The Last Tycoon (2013)

Best movie ever!

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Directed by one of the best directors of Hong Kong cinema industry, Wong Jing and starred by one of his favorite actors, the charismatic Chow Yun fat, who adds a new memorable performance to her legendary career,and wrapped by a cast full of stars such as Francis Ng and the legendary Sammo Hung and new rising stars as Xiaoming Huang, who amazing portraying the younger version of Chow Yun fat, literally becoming in him, and completing the cast with the talented and beautiful Quan Yuan, Li Yuan and Monica Mok. This film has overcame all my expectations becoming into one of my favorites from it's director, I love every photo gram from it and I dare to consider it a masterpiece.The film tells the story of the rise to the power of Cheng Daiqi in the crime world in the Sanghai from the 30's and his impossible love story with Zhiqiu, a young girl who dreams in become in a famous opera singer, something that is forbidden for her, it also tells the efforts of Daiqi to defend Sanghai from the Japanese invasion.The film pass through many different genres from melodrama, gangster cinema, action and romance, being divided in two parts.In the first part of the film Wong Jing, using flashbacks, tells the humble origins of the main character and the his love story, using masterly camera movements and travelings to take the audience in a travel through time, accompanied by a beautiful photography by Andrew Lau and a wonderful score that is a key factor in the most important moments of the story to excite the audience.scenes as the one in which a young Daiqi, played by Xaoming Hua, arrives to Sanghai and stares at the biggest building to the city trying to see the end of it where the camera ascends until the last floor in which an older Daiqi, played by Yun Fat, is contemplating the whole city and the later scene in which a traveling shows a young Daiqi sitting in front of his men just after become in the right hand of the crime boss in Sanghai, played by a great Sammo Hung, the then after the traveling become in the adult version of the character played by Chow Yun Fat, is a perfect and perfect visual exercise that unifies in a masterly way the past and the present of the story and the character.The first act of the story ends with the spectacular sequences of the invasion of Sanghai by the Japanese army that reach it's climax in a scene that is pure poetry.The second part of the film shows Daiqi defending Sanghai from the Japanese invasion leading us to an emotional and epic ending...One of the best moves made in Hong Kong in recent years, much better than the films that are coming out from Hollywood these days.

Cheng Daqi (played as a young man by Huang Xiaoming and as an older man by the legendary Chow Yun-Fat) is a village boy in 1913 China who loves Ye Zhiqiu (Feng Wenjuan), an aspiring opera performer. A blunder on Daqi's part lands him on death row, where he is taken under the wing of Mao Zai (Francis Ng), who subsequently brings him to Shanghai, where Daqi signs up with Hong Shouting (Sammo Hung), the town's leading gangster. Fast forward 24 years and it's 1937, and Daqi is himself a renowned gangster, blood brother of Hong; he is married to the lovely Bao (Monika Mok), but when Zhiqiu comes to town with her husband, the old sparks begin to fly again. But this is 1937, and the Japanese Imperial Army has designs on Shanghai, and all of China.... Well. The above synopsis only covers a part of the very complicated story of "The Last Tycoon," and I wasn't always certain about who was who and what was going on; that said, it's a wild and action-packed ride – knife fights (with umbrellas), gun fights, fighter jets dropping bombs, things blowing up real good, all pushed up to 11. Getting to see Chow Yun-Fat get back to his filmic roots, all guns blazing and tenderness toward the women in his life, is a real treat, and of course, the anti-heroic, good bad guy is a wonderful role for him. I'm not sure that I understood everything that went on, but I enjoyed it to bits!

The idea of the GOD OF GAMBLERS team of star Chow yun-fat and director Wong Jing back in business, with a decent budget and a promising subject is richly appealing. Throw in the great Sammo Hung and I'm there clutching my sixteen dollars.It takes a while to realise that what we are getting is just a shadow of the Hong Kong films pre-take over. The murky colour scheme and lack of shadow detail of main land processing is the first clue.There's elaborate staging and lots of action, some of it quite vigorous and it's always nice to see Chow's character blowing away the support cast - including a shoot 'em up Catholic priest. However the plot winds down into feeble scissors and paste of better films - CASABLANCA, THE GREAT MAGICIAN, BONNIE & CLYDE - where you can see the derivations well before they arrive - like the protracted build-up with the opera spear tossing in the climax.Sammo is wasted even with the presence he brings to his Triad boss role.

<<< Spoilers ahead, please don't read if you intend to watch the movie without any prior knowledge of the plot>>>I had the good fortune to watch this in Australia in an actual cinema, a treat for a country that rarely screens Asian movies. It was a particularly worthwhile experience as the movie was thoroughly enjoyable.The screenplay is well written, using a classic hero's journey plot contained within a "rags to riches" story of our protagonist, Cheng Daiqi (Chow Yun Fat). Viewers of western films may recognise some similarities to seminal gangster movies like Scarface and Godfather. Interspersed through this main plot line, the film's writers (Jing Wong, Manfred & Philip Lui) skillfully weave related Shakespearean subplots of power, romance, lust, betrayal, family, loyalty and patriotism. The plot travels at a comfortable pace and is made more interesting by a clever story telling method that jumps the audience through non-linear time periods during the first part of the movie to paint a beautiful back story for the film's finale.The casting director should be recognised on his/her own accord for assembling a cast that could deliver on the story. It is a little unfair to single out any specific actors given the aggregate stellar performance, but if pushed, Chow Yun Fat (Cheng Daiqi) and Huang Xiaoming (young Cheng Daiqi) are near faultless in their respective performances. Chow Yun Fat once again demonstrates his acting prowess, moving into that rare stratosphere of actors whom directors can point a camera at, and with just a close-up facial shot and no spoken lines, let the actor's eyes emotionally engage the audience. Perhaps as an indirect homage to Chow Yun Fat's good looks in his younger days, a rather handsome actor plays young Cheng Daiqi. Huang Xiaoming is great in this role, especially in the latter parts of Daiqi's rise in status, exuding a quiet confidence and poise that explain Daiqi's actions in the later parts of the movie. No commentary on the actors in the movie can be concluded without a mention of the women cast in this film, i.e. Daiqi's and Shouting's wives and lovers. Their beauty almost jumps off the screen, and is present in both their young and older guises. The respective wives of the two gangster brothers played their loyal roles beautifully to reveal a touch of vulnerability and humanity in their underworld husbands, hinting at the juxtaposition of power in these families.The film was shot beautifully and is accompanied by beautiful songs in its soundtrack. No small amount of attention went into the costumes as the cast were dressed in fantastic period pieces to match the movie's early 20th century setting. Although not quite matching the grandeur and realism of war scenes shot in Saving Private Ryan and Black Hawk Down, great care was evident in simulating the chaos of Shanghai's aerial bombing.This film is well worth watching and is a showcase for Jing Wong's movie directing and Chow Yun Fat's abilities as a thespian. It serves as further evidence of Asian cinema to deliver on movies that arouse our intellectual and visual senses.