Title: The Bullet
Vanishes
Director: Lo
Chi-leung
Released: 2012
Starring: Nicholas
Tse, Sean Lau, Yang Mi, Boran Jing, Wu Gang, Liu Kai-chi, Jiang Yiyan
Plot: Song Donglu
(Lau) an eccentric detective and expert in criminology is teamed up
with Guo Zhui (Tse) who has a reputation for being “the fastest
gunman in Tiancheng”. The pair soon finding themselves trying to
solve a series of mysterious shootings at a bullet factory were no
bullets can be found.
Review: I’m not
sure what it is about Asian cinema but it’s not only proven to be a
surprising source of great Westerns such as The Good, The Bad and
The Weird and Miike
Takashi’s Sukiyaki Western Django
especially for someone like
myself who never cared for the Western genre. The other surprise has
being these Sherlock Holmes style mysteries which we saw so memorably
reworked in Detective Dee and the Phantom Flame and now here with this film
which takes place in a
sumptious vision of 1930’s China.
While our lead might not own a deer stalker hat or even smoke a pipe, there is an
unquestionable Holmes like air to Detective Donglu who is introduced
testing out one of his
theories by hanging himself so that he can compare his own injuries
to that of the victim. We also get to see him trying to understand
how Fu Yuan (Yiyan) a woman convicted of killing her husband pulled
off the murder as he demonstrates as keen a mind for criminology and
the criminal mind as he does for detection.
His
partner Guo Zhui on the other hand is on first appearances more of
the muscle of the pairing and while he certainly gets to demonstrate
some impressive shooting skills, he also comes with an indepth
knowledge of firearms and balistics which certainly come in handy in
this case especially in
figuring out how the owner of the bullet factory was able to win a
round of Russian roulette refered to here as “Fate of the Heavens”
and makes up one of several
mysteries that the film presents over the course of it’s runtime
including a locked room mystery. At
the same time director Lo
Chi-leung even brings his
gunslinger knowledge to the action scenes as memorable seen during a
shootout were he must work out the range of the badguy during a tense
stand off.
Of
course when it comes to these
kinds of mysteries there is the tendency to provide far fetched
explanations to solve the mysteries being presented and thankfully Lo
Chi-leung never resorts to such thing as every mystery has for the
most part a logical explanation. That being said if
the solution for the Phantom bullets actually would work or not if
unclear but certainly it atleast seems plausible. Still
it’s an intoxicating blend of mystery and action that we get here
and which works only the better due to the skills
set of the films
two detectives.
Heading
up the villain quota for the film is Liu Kai-chi as the factory owner
Boss Ding a truly odious cigar smoking villain who is more than happy
to send his thugs to impose his will on not only his workers but
anyone who opposes him and certainly Lo
Chi-leung wastes little time
in establishing just how ruthless he is as the film opens to him
forcing a female worker he has accused of stealing bullets to play
him in a game of Russian roulette or “Fate of the Heavens” as he
refers to it as and what will be seen as the catalysis for the
phantom bullet murders which start befalling his men. Even with such
an obvious lead villain the film still manages to work in numerous
other twists as it soon become clear that this is a mystery that goes
a lot deeper than Boss Ding’s questionable business practices.
Sadly
while we do get a lot of strong male characters, here the female cast
are rarely given as much to do, other than to pop in and out of the
story to provide a clue or uncover a piece of evidence to keep the
story running. That being said Yang Mi is great as the fortune teller
Little Lark. Sadly used to lesser effect is Yumiko Cheng as the
coroner who for some reason also keeps an Ostrich in her lab, the
reasons for frustratingly never being revealed.
A
gorgeous looking mystery if one which will no doubt draw comparisons
to Guy Richie’s take on Sherlock Holmes, despite the film
constantly proving that it’s able to stand on it’s own merits
even if it does choose to break up the pair just when I was looking
forward to hopefully getting a series of adventures with them which
is sadly dashed in what very much felt like was a tacked on epilogue
to the story as Lo Chi-leung
opts for one last twist
instead of ending the film at it’s logical end point. Despite this
what remains is a fun mystery complimented by action scenes which are
as often as inventive as the detection methods.
