Hidden Heroes - HKNEO Reviews

HIDDEN HEROES (2004-HK)
review by Neo

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This site is full of one thing - TWINS TWINS and TWINS !
If someone just started to come to my site in August, I am sure one thing will pop in their mind, thinking that this is a TWINS site. Sure I am a Twins fan, but that doesn't mean I just review Twins movie, but with my last review being a Twins movie and a few before another one, this site is becoming totally geared towards - Twins. But this although billing Ah Sa as one of two title role, this is like Stephen Chow, a Ronald Cheng's Movie. After the mediocre fun - Dragon Loaded and the bizarre cross-dressing - Super Model, Ronald Cheng hits back with his best title role movie so far in Hidden Heroes. At once hearing that Ah Sa is starring with Ronald, I knew it would be a fun movie and sure it was a great fun ride. Marking away from the usual bizarre Vincent Kok, Ronald smartly teams up with Joe Ma and geez it is a big difference. Well, there are mo lei tau moment, this film doesn't go to the extreme which made Super Model into a repetitive and bizarre movie. Perhaps Ah Sa performs a much better restrained performance for the first time unlike her usual Twins Effect, My Wife is 18, and combine with Ronald slightly retrained style, made this a much more easy and fun mo lei tau ride. If you haven't seen Ronald yet, this is the one to start off with.

Okay, do you know what part of the review the reviewer hates writing about, well to me it is a summary of the movie. That's why I usually just copy and paste some official synopsis, cos when I do write it, like I did for Fist of Legend and some other reviews it will be like this: Well this movie goes like this, Ronald is cop meets a robot that look like Ah Sa (no sorry not a sex robot), and tells him that he only have till 15/8 to live. Then Ronald is framed for murder which is committed by a corrupter superior and meets a real Ah Sa. Then the predictable circumstances step in, and falls in love and blah, blah, blah. Yeah, I know I am pretty crap at writing summaries, cos I am good at it. Yeah, if I lost you already, it is not that the movie is confusing, may be it is just my style of writing, so bear with it.

To the acting department, Ah Sa is probably in her best mode, and produces a better performance here than Twins Effect 2 which was just a past resume combined, here although second to her best performance in Funeral March where is the only serious attempt by Ah Sa to date remains her only good performance. Here she performance a few roles and her best was the robot which is really funny and probably the cutest robot around. Then being a tough girl and also touching to emotions at times is also great to watch, definitely not as repetitive as say her overtly happy go lucky style in My Wife is 18. But Ah Sa is really a character that you either find her annoying or amazingly cute. After discussing so much about Ah Sa in my last review - Twins Effect 2, I will not repeat myself, due to dunno. Alright, those reading this is probably more interested in knowing how Ronald fare once again, as this is really a Ronald Cheng film rather than an TWINS movie. After being extreme in Super Model, Ronald produces his best performance and showing great presence as well, in a surprisingly more lay back attitude approach. Ronald is at times serious and switches to comedy mode with great ease and presence, watching an earlier TVB series, where Ronald is much subdued, in this movie his confidence is really showing. Perhaps of all his career this is the only performance that I actually liked, not too extreme and not too subdued. Supporting actor, Raymond Wong once again shows that he is a good supporting actor, but not a real lead. After the terrible leading performance in the good movie - Colour of Truth, Wong goes back to his roots - some people are born to be supporting actors - Donnie Yen, Anthony Wong, Francis Ng, but that league will be hard to reach but Wong is not entirely talent less either. Yuen Wah and Ronald's girlfriend also pop up here and there to provide some comedy and laughs.

Joe Ma's direction is not bad, but far from arty, and his ultimate decision to not finish the movie with an emotional scene, but rather a mo lei tau ending reveals as one of the biggest flaw of the movie. While that random Ah Sa saves the day emotional ending is far from good, the extra 2 minutes is unnecessary than trying to please the audience. By not being brave, Joe Ma, almost ruin the movie, but the overall feel of the movie is fun enough to make it without any doubt the best Ronald Cheng movie to date and combination of Ah Sa better than her usual self performance, surely fun can be have in this movie. So after all this bullshit, all it comes down to is an essential question, is this movie any good? Well, personally I reckon it is a pretty fun ride, but this is just another movie that virtually points to the viewers - do you like Ronald Cheng, if not, then don't even bother watching it. As for Ah Sa fans, it is kind of worth a look, in what I call the best Ronald Cheng movie so far.

I rate it 7.75/10

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