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| Images courtesy of 88 Films |
88 Films as a British boutique label just making its landing
in the United States through MVD Entertainment Group continues to unearth and
license through Fortune Star an ongoing number of Chinese (distinctly Hong Kong
based) action thrillers throughout the 1970s and 80s that remain overlooked if
not completely unknown outside of their country of origin. Their latest endeavor comes in the form of
Golden Harvest producer-director Johnny Mak’s grim, nihilistic true-crime
action saga on both sides of the fence The Long Arm of the Law.
Both films penned by Hard Boiled actor Philip Chan with
the first one choreographed and co-produced by Sammo Hung, The Long Arm of
the Law sparked a total of four movies though each story of gangsters vs.
police consisted of a new subset of characters and the third and fourth films
went to Michael Mak in the director’s chair.
For the first time outside of Hong Kong, MVD Entertainment Group and 88
Flms present the first two offerings overseen by Johnny and Michael Mak in newly
created 2K digital restorations featuring the original Hong Kong as well as the
revised export cuts in limited release.
While parts III and IV aren’t included, a future set of the remaining Michael
Mak offerings may happen in the near future so stay tuned.
The Long Arm of the Law (1984)
Reportedly based on a true crime account involving the Crown
Colony, the first of Johnny Mak and Philip Chan’s The Long Arm of the Law series
drops the viewer into an amoral collective of thieves on the run from the law
after crossing the border and committing violent crimes in broad daylight. Intending to rob a jewelry store, their
endeavor is complicated by a prior job involving pulling off a hit for a local
triad against a man who turns out to be a cop.
Now fugitives still tasked with carrying out an armed robbery, the ex-Mainland
Chinese soldiers turned rogue burglars gradually amasses into an all-out war
between themselves and the encroaching police force determined to snuff them
out of hiding.
Gritty, violent and at times discomforting including but not
limited to one of the thieves forcing oral sex on a prostitute at gunpoint in a
moment awkwardly played for laughs that threatens to derail the whole thing, The
Long Arm of the Law for good or for ill proves to be something of a
detached crime saga spoken of the same breath as Kinji Fukusaku or Takashi
Miike. Lumping all the good and the bad
together in an electrifying mixture of action violence, crime scene
investigating, Triad warfare and sexual abuse, and the fish-out-of-water
displacement of the characters from the Mainland enmeshed in the culture of
Hong Kong. A bit of a precursor to the
likes of Dead or Alive involving a ragtag group of miscreants just trying
to survive the brutality of their cards they’ve been dealt, aside from the one
aforementioned scene The Long Arm of the Law nevertheless develops into
a most intense and startlingly bleak white-knuckled actioner.
Featuring arresting if not grimy looking cinematography by
Johnny Koo who years later would lens Wong Kar-Wai’s As Tears Go By and
a relatively abrasive electronic score by Pom Pom composer Mahmood
Rumajahn, the look and feel of the world of The Long Arm of the Law is rough
and tough proto-John Woo filmmaking.
Performances across the board are generally good with Chiang Lung and
Chan Ging turning over intense performances largely driven by stunts and
physical acting. Take for instance a
scene where a man is shot and his body falls from the floor above down into an
ice rink where his body smashes and slides across the ice with the camera in
tow with the bloodied corpse decorating the rink with crimson red. From the preplanning of this stunt to the
choreography and blocking of the camera, it is one of many astounding stunt work
sequences littered through the messy unforgiving world of the film.
The Long Arm of the Law: Part II (1987)
While Johnny Mak remained a prolific producer in the Hong
Kong action as well as sexploitation scene, producing everything from The Iceman
Cometh to Sex and Zen, his work as a director fizzled out until 1993
with his last film the co-directed The Bare-Footed Kid. But while still an active producer, Mak turned
over the directorial duties to Michael Mak (though the 88 Films BD credits Part
II as also being directed by Johnny against online sources) and in so doing
perhaps injected something resembling a moral compass curiously completely
absent from the 1984 film which was a strong crime drama but devoid of
relatable characters. In the case of The
Long Arm of the Law: Part II, we’re presented with something of an unlikely
redemption arc.
In Hong Kong, three former police officers from Mainland
China under arrest for trying to escape are given a second chance by agreeing
to go undercover as police informers infiltrating triad societies in exchange
for permanent residency. Initially clean
shaven before being given wigs to hide their identities and blend in, the trio
of characters meet up with veteran informant and undercover cop King San (Ben
Lam) who takes them under his wing and serves as a sort of mentor guide to the
three. From here they take on small
tasks of infiltrating, raiding and overthrowing triads but not before a
vengeful triad picks up on King San’s trail with shocking results, sparking out
intense trading of bullets and gunfire in a fierce battle of the so-called ‘heroic
bloodshed’ subgenre ala Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch.
Tighter and faster than the previous film with a set of
characters we can sort of lean on rather than be constantly repulsed by, The
Long Arm of the Law: Part II takes on a similar structure to Takashi Miike’s
eventual Dead or Alive trilogy or even his Black Society Trilogy where
each picture gives the viewer a different angle and alliance with the
characters than the one before it.
Helping to characterize the series as a set of true crime dramas which
has a similar outcome but a different outlook on the events unfolding, The
Long Arm of the Law: Part II though considered the less-meaty of the two in
terms of characterization winds up being the far more compelling and engaging
picture of the two.
Presented by Raymond Chow on his Golden Harvest Production
label and shot again by Johnny Koo of the first film, The Long Arm of the Law:
Part II is decidedly slicker and more technically advanced despite having
heavy grains in nighttime scenes or dark interiors. Hard to say which of the two is more violent
or bleak in the ballet-of-bullets coda greeting each picture, there are areas in
here that are as startling and shocking as anything you’d see in a modern-day
crime drama. It goes without saying Ben
Lam gives a top-notch pitch perfect performance as the mentor leading the group
through triad alleyways and hidden complexes while veteran actor Elvis Tsui of Viva
Erotica and The Grandmaster turns over a dangerous and intimidating
but ultimately sympathetic and caring cop we come to know and identify with.
Closing out the set, MVD Entertainment Group and 88 Films
have housed both films in a hardbound box replete with a 40-page booklet of
essays on the films, reversible sleeve art, a double-sided poster, multiple
cuts of each film and plentiful retrospective interviews. Tough, brutal and uncompromising, The Long
Arm of the Law series simply put will not be for most people. Loaded with difficult characters, sometimes
awkward tonal shifts and a chum bucket full of violent gore, these are far from
nice and easy carefree action flicks.
When
someone gets shot, you absolutely believe in the reality of it despite being
dramatized and they seem to forecast the eventuality of what would or would not
become the John Woo action film or the Tsui Hark action film for that
matter. Bumpy and prone to giving you
cuts or bruises, The Long Arm of the Law films arrive with an iron
fisted brass knuckled punch. Not all
Hong Kong action fans will easily absorb these, but those who don’t mind some
small injuries will be proud to bear such Chinese true-crime action-thriller
scars.
--Andrew Kotwicki
