Introduction:
A conflict of interest between two high-kicking assassin sisters is complicated as they're pursued by the criminals who hired them and an equally high-kicking female cop.
The brothers Chow Nunn and Chow Lui's giant computer company is facing a tense crisis - a powerful computer virus is rapidly wiping out their computer network. At the last minute a cyber-friend arrives to join the battle. The mysterious 'Angel.com' battles the virus and saves the company. Invited by Chow Lui for a visit in person, Angel.com arrives in the form of the beautiful Lynn. But it turns out Lynn is a professional assassin with amazing high-tech and kung fu skills. She kills Chow Lui with cyanide hidden in a pair of sunglasses. She's aided by her sister Sue, who operates the pair's World Panorama surveillance system, which allows them to tap into any video security system in the world. Young cop Kong Yat Hong and her partner Mark are put on the case. Hong has a brilliant mind and immediately senses she's dealing with a killer with very special skills. Realizing they are facing a tough adversary, Lynn and Sue become fascinated with Hong as well. Lynn runs into Yan, the cousin
The brothers Chow Nunn and Chow Lui's giant computer company is facing a tense crisis - a powerful computer virus is rapidly wiping out their computer network. At the last minute a cyber-friend arrives to join the battle. The mysterious 'Angel.com' battles the virus and saves the company. Invited by Chow Lui for a visit in person, Angel.com arrives in the form of the beautiful Lynn. But it turns out Lynn is a professional assassin with amazing high-tech and kung fu skills. She kills Chow Lui with cyanide hidden in a pair of sunglasses. She's aided by her sister Sue, who operates the pair's World Panorama surveillance system, which allows them to tap into any video security system in the world. Young cop Kong Yat Hong and her partner Mark are put on the case. Hong has a brilliant mind and immediately senses she's dealing with a killer with very special skills. Realizing they are facing a tough adversary, Lynn and Sue become fascinated with Hong as well. Lynn runs into Yan, the cousin
Director: Corey Yuen
Writer: Jeffrey Lau
Stars: Qi Shu, Wei Zhao, Karen Mok
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I really enjoyed this movie. This time, it's not Chinese male who rule an action movie, but Chinese women. But above that I really enjoyed the relationship between the two sisters. How a movie is touching you depend of your life. I lost my parents I lost my daughter and may be this is why I was touched by this movie. I would like to have the version of close to you from this movie. I also liked the play with the camera. One of my favorite scene, is when Lynn (in the french version) jump out of the window (at the beginning) while her sister is asking her to not forget the cake.
ReplyDeleteSO CLOSE (2002) is a high-tech action adventure from Hong Kong that revives the girls-guns-and-kung fu genre that once attracted fans to HK cinema from all over the world. This one is an update by director Corey Yuen of exactly the kind of films he used to make back in the day like YES, MADAM! (1985), with Michelle Yeoh and Cynthia Rothrock, RIGHTING WRONGS (1986), with Rothrock, and SHE SHOOTS STRAIGHT (1990), with Joyce Godenzi and Carina Lau.
ReplyDeleteSO CLOSE is a little more pumped-up, with more beautiful female stars, more CGI and wire work, and a high tech veneer that permeates every aspect of the characters' lives. There are three main characters--all female and all played by top Hong Kong stars--Shu Qi (THE TRANSPORTER), Vicki Zhao Wei (SHAOLIN SOCCER), Karen Mok (BLACK MASK). The first two are absolutely stunning while Karen Mok opts for a no-nonsense, scrubbed-down, ready-for-action policewoman look--which is still damned attractive. The women get a lot to do here and are seen frequently in close-up. What more can fans of these actresses ask? Well, there is more. They also create strong, confident, vulnerable, emotionally-charged characters who interact a lot with each other. Shu Qi and Vicki play sisters, Lin and Sue, who hire out as a high-tech hit team to go after high-profile corporate criminal types. Karen plays the policewoman who takes it upon herself to go after the sisters, but also bonds with them and even offers a significant helping hand at one point.
That's pretty much all the plot you need to know, although there are plenty of subplots, including a burgeoning romance between Lin and a young man she once knew who's come back into her life. There are abundant flashbacks, achieved largely through digital video home movies, showing the two sisters as young girls playing with their parents, whose brutal murders (also seen in flashback) were engineered to steal the father's invention of World Panorama, a surveillance system with unlimited capacity. These murders propel the girls into their lives of crime--nd vengeance.
The high-tech aspects are particularly clever and imaginative. The sisters each carry a watch that can pretty much do everything (cell phone, surveillance camera, computer, detonator, etc.). At one point Sue is in a car chase through the streets of Hong Kong and dials Lin on her headset for help. Lin uses a surveillance satellite to track Sue and keep her away from the pursuing police cars, all while she herself is using two automatic pistols to ward off a raid on her house by a team of assassins. Later, during the final raid, the two opposing sides use different tricks to fool the other side with manipulated surveillance camera coverage.
Do the action scenes deliver? Yes, they do. Granted, the actresses are not fighters and have to rely on stunt doubles, quick cuts and wire work, but they pull it off (certainly better than the girls in the CHARLIE'S ANGELS films do). Is the action far-fetched? Yes, but it will have you smiling and cheering, not groaning. These girls are the good guys and you care about them and want them to triumph.
Kung fu fans will welcome the presence of Yasuaki Kurata as one of the villains. This Japanese star has been in Hong Kong films for over 30 years (including SHAOLIN CHALLENGES NINJA and FIST OF LEGEND) and he's still going strong.
The film is best appreciated in its Mandarin-language version, in which you get to hear Shu Qi and Vicki speaking in sync-sound in their own voices.
"So Close" is a terribly unremarkable and uncharismatic title for a movie that should have been called, simply, "Sexy Action Chicks!". There's a lot of cool action and style, mostly to do with wire-aided martial arts and the three immensely appealing leading ladies, who were obviously having fun doing this. So if you like Asian action and kick-ass heroines, this is a must-see.
ReplyDeleteThe premise with two girls being an action team, one a computer whiz and the other a field agent, is extremely similar to the comic book "Birds of Prey", which was also a short-lived (but abominably bad) TV series recently. Being martial arts assassins, the characters can also be compared with other comic book action chicks like Elektra or Lady Shiva, or, for that matter, Danger Girl. This movie seems very comics inspired.
Unfortunately, there is also some bad news: the story is pretty awful. In fact, you hardly notice it. The film-makers almost appear to have forgotten about it. Once again Asian producers do not realize the importance of having a proper plot. This is formulaic assassin/police/revenge clichés ad nauseam, with nothing even remotely original or surprising. One of the girls has a crush on the female police officer, and while that's sure-fire fodder for male fantasies, it's also gratuitously voyeuristic. Oh well, peace be with that - I admit I enjoyed it! Also, this was the first time I saw Karen Mok (outside of cameos), and she made a great impression. She's not drop-dead gorgeous, but she makes what she has go a long way! And she's a very sympathetic kind of person.
The CG effects were a little grating, esp. all the smashing glass. You'd think it would have been cheaper to just use real glass - but I guess they didn't wanna clean up afterward! Some of the other effects, like the elevators and many of the shots of the office building, were very well made.
I would have liked to rate this movie very highly, but at the end of the day it doesn't have much substance. It does however have beautiful women, some cool fight scenes, and great style. The entertainment value is definitely not bad, but I can't rate it higher than a 7 out of 10.
(Edit: Actually, yes I can! In hindsight I think it has enough intriguing elements, also story-wise, to warrant an 8 rating, and that is what I have now revised my rating to.)
Directed by Corey Yuen (The Legend) and starring Qi Shu (The Transporter) as the deadly assassin Lynn, a.k.a. Computer Angel; Vicki Zhao (Shaolin Soccer) as Lynn's spunky younger sister Sue; Karen Mok (Shaolin Soccer) as Hong Yat Hong, the ambitious cop set on catching the two; and the oh-so-dreamy Seung-heon Song as Yen, Lynn's doe-eyed love interest.
ReplyDeleteThe story starts off with a beautifully shot and choreographed action sequence where Lynn gets into a crime lord's uber-command center and kicks some major butt in a flurry of glass shards as "Close To You" by The Carpenters plays in the background.
At first I thought Lynn was our star, the dark assassin seeking love/redemption. Then it seemed as though Hong Yat Hong may have been our main character, the woman-cop who knows only that these two are hired killers whom she must catch. Then the story focuses on Sue and her inner-angst/possible sexuality issues. It feels like it may have been a flaw on the writer/director's side that there was no clear protagonist, which would have been better for a film like this, but it still worked well.
The movie had amazing action scenes, a great sister on sister bubble bath battle, and some really fun characters. The romantic scenes between Lynn and Yen are painfully entertaining and at times the film's score sounds like it comes off of a music library CD, but even at its worst So Close is unendingly endearing.
In the end it felt like a cross between Charlie's Angels (the movie) and those bad Chinese restaurant Karaoke videos. I definitely recommend this film to fans of cheesy action flicks or campy female leads.
I can't recall the last time I had this much fun watching an action film.
ReplyDeleteSometimes it's good for the soul to watch mindless, yet enormously entertaining, popcorn movies. That's exactly what Corey Yuen's "Chik yeung tin sai" is.
The plot's preposterous, but no more than most Hollywood blockbusters. It's just that "So Close" - the film's English title - provides tons more fun than any recent Hollywood actioner. And Yuen and screenwriter Jeff Lau still toss in a doozy of a plot twist that most American action filmmakers wouldn't have the chutzpah to do.
The plot: Two sisters, Lynn (a tremendously sexy Shu Qi) and Sue (Zhao Wei) turn assassins after their parents get gunned down by gangsters seeking the girls' father's invention - technology that can infiltrate every closed-circuit monitoring system in the world. Lynn, the brawn, and Sue, the brains, now use that technology to fight bad guys. Tracking them after their latest hit is female cop Hong Yat Hong (Karen Mok).
Although it's occasionally referred to as Hong Kong's "Charlie's Angels," comparing the two American films to Yuen's work is akin to likening a Pauly Shore movie to "Pulp Fiction." Charlie's Angels got nothing on the three women in "So Close." These heroines would mop the floor with Charlie's Angels.
The film's charm is that it doesn't delude itself by pretending to be something it isn't. Yuen set out to make an action film brimming with sensational stunts, exciting gunplay and cheeky humor and starring three attractive women. Lau's script espouses a feminist message, not only with the sisters' high-kicking independence, but also with Hong's struggle in a male-dominated police force. But feminism isn't the film's main goal. Dazzling us with awe-inspiring action is. And Yuen packs his film with plenty of it.
One particularly astounding display of gunplay features Lynn, clad in a tight white body suit, calmly eviscerating an army of bad guys in a shiny high-rise. The sequence features the most novel pair of stiletto heels and quite possibly the best and cheekiest use of Burt Bacharach's "Close to You" I've heard in a movie.
There's also a rousing fight between two handcuffed women within the claustrophobic confines of a parking garage. No wisecracks, no expressions of bravado. No dialogue whatsoever. Just the grace and beauty of a magnificently choreographed action sequence.
Yuen clearly is having fun. A three-person brawl with swords, guns, knives and bamboo seems like a tribute to himself – the scene's reminiscent of a fight featuring Michelle Yeoh and Cynthia Rothrock in Yuen's "Huang gu shi jie" (1985), aka "Yes, Madam" and "Police Assassins."
The music's often cheesy and dialogue doesn't exactly zing. But "So Close," nevertheless, enthralls because it's so unpretentious in its aim.
American action films would be so much better if their filmmakers were half as imaginative as their Hong Kong counterparts. Is it any surprise that Hollywood now actively courts Asian filmmakers and stunt coordinators? Of course, thanks to studio meddling, they've wound up making mediocre stuff here.
Yeah, Hollywood makes popcorn actioners, too. But they're rarely as thrilling or enjoyable as "So Close."