biggish first feature on an obviously limited budget, the action is okay-to-good, with some clever use of crowd scenes and some smart editing by the experienced Li Dongquan 李栋全 [Wenders Li]. The movie’s best part is the last half-hour – as the action returns to the present and the various characters find themselves held hostage in the bank – though even here there’s a lack of real claustrophobia and sense of entrapment to bring the various story strands to the boil. That’s more down to He’s lack of directing experience than the script itself, but for a first feature with no big star names it still manages to hold the attention.
The strongest performances come from singer-guitarist Huang Guanzhong 黄贯中 (the taiji master in The Way We Dance 狂舞派, 2013), as the weary-looking police detective investigating the bombing incidents, and Cantopop star Xie Anqi 谢安琪 (Lover’s Discourse 恋人絮语, 2010; Nightfall 大追捕, 2012) as the bank clerk romanced by him. The student terrorist played by Guan Chuyao 关楚耀 doesn’t carve much of a screen personality, and Malaysian Chinese actress-model Liao Ziyu 廖子妤 is just okay as a social drop-out from Guangzhou who becomes entwined in his world.
CREDITS
Presented by CL Group (Holdings) (HK), Film Development Fund (HK), Sundream Motion Pictures (HK), Film Plus Productions (HK). Produced by Film Plus Productions (HK).
Script: He Kang, Luo Peiqing, Chen Zhaozhong, Mai Xin’en, Guan Weipeng [Teddy Robin], Wang Riping. Script advice: Pan Yuanliang [Calvin Poon]. Photography: Zheng Zhaoqiang [Cheng Siu-keung]. Editing: Li Dongquan [Wenders Li]. Music: Guan Weipeng [Teddy Robin], Wei Qiliang [Tommy Wai]. Production design: Huang Minxuan. Costume design: Wu Min’er. Sound: Chen Wenzhao, Zhu Zhixia, Ye Junhao. Action: Yi Tianxiong. Special effects: Chi Ruitian. Visual effects: Zhao Weijun.
Cast: Huang Guanzhong (Jianhao, police detective), Xie Anqi (Lu Yunyi, bank employee), Guan Chuyao (Lang, student), Guan Weipeng [Teddy Robin] (Yu Zhongde, teacher), Liu Haolong (Victor Luo), Chen Meiqi (Rebecca, widow), Zhang Guoqiang (He Songli, councilman), Liao Ziyu (Xiaoyu/Fish), Xie Zhuoyan (Zhuo, Jianhao’s deputy), Jin Xingxian (police chief), Yuan Fuhua (Liang Shiguang, bank manager), Katy Lee (Cindy, Lang’s sister), Fu Xiaowei (Zhenzhen), Li Haiqing (Mini).
Premiere: Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival (Global Chinese Vision), 20 Nov 2013.
Release: Hong Kong, 28 Nov 2013.
(Review originally published on Film Business Asia, 28 Nov 2013.)