Director – John Woo – 1990 – Hong Kong – Cert. 15 – 126m
*****
Three teenage friends forced to leave Hong Kong by a gang war find themselves in the middle of the horrors of war-torn Vietnam – back out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 29th, and out on 4K UHD on Monday June 22nd
John Woo’s American canon never quite produced anything comparable to his earlier, groundbreaking Hong Kong actioners which, as well as being much more violent, possess a stronger emotional core – perhaps none more so than Bullet In The Head, a Far East Asian cross between Rebel Without A Cause (Nicholas Ray, 1955) and The Deer Hunter (Michael Cimino, 1978) with Salvador (Oliver Stone, 1986) thrown in for good measure.
Arguably Woo’s most personal HK outing, falling as it does outside the cop / triad actioners for which he’s best known, it was originally intended as a prequel to the two A Better Tomorrow films (1986, 1987) Woo made with producer Tsui Hark. However, following creative differences, Tsui retained megastar (and Woo onscreen alter-ego) Chow Yun Fat for A Better Tomorrow III Love and Death In Saigon (Tsui Hark, 1989) while Woo took the material and developed it on his own, acting uncharacteristically as his own producer.
1960s Hong Kong provides the backdrop for three teenagers Paul (Waise Lee), Frank (Jacky Cheung) and Ben (Tony Leung Chiu-wai) growing up inside a vicious juvenile gang culture, and while the images one remembers are by no means merely the darker ones – the three friends racing through streets on bicycles for instance – it’s the more depressing material which ultimately decides their fates with a violent reprisal on a local gang forcing them to get out of the colony and drive to Saigon to seek their fortune running guns for Luke (Simon Yam) in the Vietnam War.
Cut to Saigon where the trio’s car is destroyed and, in a scenario reminiscent of Salvador, they run smack into soldiers on Saigon’s streets and are swiftly herded along with numerous other unfortunates into a school yard (rapidly emptying of nun teachers and small children) to kneel at gunpoint as their captors search for a terrorist bomber and shoot likely suspects point blank. “We are Hong Kong people,” they plead desperately. This and what follows could be read as Woo’s reaction to the Tiannamen Square massacre.
Later, in a dramatic steal from The Deer Hunter (1978), the three are tied up as prisoners of war under a VietCong river shack and required to shoot their fellows for the guards’ amusement.
Their camaraderie subsequently disintegrates until Paul, obsessed with a trunk of gold to the point of abandoning his friends for it, shoots Frank in the head as the latter’s panicky screams threatens to reveal the pair to enemy troops. Frank ends up a junkie undertaking contract killings to pay for his next fix, the inside of his cranium irreparably damaged by the eponymous bullet still rattling around inside. Finally, Ben must confront Paul, now a rising triad member in Hong Kong, over Frank’s death in an unforgettable OTT car duel finale reminiscent of jousting knights (a sequence excised in the shorter but otherwise identical, domestic HK version).
If some of the characterisation is overstated while action scenes sometimes veer too far into overkill to maintain the piece’s gut feelings, admirers of Woo will nevertheless find much to relish. The set pieces in themselves are as impressive as anything in the director’s work, but ultimately what stands out is a brave, brutal and emotionally searing vision of a war-torn land. It’s a bleak descent into hell and beyond pulls no punches and screams out to be seen.
Bullet in the Head is back out in cinemas in the UK on Friday, May 29th, and out on 4K UHD on Monday June 22nd.
Trailer: