Rating: B+
Dir: Pang Ho-cheung
Star: Josie Ho, Eason Chan, Norman Chui, Phat Chan
Ah, this is a glorious throwback to the days when “Cat III” was a badge of honor in Hong Kong cinema. I was quite surprised this came out over a decade after the colony was handed back to China. Despite presenting capitalism as evil, it’s exactly the sort of decadent and immoral material, produced by running dogs and their bourgeois film industry lackies, that would make Chairman Mao’s head explode. Replace Ho with Anthony Wong, and it’s content Rick Baker used to flog on dodgy VHS, upstairs at the Scala Cinema, and which I may or may not have bought. I mean, killing off a pregnant woman, by suffocating her with the help of a vacuum cleaner (top)?
It’s also horror as social commentary done right, with the message never getting in the way. Taking place not long before the 2008 financial crisis, it may be more timely these days, with an entire generation now unable to afford a house of their own. That’s the problem which is affecting Cheng Lai Sheung (Ho), despite working two jobs. A lot of this unfolds in flashback, intercut with scenes showing her going through an apartment complex, killing the residents in spectacularly brutal (if sometimes implausible biologically) ways. We simultaneously learn what drove her to that point, beginning as a child when her family lost their hone to benefit property sspeculations. It’s the first time, and not the last, where home ownership became an issue for Cheng.
I could only admire the surprisingly mean-spirited nature of this, from beginning to end. CCP regime or not, don’t expect the guilty – by which I mean Cheng – to receive her just deserts. Indeed, if there is a moral here, it’s that it is okay to carry out mass murder as part of property negotiations. The victims are mostly cyphers, about which we know little. The exceptions are three highly obnoxious young men, and their two “dates”. One of who is naked and unconscious – not that this prevents the opportunity for a crass selfie, naturally. When the men’s predations are interrupted by Cheng’s arrival… Yeah, they deserve it. But she is strictly equal opportunity, delivering a death by bed-slat to one woman, that needs to be seen to be disbelieved.
The structure does take a little bit to get used to, though I can understand why Pang took the approach. It allows what would otherwise be an insanely bloody final act to become more balanced, between the dramatic and exploitative elements. On the other hand, we’re not really brought along on Cheng’s journey, since we know from the opening, she will end up going full Anthony Wong. Except, she’s this little telemarketer, so it’s not as if she can overpower most of her victims with raw strength. By the end, she seems almost calmer and more confident, despite – or because of? – all the carnage she has committed. Chalk up another way in which this is impeccably, unrepentantly and laudably twisted.