The acquisition of Hong Kong's Golden Princess Library of films by Shout Factory is arguably one of the greatest moments in recent history for fans of action cinema.
There have been some bumps along the way, but Shout licensing those rights out to other publishers has ironed out nearly all of them. Australia's Imprint Films is one of the labels releasing their own titles from the library, and their latest is one of the year's best.
Ben (Tony Leung), Frank (Jacky Cheung), and Paul (Waise Lee) are best friends in Hong Kong who've faced difficult childhoods together. When trouble finds them yet again as adults in the late 1960s, the three head off for Saigon and the promise of easy money amid the chaos of a rumbling conflict. It's not long before their plans fall apart in the face of war, violence, and treachery.
1990's Bullet in the Head is a story built on friendship, betrayal, and painful realizations. Its placement in John Woo's career sees it as an emotionally autobiographical tale, even as the story specifics are far removed from his own life. Still, even if you don't care to read into the film's shattered friendships as connected to Woo's own troubles with Tsui Hark -- a filmmaker who produced some of Woo's earlier movies before the two parted ways -- the broken relationships here land with definitive power.
The three leads, and a fourth man (Simon Yam) who joins their ragtag group, form a tight unit with hopes and dreams that threaten to cloud reality. While Ben stays true to his friends, Paul finds himself pulled more by money than loyalty, and tragedy isn't far behind. Woo and his cast milk scenes for drama, but it never feels overwrought and instead lands with genuine human affection and pain.
This being a Woo film, the action is never left to feel like an afterthought. The violence comes with both immediacy and explosive thrills as we move from gun fights to larger battle scenes, from intense beats of Russian roulette to heartbreaking pulls of the trigger. It's a film that thrills, entertains, and crushes in equal measure, and it's great to have the film looking better than it's ever looked before.
There are three separate 4K UHD releases of Bullet in the Head to choose from -- action fans are truly blessed these days -- with the original Shout Factory release, the Arrow UK release, and Australia's Imprint Asia line. Arrow did their own restoration work on Shout's remaster while Imprint uses it as is.
I can't speak to Arrow's changes, but Imprint's 4K looks terrific. There are a handful of imperfections in the source material that remain, but the bulk of the film gets a sharp remaster. It's not an overly colorful film, but the palette still feels more vivid while nighttime scenes find new clarity and depth.
Imprint's hard box release features a hardcover book with new essays and a steelbook containing three discs -- Woo's 131-minute final cut is on 4K UHD, while two Blu-rays feature tons of extras and the 136-minute festival cut of the film. There aren't any new supplements, but we do get the new interviews done for the Shout release alongside featurettes, additional interviews, deleted scenes, and a documentary.
From the highs of John Woo to the lows of another new entry in the Imprint Asia line... as 2002's Face to Face gets a Blu-ray release from the label.
Lam (Stephen Fung) is a wealthy young Chinese man who finds a strong friendship with a young Japanese artist named Kawamura (Shosuke Tanihara). They have the misfortune of falling in love with the same woman (Misaki Ito), but while Lam marries her, Kawamura and Rureko begin an affair. Lam dies in an accident, leaving the others free to remarry, but things take a turn when an older stranger arrives with an eye for Rureko as well. Well, less of a stranger and more of a reanimated Lam -- but there's trouble brewing either way.
Casey Chan's Face to Face is based on a story by the great Edogawa Rampo, but that's not enough to make it a winner. It's a slow burn, and while that's not automatically a negative, here it lends the film a lethargic pace and lack of energy. Beats that should thrill or surprise instead land with a dull thwap as there's really nothing surprising about them. Worse, Chan's direction fails to give them life.
The movie also looks fairly cheap -- again, nothing wrong with smaller budgets and indie films, but it's a cheap look with nothing else to hang itself on. Performances feel a bit overblown, almost stage-like at times, and while they're generally fine, they still fail to take hold of our interests or attentions. It's a revenge tale that generates neither the buildup nor the payoff we're hoping for.
Imprint's presentation is fine, or as fine as what looks to be a shot-on-video production with little attention to production design and lighting can be. The release features a single extra, but thankfully -- for fans of the film, anyway -- it's an informative and engaging commentary track by film historians Jasper Sharp and Tom Mes.