Drugs Area
Director: Cheung Bing-chan
Year: 1991
Rating: 4.5
This is a fairly lackluster
Hong Kong B action film that fills too much of its running time with piffle
and dull conversation that doesn't do much to push the film forward. It also
wanders around from character to character like a drunken mosquito landing
on different people. It also doesn't have that much action for a crime/action
film until it ends on a solid one where they clearly spent most of the budget.
The cast isn't bad though a bunch of them shuffle off out of the film fairly
soon and unexpectedly. This is another HK film that partly takes place in
Thailand and like many HK films paints the country with a broad tarnished
brush - prostitutes and a transvestite bar. Still I enjoy seeing Thailand
from years past.
It begins with two men
having a conversation about which is worse for your health - smoking or hookers.
Smoking wins. Peter (Lam Wai) comes from the Mainland to Hong Kong and his
uncle (Kenneth Tsang) puts him to work in his property management office.
The uncle has a number of businesses - some legal, some not so much.
Peter wants to get into the not so legal side of the business but his uncle
won't let him. So he takes care of that with a slaughter at a party and goes
to Thailand to stay with Ko - played by Eddie Ko. The cops are after
him led by Madam Wu (Sibelle Hu) who seems to spend a lot of her time shopping.
One of her cohorts asks if there are 7-11s in Thailand (tons of them) because
he needs to buy condoms. While searching for Peter, Madame Wu enters a bar
and is molested by three farangs (white men) who then proceed to get their
asses handed to them on a plate. Always happy to see that. More skullduggery
to come.
That Sibelle Hu became
a star of Girls with Guns films is a bit of an accident. She was at one point
considered to be a top Taiwanese actress in Weepie films but as those began
to lose their popularity in the 1980s she moved to Hong Kong and got into
action films. And though she had no training, she was a fast learner and
though doubled often, she looks good enough and was very popular. Most importantly
of course, is that she looks good holding a gun.