Cynical Cinema

When I started watching Exiled, the latest Chinese action film from director Johnnie To (who is very good), for the first time in a long time I found myself wishing desperately that I spoke Cantonese. I figured that if I spoke Cantonese, I would have some idea what the hell was going on. For the first forty-five minutes of the film, I was basically lost as to the plot. And what was most irritating was that even if I spoke Cantonese, I would still likely not have understood. There was so little dialogue, and so much sweeping camera work that the story is moved along almost exclusively in pictures. Which were impressive. The camera work here is terrific, and in some cases, breathtaking. But that does not tell the story. The movie opens with four guys following a fifth guy into his house, at which point they even up the odds and have a gun fight. When they see this fifth guy’s wife and baby, they stop their gunfight, repair the bullet holes in the house, and they all sit down to dinner. What? They go see another guy, then that guy sees another guy, who’s talking to the boss who keeps phoning one of the original four guys…it seems bonkers.

In fact, I learned more about the plot from reading the back of the box than I did from watching the film. I can only surmise that the blurb written on the back of the DVD case was written by the director himself, or at the very least someone who spoke Cantonese. Because I would be amazed if anyone sitting here in Canada or the U.S. could have figured it out. It turns out that two of the four guys were there to kill the fifth, and the other two were there to protect him. And in order to make sure that his wife and baby are provided for, the fifth man suggests that all five of them pull off one last big score before he is executed so his wife and baby will have something to live on. Again, I got this from the back of the case, and not from the movie itself.

My girlfriend gave up. After half an hour, she was totally lost, and even the occasional brief gun fight could no longer pique her interest. My commitment was a little greater. I figured that if Alliance Atlantis was giving me the DVD to review, the least I could do would be to sit through it. And am I ever glad I did! From the forty-five minute mark on, the movie makes sense. And by the end of it, the whole thing makes sense, and you have forgotten that painful first forty minutes or so. The main reason is the five main actors, who are all terrific. I’m not going to attempt to write their names down here any more than I plan to try to pronounce them on the air, but all five are wonderful. They are so convincing as buddies and equally convincing as enemies. Equal part good guy and bad guy, the killers and thieves with a certain ambiguous morality…I think I have written something a lot like this recently. Sound familiar?

Well, the Chinese certainly love their American westerns, and Exiled is no exception. The main characters are very reminiscent of Sam Peckinpah’s Wild Bunch, there is a scene where a gun keeps being shot away from a soldier that is taken directly from a scene between Clint Eastwood and Lee Van Cleef (with a hat, not a gun) in For a Few Dollars More. And the final scene is straight out of the Wild Bunch as well. Oops. For those of you who have SEEN The Wild Bunch, that may have given away the ending somewhat. Sorry. The main problem with Exiled is that the second half is far superior to the first, yet the second half would not work at all without the beginning. So you can’t just skip to 44:15 and start watching. I give the first half four out of ten, the second half eight out of ten, which overall gives the movie six out of ten. Makes sense, right? Exiled comes out on Tuesday, January 15th.